Waxing a little nostalgic today, I was thinking about the holidays and how small, spread out and detached the Hall and Hopping side of our family has become over the years and remembered this older post I had made about my Grandfather. T have a few fun facts here about him but thought the recipes for candy we found a couple years back were interesting as candy is such a popular holiday cook for many.
Pictured here is my grandfather Lewis Hopping a.k.a. "HOP" to one and all circa about 1950 outside his restaurant in Yorktown, Indiana. He passed about 44 years ago at the age of 83. He had a colorful career during his lifetime, Restaurateur, (Hops in Yorktown and he managed the 5 Star in Muncie for years), he was a Bootlegger (hey, he had to make money during the depression and even served some time for his venture) and pre-depression he was a Confectioner (candy-maker) in Muncie, Indiana.
One of the few stories I remember was that new employees at the confectioners (still researching the location and name of the place he worked) were allowed to eat all they wanted to fend off theft or them not paying for what they ate. The average new employee lasted 2 days until they were so sick of candy it wasn't a problem any longer.
He also worked for Robert Terhune Sr. (deceased) in the Muncie area in many capacities over the years including being at one time the OLDEST McDonald's employee at the age of 81 working three days a week making 'shakes' (McDonald's actually originally made shakes the old fashion way) and I'm still looking for that newspaper article to post.
Back to the candy...recently I came across three pages of onion skin paper typed recipe lists I thought you might enjoy. They aren't really Christmas candy and the quantities are HUGE as you might imagine for a candy store. Some of these ingredients I can't even identify today on Google but those I have shown these to have always had fun trying to figure out some batching proportions.
Happy Holidays to all as we remember those we love and maybe there is a recipe on this list you can break down for the holidays...
I did add a new and final section to my pending cookbook for family recipes and putting these in there just for giggles. Now to figure out how to actually get this 320 page monster to eBook status begins...Keep On Eggin' and Enjoy!
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Great post, sounds like Hop was a cool character.
ReplyDeleteIts one of those things that you look back and you wish he was around to meet your wife, your kids, see you be successful. But he passed when I was 13 so I take what few memories I have and try to keep them alive.
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