San Francisco County
SWAIN BROS.
Swain Bros., proprietors of Swain’s bakery, 213 Sutter street, San Francisco, are enterprising business men and have an establishment second to none of its kind in the city. This pioneer bakery was started in 1855 by Mr. R. R. Swain, father of the present proprietors, and has always maintained a leading place among the confectioners here.
R. R. Swain was born in New York city and is of Danish descent. His ancestors immigrated to this country in 1664, settled on the island of Nantucket and subsequently removed to New York. He had the misfortune to lose his father when quite young, and at the age of fourteen he was apprenticed to learn the trade of baker, receiving a salary of $30 per year. After completing his apprenticeship, he established a small bakery in New York and continued it until 1852. That year he sold out, made the voyage to California, via Panama and landed safely in San Francisco. He at once started for the mines on Yuba and Feather rivers, soon, however, becoming tired of the hardships of mining. He then resumed his old business and established a provision store and miners’ hotel at the camp, which he continued until 1855. Returning to San Francisco, he opened the original Swain’s Bakery, and from the first met with marked success. His location was changed from time to time with the development of the city until 1875, when he settled at 213 Sutter street, and, in connection with his bakery, opened an oyster saloon, which subsequently developed into a fully equipped restaurant, now the leading one in the city.
After a long and successful career, Mr. Swain retired on March 1, 1887, and the business passed into the hands of his sons, Edward R. and Frank A. The bakery and restaurant occupy a frontage of twenty feet, a depth of 130 feet and a width of forty feet in the rear. It is conveniently arranged and divided into separate departments, the restaurant having a seating capacity for 105 persons. The baking is all done in the basement, about forty hands are employed in the several departments, and all meals are served a la mode. The firm does an extensive business in bread and pastries, four wagons being employed to serve customers. This popular establishment is fully equipped with all the latest improvements, even having their own dynamo and accumulators for electric-lighting purposes.
The Swain Bros. are courteous and obliging gentlemen, and through their earnest efforts to please their patrons they are achieving signal success.
Transcribed
by David Rugeroni.
Source: "The
Bay of San Francisco," Vol. 2, Page 215, Lewis
Publishing Co, 1892.
©
2005 David Rugeroni.