DUANE
Duane's take
Here's my telling of what the official marker has to say about the Orange Dairy Company — and friend, this one's got more layers than a good brisket. Back in 1941, a man named Clyde Spears planted his flag right here and established the Orange Dairy Company. Every single day, this place pasteurized and bottled eight hundred gallons of milk.
Eight hundred gallons. Day after day. And to keep those bottles coming, the Orange Dairy Company pulled raw milk from at least sixteen local dairies scattered across the area — families like the Pevetos, and the Eddlemans, whose operation went by the name Moonglow Dairy.
Now the marker says the Moonglow supposedly milked its cows by the light of the moon. I'm not here to confirm or deny that. I'm just saying somebody thought it was worth puttin' on the sign.
The building Clyde built is still standing — two stories, red brick, and if you look up, you can still see the ceiling hooks that once held a cooling system. The ceramic tiles on the walls and floor, put there originally for sanitary purposes, are still right where they were installed. This place was serious about its milk.
And for a moment there, Orange was a genuine dairy town. The Chamber of Commerce was so proud in 1940 that they boasted their dairies had produced one and a half million gallons of milk. One and a half million.
That is a lot of moonlight and a lot of cows. But here's where the story turns. The postwar economy didn't play favorites.
All of a sudden, the necessity of pasteurization was raising costs. Then came something called the Rotolactor — a new milking technology — raising costs further still. And at the same time, better refrigeration and lowered transportation costs meant Orange wasn't just competing with the dairy down the road anymore.
They were going head to head with dairies as far away as Wisconsin. Wisconsin. From Orange, Texas.
Now, the city of Orange tried to hold the line. In 1945, they passed an ordinance requiring that all milk sold in Orange had to be pasteurized right there in Orange. A home-field rule, you might say.
But even that couldn't stop what was coming. By 1953, most of the local dairy production had to be dumped — because it cost twice as much as out-of-state milk. Twice as much.
All across Texas, the numbers told the same grim story: the dairy cow population had been slowly growing through the first half of the twentieth century, and then between 1945 and 1971, it plummeted eighty percent. Eighty percent. And as for Clyde Spears's Orange Dairy Company — in 1948, a nationwide dairy company with Texas roots by the name of Borden bought it out and closed it down.
The tiles are still on the walls. The hooks are still in the ceiling. One and a half million gallons of pride, and in the end, it was Wisconsin that won.
Some stories don't end with a sunset. Some end with a refrigerated truck rolling in from up north.
What the marker says
Clyde Spears established the Orange Dairy Company at this site in 1941, where he pasteurized and bottled 800 gallons of milk every day. The Orange Dairy Company collected raw milk from at least 16 local dairies, including the Peveto family and the Eddleman family's Moonglow Dairy, which supposedly milked its cows by the light of the moon. The two-story red brick building retains many features of the original dairy processing plant, including the ceiling hooks which held a cooling system. Ceramic tiles, which were originally installed at the dairy for sanitary purposes, still cover the walls and floor. But in the postwar economy, Orange's thriving dairy industry could no longer operate on a small scale. The necessity of pasteurization, as well as the invention of new milking technologies like the Rotolactor, significantly raised operating costs. At the same time, better refrigeration and lowered transportation costs brought Orange into competition with dairies as far away as Wisconsin. Even a 1945 city ordinance requiring all milk sold in Orange to be pasteurized in Orange could not save the local dairies. The number of dairy cows in Texas, which had been slowly growing through the first half of the 20th century, plummeted 80 percent between 1945 and 1971. The Orange Chamber of Commerce boasted in 1940 that its dairies had produced one and a half million gallons of milk, but by 1953 most of this production had to be dumped because it cost twice as much as out-of-state milk. Borden, a nationwide dairy company with Texas roots, bought out and closed the Orange Dairy Company in 1948.