1985 Yukon Nuggets

Carnation Evaporated Milk

You gotta hand it to the Klondike Gold Rush. It was much more than a rush to find the precious metal in the obscure hills around Rabbit Creek in the unknown Yukon. It helped propel Seattle into a world-class city. It had a huge impact on the early motion picture industry in Hollywood. And it saved a milk company from bankruptcy.

Today, Nestlé Foods own that milk company and is worth billions. Back in 1899, however, it was a fledgling business that had trouble selling its product.

The product was evaporated milk. A Seattle grocer named E.A. Stuart had a dream of making wholesome, good-tasting milk as available to consumers as sugar and salt. So in 1899, he co-founded the Pacific Coast Condensed Milk Company and spent $25,000 to buy the rights to a new process for producing canned evaporated milk.

At first, poorly sealed cans were spoiled, by the wagon load, after leaving Stuart's farm near Seattle. Even worse, local customers weren't convinced they needed his product because fresh milk flowed freely.

Nevertheless, Stuart perfected his milk evaporation process and improved canning procedures. The process was extraordinary because it took about 60% of the water content out of dairy milk, thus making it easy to transport and store without refrigeration. But buyers remained wary.

Then luck struck in the form of the Klondike Gold Rush. Demand for evaporated milk skyrocketed as Yukon-bound gold-seekers poured through Seattle. Prospectors bought evaporated milk as fast as Stuart could make it. Soon, the sale of cans of evaporated milk had grown from nothing to more than four million dollars a year.

As sales soared, Stuart searched for the perfect name for his product and stumbled across the answer while walking in downtown Seattle. As he passed a tobacconist's window with cigars on display, he saw a sign proclaiming their name — CARNATION.

Stuart thought it was a curious name for a cigar, but perfect for his new milk product. He also believed that quality milk came only from contented cows and eventually established his own breeding farm known as Carnation Farms.

 

In 1907, Stuart introduced the promotional phrase, "Carnation condensed milk, the milk from contented cows." Carnation used the slogan for decades on a radio variety program called "The Contented Hour," with entertainers like Dinah Shore and Burns and Allen.

 

In 1985, the descendants of E.A. Stuart hit pay dirt when the international food giant Nestlé bought Carnation for about $3 billion in cash. Today, Carnation Farms is just forty-five minutes outside Seattle and is still home to contented cows and the riches the Klondike Gold Rush brought.

 

A CKRW Yukon Nugget by Les McLaughlin.