As remembered by Dorothy Jones

            Sally Bell’s Kitchen, which until 1959 had the name Sarah Lee Kitchen, begins its 81st year in October (2005).  I get a thrill when I think about it.  That is because I am eleven, almost twelve, years older than Sally Bell’s and I can personally remember almost all of its long story.  It is also because my father’s youngest sister was one of the “two distinguished Virginia ladies” who, on October 1, 1924, signed a partnership agreement that brought the business into being.

            Sarah (“Sallie”) Cabell Jones of Ashland and Elizabeth Lee Milton of Gloucester met at the Woman’s Exchange of Richmond (note: the Woman’s Exchange of Richmond was a remarkable institution- perhaps we could tell its story later on this web site.  Would you be interested?)  Mrs. Milton told a news reporter “I knew as soon as I met Miss Jones that we would make good partners.  She could add and subtract and I could make a good cake.”  The two ladies named their business “Sarah Lee Kitchen”, borrowing from their respective names.  Their purpose, still the purpose today, was to produce a variety of good things to eat made each day from scratch.  The main focus was on having a wholesale business with a retail business less emphasized.  I remember the frantic search for old family recipes.  I remember my mother supplied a recipe for Sally Lunn bread.  I remember the careful search for good cooks, who from childhood were exposed to and experienced in the art of making good things to eat.  I remember the day Mrs. Milton and my aunt rented the “step down” ground floor of an old residence on the southwest corner of Grace and Pine Streets (701 West Grace).  I remember how they had ovens, sinks, worktables, and chairs installed in the spacious area of the “back” and how my aunt established herself there.  I remember the small catty-cornered room at the “front” in which Mrs. Milton presided over the retail sales and took wholesale orders from local bakeries, restaurants, neighborhood grocery stores, and drugstores.

            Five years after they had opened Sarah Lee Kitchen, Mrs. Milton sold her interest to Cabell and moved to Stanton Island, New York.  I remember how in-laws and family members strained to help Cabell get together the money she needed to pay Mrs. Milton.  I remember the family councils that were held to deal with the fact that Sarah Lee Kitchen was not doing well financially.  Lots of advice was forthcoming.  Cabell’s siblings thought of her as the sheltered youngest child of their parent’s six children… a shy small-town girl unfamiliar with the ways of the world… a pretty young lady who might sing a solo in the church… do delicate handwork, but never any work in the kitchen.  Little did they realize that Cabell, now the 38-year-old sole proprietor of a business, was a keen and determined businesswoman, able and willing to make her own decisions.  Her first decision was to discontinue the wholesale trade and concentrate on retail.  Next, she arranged for Elizabeth Pendleton Cox (Mrs. James Marcellus Cox), an Ashland artist, to create a logo for Sarah Lee Kitchen.  It was an attractive, delicate figure of a standing colonial lady daintily holding aloft a tiny basket.  Cabell then had this logo and the Sarah Lee Kitchen name copyrighted at the United States Patent office.

            The variety of good things to eat made from scratch each day was no less than amazing.  Cabell was more than generous in bringing home to Ashland the delicious breads and treats.

To be continued…

You can purchase the entire history of Sally Bell’s (pictured below) complete with photographs of all the “good things to eat” at the kitchen for $10.