Prince Albert Historical Society
I recently came across an article detailing the renovation in the summer of 1951 of Mills Brothers, a confectionery on Central Avenue. This brought back memories of similar shops which existed on Central when I was a youth. There were three of them, Central Fruit and Candy Kitchen (later Frank’s), Amos Cigar Store (later also Frank’s), and Mills Brothers.
The earliest of the three was Central Fruit and Candy Kitchen, which in the early days was simply Central Fruit Store. This was the longest lasting of the three shops. In 1913, the shop was owned and operated by Roy Taylor. He had two shops in the 1300 block of Central Avenue, near each other on the east side of the Avenue. One was a bakery, and the second, at 1312 Central, was a confectionery. Sometime between 1914 and 1919, Taylor sold out to Harold Corbin and James McConnell. Corbin had been a baggage man for the Canadian Northern Railway, and McConnell had been a clerk at the Union Trading Company. They were the individuals who named the store Central Fruit. Together they operated the store until1927, when Corbin moved away and left McConnell with sole proprietorship, a proprietorship he maintained until 1964.
In 1934, McConnell had two clerks, the brothers John and Robert Wyllie. Sons of Robert Wyllie, the Deputy Warden of Saskatchewan Penitentiary, the latter was known as Bert. Within a year, John went on to other employment, but Bert remained employed at the store, eventually managing it for McConnell until 1964 when, after owning the business for more than forty-five years and at the age of eighty, McConnell sold the business to Frank Hickey. Bert continued employment as the assistant manager until 1965.
Although it retained the name Central Fruit and Candy Kitchen until 1965, when it became known as Frank’s, I am not sure how long the store’s main product was fruit. As a youngster I do not recall much in the way of fruit in the store. It was mainly candy and magazines when I would stop in there on Saturday mornings.
Harry J. Amos opened Amos Cigar Store in the mid-1930s, just north of 12th Street West (beside Harradence Hardware). As the name suggests, his main product line was tobacco, although my earliest recollection was of confectioneries, newspapers, and magazines. There was a barber shop in the back end of the store, originally owned by Frank S. McKim. Frank Dixon was the second barber in the shop. They had previously cut hair at 1105a Central Avenue, in another confectionery, Gus’s Candy Land, owned by Gus Christakos.
Harry Amos operated his shop until the early 1960s. Frank McKim retired in 1954 and although the barber shop remained known as McKim’s Barber Shop, Frank Dixon had become the owner. When Amos sold to Frank Hickey, Hickey renamed the shop Frank’s Cigar Store. Both Harradence Hardware and the building in which Frank’s Cigar Store were located later became Yaeger’s Furs. The old Royal Bank building (originally the Union Bank) was demolished and the new Royal Bank building was constructed. That building is now the Hope Health Centre.
Frank’s Cigar Store is pictured in 1975.
Frank Hickey purchased the Central Fruit and Candy Kitchen from James McConnell and renamed the building at 1312 Central Avenue, Frank’s. Peter Dyck established his barber shop, The Clip Shop, in the back end of Frank’s.
Of note is the fact that these two confectioneries were managed by men who sat on City Council. Harry Amos was an alderman from 1946 until 1952, while Bert Wylie (who managed McConnell’ s shop) was an alderman from 1951 until 1967, with the exception of 1959. He had chosen to run for mayor in the autumn of 1958, but lost to Alan Barsky. In the election held in the autumn of 1959, when Wylie once again ran for an aldermanic seat, he was elected, leading the polls. (At the time, elections were held annually, with the mayor and half of the aldermen (4) being elected for a two-year term, and the following year the other four aldermanic seats being elected for a two-year term.)
The fact that businessmen from Central Avenue were elected to City Council for so many years in a row would suggest that their businesses were considered to be highly successful, but also that they heard and listened to the concerns of their customers.
In 1954, when Harry Amos’s business came up for sale, Frank Hickey purchased it and changed the name to Frank’s Cigar Store. This occurred at the same time that Frank McKim chose to retire, and Frank Dixon bought out McKim. The barber shop remained in the back end of Frank’s Cigar Store, under Dixon’s ownership. By 1965, when McConnell had decided to retire, Frank Hickey bought Central Fruit and Candy Kitchen, leaving his shop at 1129 Central Avenue vacant. Dixon chose that time to retire.
Hickey maintained Bert Wyllie as his assistant manager for a year, and brought Peter Dyck into his shop as a barber in the back end.
By 1968, Hickey had sold the business to Gerry Goota, still with The Clip Shop in the back. Goota ran it until 1972, by which time Nestor Hryciuk had taken over the shop. Both Goota and Hryciuk maintained the name Frank’s, and Peter Dyck remained as a tenant. Dyck did, however, change the name of his barber shop to Hair Design
Centre by 1973. It was in that same year, 1973, that Hryciuk bought Mills Brothers, a wise move because by 1975 the building at 1312 Central Avenue had to be vacated in advance of the construction of the Orpheum Plaza.
From 1976 on, the only remaining confectionery on Central Avenue was Mills Brothers. The Hair Design Centre opened in the Orpheum Plaza, where it remained until moving across the avenue into the Eaton’s building once Eaton’s had moved into the Gateway Mall.
Back then to where we started, with Mills Brothers.
In 1945, 924 Central Avenue was a coffee shop with the appropriate name of The Coffee Shop. It was managed by Ida Schofield. But by 1947, 924 Central was Mills Brothers, owned and operated by John (Jack) and William Mills. Jack had previously been a clerk at Central Fruit and Candy Kitchen. They initially ran their business as a coffee shop, gradually expanding into newspapers, magazines, and confectioneries. Like the other two confectioneries, the Mills brothers had a tenant – in this case, Canadian National Telegraphs.
By 1951, the business required renovation and, by the middle of September they were ready to open. Bill and Jack had gained a reputation as “wise-cracking pranksters”, who enjoyed playing tricks on their customers while at the same time talking the latest sports stories. In addition to their enlarged coffee bar (they were now able to seat twenty-three patrons), they had additional racks for magazines, newspapers, as well as other reading material, as well as more room for candy and novelties designed strictly for laughs. Some of the gags give electric shocks to the palm of the hand, posies that will shoot water into your eye when you lean in to smell them, and other similar items.
Mills Brothers did such a good business that eventually CN Telegraphs moved out (1960) and when the City Market closed in 1977, they moved from 924 to 914 Central Avenue. Nestor Hryciuk bought the business in 1973 (it had been owned by Bob Mills and Jack Mills since 1971), owning it until 1994 when he sold to a company of which Wayne Ulmer was the president. That company later sold to a company of which Tom Heighton was president. His company owned the business from 2000 until its closure in late 2002 or early 2003.
The three Central Avenue confectioneries had a good life span, but today’s commercial environment does not seem able to sustain downtown businesses of that nature.
fgpayton@sasktel.net
