Dominion Atlantic Railway Digital Preservation Initiative - Wiki
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M. W. Graves
The M. W. Graves fruit and vegetable processing plant in Berwick was a large customer of the DAR and an important market for several generations of valley farmers. The plant started out as a large cider distillery built in the 1920s by a New Jersey businessman. He abandoned the plant after several years as temperance campaigners in local churches scuttled his chances of getting a liquor license. The buildings were purchased in 1938 by Minard W. Graves, who ran the Annapolis Valley Cider a successful cider and vinegar plant in Bridgetown. Graves timing was good as World War II produced a demand for processed and canned fruit and vegatable rations. The Graves plant in Berwick expanded in peacetime to juicemaking and other types of canned foods. During the war Graves further expanded by building a dried potato factory in Kentville, the Canada Foods Plant. The Graves family sold the Berwick plant to the Stokely Van Camp operation in the 1960s but the plant continued under the Graves name through several different owners until the Quebec parent company Carrière Foods closed the plant in 2004.[1] The former plant is now used for storage and a variety of small businesses.
Gallery
M. W. Graves Plant, Berwick. c. 1940.
M. W. Graves former plant, Berwick, 2016.
References and Footnotes
- Valley Gold by Ann Hutton
