From the editor
by Rosemary Fifield

Celebrating Co-ops

This year, our co-op celebrates its 65th anniversary.

On January 6, 1936, seventeen families signed on as charter members of a cooperative buying group to be called "The Hanover Consumers Club." They began by ordering bushel baskets of oranges and grapefruits directly from Florida, storing the citrus in one member’s garage where all would come to pick up their orders. Over time, they added local butter and milk, canned fruits and vegetables, dried fruit, potatoes, and maple syrup, and moved the distribution point to a different member’s basement.

This shop in Rochdale, England, is the home of the first successful cooperative business, started by the Rochdale Society of Equitable Pioneers in 1844. The building now houses a museum about the history of the cooperative movement in Britain.

By November 1936, the members voted to incorporate as the Hanover Consumer Cooperative Society, and in December they agreed to rent the basement of a barbershop on Hanover’s Main Street to house a small store. Roger Bristol, a founding member, resigned his position as a teacher at Hanover High School and became the Co-op’s manager and sole employee. By March of 1937, the Co-op had 96 member families.

In 1938, the store moved across the street to the basement of what is now the Dartmouth Bookstore. When the restaurant on the street level above went out of business in 1941, Co-op members carefully considered leasing the first floor space in addition to the basement. It was wartime and money was scarce, and borrowing from a local bank was out of the question. The president of the bank was reputed to have called the Co-op "communist infiltration into a respectable town." Co-op members rallied to the cause as best they could by purchasing more shares or loaning the organization money, and in the summer of 1942 the Co-op opened its doors above ground for the first time.

The Co-op remained on Main Street until 1963, when it built a new store on the current Park Street site. Many members feared that the Co-op was now too far out of town and would not survive the move, but the Co-op continued to grow in sales and membership. In 1985, the Co-op purchased the service station abutting its property and created the Co-op Service Center. The first major expansion of the food store took place in 1986, the year the Co-op celebrated its 50th anniversary. A second expansion occurred in 1994.

In 1995, the Co-op added a second Co-op service center on Lyme Road, which has since been converted to the Community Food Market, and in 1997 opened a second food store, located in Lebanon. Today, what began as a cooperative of 17 households now has over 20,000 households and sales that exceeded $42 million last year.

Because October is Co-op Month in the United States, we have chosen to celebrate our Co-op’s 65th anniversary during this month, and are devoting this issue of the Co-op News to the co-op movement and to the history of our co-op. Inside you will find articles about the principles and philosophy that guide our co-op, as well as a fascinating tidbit about the Rochdale Pioneers, the ancestors of today’s successful cooperative movement.

You will also find yourself transported to the year 1936 by three fun articles on food and nutrition in the 1930s. And we hope you will enjoy learning more about the history of the Harvest Partners garden, the Co-op’s Education and Member Services Department, the Suggestion Box, and the Co-op’s community giving program.

So let’s go forth and celebrate Co-op Month and our own 65 years of service to our members!

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