Grocery stores have evolved over the decades from small, very local shops to supermarkets offering products and services of all kinds. The White Bear area has had many stores come and go over the years. The Getty Store was the first, opening in 1870 to serve those getting off the trains at the White Bear station in what would become downtown White Bear Lake.
On the Mahtomedi side of the lake, one of the most fondly remembered merchants was William Spink. He opened his first store on the east shore of White Bear Lake in 1905. Nearly two decades later, a devastating fire destroyed that building and Spink constructed the brick building on the intersection of Quail Street and Mahtomedi Avenue that still stands today. It was originally built as a Fairway Grocery, operated by Spink and his wife, Rebecca.
The Mahtomedi Store boasted they had a “high-class line” of groceries, meats, candies, fruits, vegetables, cigars and tobaccos, as well as hardware items. The location also served as Mahtomedi’s post office, where Spink was the postmaster. It was from this location that local lore depicts Mr. Spink distributing mail to Baby Face Nelson, a well-known gangster who is commonly believed to have spent time in Mahtomedi. Spink described the visitor as someone he mistook for a “gentleman tutor.” When the elder Spink passed away in the summer of 1932, his son Edward (Ned) took over the business.
The structure has housed several businesses, including an ice cream parlor and Barbara Rose’s Dress Shop. Today, the structure has been updated and is known as the Ramsay Building.
Sara Markoe Hanson is the executive director of the White Bear Lake Area Historical Society. She is one of a handful of community representatives sharing history thoughts monthly on this back page.
This story was a reader favorite from the April 2015 issue of White Bear Lake Magazine.
