By Joan Hampton-Porter, Curator, The History Museum on the Square
Brothers James (1852-1929) and Burton Hardrick (1854-1914) began Hardrick Brothers Grocery about 1884 in the 200 block of St. Louis Street, as it is listed in the 1884-1885 Springfield City Directory. Usually there was a notation indicating a Black person or Black owned business, but there is no such notation for Hardrick Brothers in either that directory or the 1889 one. This may be because it was not considered a Black owned business strictly for Black people, as was typical for the time. It was patronized by people of all races, as a newspaper article from 1890 attests. It mentions that their delivery wagons went all over the city and that some of their “regular customers” were from the “leading white families of the city.”
In 1898, the store employed two clerks. One of which, James and Burton’s brother Charles, had served in the U.S. Army during the Spanish American War as a member of the “immune troops.” The erroneous assumption was made that Black people were naturally immune to tropical diseases, so the “immune troops” were created. In 1898, there were 123 retail groceries in Springfield. Only two of them are listed as being owned by African Americans: Hardrick Brothers and C. W. Smith.
Hardrick Brothers was the largest grocery store in Springfield, and its owners were influential and involved individuals in both the Black community and the greater Springfield one. James Hardrick and the long-time chief clerk, J.S. Simmons, served on City Council. James was on the committee to inform Black voters about the streetcar and jitney proposal in 1921 and helped organize a “Negro mass meeting.”
After the northeast corner of the Public Square burned in 1913 and fire erupted in the debris, a newspaper account reported that great efforts were performed to protect Hardrick Brothers. In 1921, James and Ulysses Hardrick were two of the five prominent Black men who put up bond for a Black man accused of murdering a Black man and a white man. Just fifteen years earlier, three innocent Black men were kidnapped from the county jail and lynched on the Public Square.
In 1930, after the death of James—his brother having predeceased him—there was a petition to rename Lincoln School, the school for Black children, Hardrick. The petition failed, but the fact that there was a petition says a lot about how people viewed their contributions.
There were two more Hardrick Brothers locations each smaller than the last. The second store was at 228 McDaniel; they moved into it between 1913 and 1916. In 1913, there was a newspaper advertisement noting that they had installed a milk refrigerator. This was very early for such a device to be installed in Springfield. By 1920, Ulysses Hardrick (1869-1934) was listed as the owner of the store, and it was located at 821 Washington. Ulysses was the much younger half-brother to James and Burton. He and his wife Cordelia, (1874-1964), ran the business together until his death in 1934. She continued to run it until her death in 1964.
Shown is the location of Hardrick Brothers Grocery on St. Louis Street. Image is Courtesy of Missouri State University Libraries Special Collections and Archives.
