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Farmers Shipping Association was by far the biggest business firm in Zearing.
R. B. (Bert) Craft became the manager of the association soon after its organization. Bert served until the early 1930 's. H. Vaughn Freeman succeeded him.
In the late 1930's the handwriting was on the wall. Trucks took the place of the railroad as a means of transportation for livestock. The Farmers Shipping Association disbanded.
The first Zearing creamery was established in the 1880's on the J. Wesley Deal farm at the west end of North Street. The 1890 history of Story county called the creamery the Flowing Well Creamery. It was managed by a Mr. Fenton. We do not have his first name or initials.
The first record we have of a Zearing creamery is a newspaper item which appeared in The Branch newspaper dated February 23, 1889.
“While other towns and cities with larger pretentious and less business are taxing their citizens and paying out large sums of money to get a supply of water, Zearing strikes a flowing well where least expected. Some days ago Mr. Fenton commenced to dig a well 4 feet in diameter at his creamery. After going down 37 feet and not getting a supply of water, he concluded to bore down with a 1½ inch auger. At the depth of 104 feet he struck a supply. The water forcing up soon filled the large well and ran over the top at the rate of 1,000 gallons per hour. You may talk about your sunny clime in some far off western state, but for real get up and go, Zearing takes the cake.”
The March 2, 1889, issue of The Branch contained another story about the well at the creamery. The story was entitled, “Still Booming—Artesian Well.”
“Mr. Fenton and J. Wesley Deal are drilling a new well, and putting down- pipe as they go, expecting to get the same flow of water, and then fill up the other well, and in that way get it under control. So far the water has been coming up with such force in the first well they can not do anything much with it.”
Edwin S. Hoyt was the buttermaker at the creamery in the 1890's. A fire destroyed the creamery in the late 1890's. A short time after the fire a new creamery was constructed northwest of the intersection of Pearl Street and Grant Street. The creamery was never moved from that location.
We do not have the exact date the new creamery was ready for business. Jess J. Ross was the first buttermaker at the new creamery. A news item in The Zearing Enterprise dated April 8, 1898, refers to Jess J. Ross, Zearing buttermaker.
Some of the buttermakers who served the creamery in south Zearing, in addition to Ross, were C. N. Hart, Raymond Hadley,