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St. Lawrence Starch Company fonds
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Physical description
86.7 metres of textual records
ca. 4500 photographs
ca. 700 items of documentary art and printed artwork
1005 architectural drawings
1 map
1426 metres of motion picture film
3 videocassettes
8 film strips
80 radio transcription disks
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Biographical history
St. Lawrence Starch Company Limited was a major Canadian manufacturer of corn based starch, glucose and feed products, established in 1889 by John Gray, Archie Hutchison, Robert Kilgour, Joseph Kilgour and Jessie Malcolm and based in Port Credit, Ontario.
The St. Lawrence Starch Company was a family owned private company specializing in the manufacturing of corn based products for over a century. Its products, such as Durham corn starch and Jersey Brand gluten feed, were produced for the pulp and paper, textile, alcohol, grocery/food products and pharmaceutical industry. The Bee Hive Golden Corn Syrup brand was a familiar grocery product in many Canadian households, and on behalf of this brand the Company sponsored sporting events (particularly skiing, figure skating and hockey). The Company was also involved in a major lawsuit in the mid-1930s with its principal competitor, the Canada Starch Company, over which brand of corn syrup was fed to the Dionne quintuplets.
As a result of the Canadian government's 1987 imposition of a countervailing duty against subsidized American grain corn, in 1989-1990 St. Lawrence Starch, as a user of corn, was forced to downsize. It sold its major trademarks to Bestfoods and ceased large-scale domestic production. The factory was closed and subsequently demolished and the land sold to a residential developer. St. Lawrence Starch formed a strategic alliance with the A.E. Staley company to distribute their starch and sweetener products in Canada. The Port Credit site served as a distribution centre for imported products from 1990 until the beginning of 1993. The distribution operations were relocated to a facility in Stoney Creek, Ontario. In 1995, SLS changed principles for the starch and sweetener business and began to represent Cargill, Inc., a large US based corn wet miller, providing sales, marketing and technical services across Canada. The Company continues to operate as a much smaller importer and exporter of corn products across the Canada-United States border. It is still owned and operated as a private company by the Gray family.
Custodial history
The records were transferred to the Archives of Ontario through numerous accessions in 2001 and 2002. The records were stored in the personal residences of the Gray family and the head office of St. Lawrence Starch. An earlier donation of sound and moving image material (featuring additional What Price Loyalty scripts and Bee Hive Giant Slalom film films) was received from William Gray in 1986.
Scope and content
Fonds consists of the records created, received and collected by the St. Lawrence Starch Company Limited and its associated operations.
The records are comprehensive in scope and span the company's history from its beginnings to the late 1990s. Included among the textual records are minutes from the Board of Directors of St. Lawrence Starch, its subsidiaries, and the parent W.J. Gray Holdings Company. There is also extensive executive level correspondence, financial statements, corporate tax returns and ledgers; factory orders; correspondence with suppliers, customers and competitors and various levels of government; internal committee minutes; records relating to labour relations; and records relating to legal matters, including litigation over supply of corn syrup to the Dionne quintuplets in the 1930s and the Countervailing duty in the 1980s.
There are also records documenting product research and development, production processes, planning and expansion proposals, and files documenting the company's relations with the community and its involvement in sponsoring sporting events. Finally there are records on the Company's downsizing and plant closing, and the demolition and redevelopment of the factory lands, including environmental assessments.
The fonds also includes special media such as photographs, architectural drawings and moving images. Among the special media highlights are numerous photographs and architectural drawings of the company's facilities and machinery, photographs of company sponsored sporting events and of the Gray family, original art work and advertisements for Bee Hive, Durham Starch. St Lawrence Corn Oil and other St. Lawrence products (a number of the Bee Hive ads featuring the Dionne quintuplets and well-known Canadian athletes such as hockey legend Frank Mahovolich, and Olympic medallists Karen Magnussen (figure skating) and Nancy Green (skiing)). There are a few examples of Bee Hive hockey cards of Toronto Maple Leaf players from the 1950s and 1960s. Finally there are sound recordings, transcripts, films and videos of St. Lawrence advertisements. Of particular interest are sound recordings and transcripts pertaining to the 1930s radio program 'What Price Loyalty?' which highlighted the St. Lawrence versus Canada Starch rivalry.
For a more detailed description, use this link to the Archives of Ontario's descriptive database: http://ao.minisisinc.com/scripts/mwimain.dll/144/PROV/PROV/REFD+F+4392?SESSIONSEARCH
Notes area
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Restrictions on access
Certain records are closed for 25 years from their date of creation. Please contact a Reference Archivist for more information.
Terms governing use, reproduction, and publication
Copyright has been transferred to the Archives of Ontario by the donor, although there may be third party copyright in some materials. The trademarks Bee Hive Golden Corn Syrup, Durham Starch, and St. Lawrence Corn Oil were sold by the Company and are owned by ACH Food Companies Inc. There are no restrictions on reproduction. Permission of the Archives of Ontario is required for publication; submit a Request for Permission to Publish Form.
Finding aids
For a more detailed description, use this link to the Archives of Ontario's descriptive database: http://ao.minisisinc.com/scripts/mwimain.dll/144/PROV/PROV/REFD+F+4392?SESSIONSEARCH
Associated materials
See C 105, St. Lawrence Starch collection.
Accruals
General note
C 105, St. Lawrence Starch Collection, is destined for integration into this fonds, but as of February 2012, they are still maintained separately.
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Entered Feb/12.