ROD THOMPSON / RTHOMPSON@STARBULLETIN.COM
Hilo Macaroni Factory foreman Belinda Pulido removed a tray of freshly baked soda crackers from the oven behind her yesterday. The work done by hand instead of by machines raises costs, one reason for the company's closing, said acting manager David Ikeda.
‘Saloon’ workers to
break bread final timeBig Isle cracker's pedigree
claims ties to WWI
HILO >> Hilo Macaroni Factory acting manager David Ikeda tipped up a massive block of iron so the dies used for cutting Saloon Pilot crackers out of sheets of dough could be seen.
A few feet away, a different die was stamping out soda crackers yesterday, pa-chunk, pa-chunk, pa-chunk.
Ikeda doesn't know how old the heavy dies are. "They're older than I am," he said. He's 59.
"They made them to last. They aren't very high tech, but they keep working," he said.
After Tuesday they won't work anymore. The company was supposed to have baked its last crackers yesterday, but Ikeda found a little more flour, so on Tuesday his 10 employees will do one more run of Saloon Pilots.
"It's my favorite cracker," said the community college agriculture teacher, filling in for his uncle as manager.
"Since I'm the boss, I can call whatever I want the last," he said.
Like his employees and like community people who learned about the closing of the company with roots back at least to 1908, Ikeda said he was sad.
"It's like a death in the family," he said.
But no one was agonizing. "I'm ready for a change," said foreman Belinda Pulido, 40, a 17-year-employee. And do what? "I have no idea," she said.
George Kaheiki, 32, placing uncooked crackers in a huge oven, has worked for the company for 11 years. He's going back to school. And study what? "That I haven't decided yet," he said.
Upstairs in the office, Sally Villaluz, 47, will be ending 21 years of work for the company. She's not too concerned about the future. "If you want to work, you can get a job," she said.
Nora Duyao, soon to be 50, has worked for the company 30 years. She's not worried about work, either, but both she and Villaluz worry about lack of medical benefits while they're unemployed.
Ironically, these loyal
employees are its weakness was well as its strength. A company this size should be operating with only five employees, not 10, Ikeda said. Employee costs, such as medical benefits and worker's compensation insurance, cut into the bottom line, he said.
The "not very high-tech" machines are no longer enough for the new millennium.
Meanwhile, Hilo residents rushed to the factory and to stores to buy the last of their favorite crackers.
Maybe 30 people showed up to buy crackers by the pound, Duyao said. Stores were running out by noon.
Customer Danny Escalona was carrying off four pounds of Saloon Pilots. He'd send some to his sister in Louisiana, he said.
One more run of Saloon Pilots will happen on Tuesday. Escalona will be back then for more.
But as many as people get, the crackers won't last forever. "We'll eat them slowly," said customer Ainahau Toledo.
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Big Isle cracker's pedigree
claims ties to WWI
HILO >> The 19th-century seafarer's name for twice-baked, dry-as-a-bone, tooth-breaking crackers was hardtack.
So why is the tastier, chewier Hilo version called a "Saloon Pilot"?
The answer is unclear but Hilo Macaroni Factory manager David Ikeda says it may be because they were served in bars. His brother Earl thinks "saloon" refers to the dining room of a ship's captain.
Ikeda family lore says a baker from a World War I German ship taught Hilo people to make the crackers.
A 1997 New York Times story, meanwhile, tells how Massachusetts baker John Pearson invented a square "Crown Pilot" cracker in 1792. No explanation of the name was given. Nabisco continued to bake "Crown Pilots" until 1996.
When Nabisco halted production that year, residents of Maine mounted a "Save the Cracker" protest, and Nabisco resumed production.
Hilo writer Leilehua Yuen says West Coast and Pacific people already knew about hardtack in the 19th century because whaling ships carried it.
The Anchorage Daily News reported in 1999 that Alaska residents eat nearly 2 million pounds per year of a cracker they call "pilot bread."
Still, no explanation of the name.
Eskimos like the crackers, too. According to alaskool.org, the Inupiaq Eskimos apparently bypassed the "pilot" question and gave the crackers not one, but three names of their own: qaqqiaq, qaqqulaaq and qaqquq.
Now, that's a mouthful.
