The Beatrice Creamery Co. was founded in Nebraska in the 1890s by partners George Everett Haskell and William W. Bosworth. By the time Beatrice moved its headquarters to Chicago in 1913 (settling in a large facility on South State Street in 1917), it was already a leading seller of dairy equipment and operator of dairies. By the early 1930s, its national network of 32 plants produced about 27 million gallons of milk and 9.5 million gallons of ice cream per year; its “Meadow Gold” brand of dairy products was particularly successful. In 1946, when the company became the Beatrice Foods Co., annual sales stood at about $170 million; sales doubled over the next decade. Starting in the 1960s, the company expanded rapidly by purchasing other food firms, and annual sales jumped to $12 billion by 1984. During the 1970s, Beatrice employed as many as 8,000 Chicago-area residents. After the company changed hands in 1986, however, it was dismantled with stunning speed. By 1990, the last of Beatrice was sold off, and the company that had once been one Chicago's largest was gone.

This entry is part of the Encyclopedia's Dictionary of Leading Chicago Businesses (1820-2000) that was prepared by Mark R. Wilson, with additional contributions from Stephen R. Porter and Janice L. Reiff.