Federal Pretzel Baking Company of South Philadelphia was the first large-scale soft pretzel manufacturing factory in Philadelphia, and the United States of America.
Federal Pretzel Baking Company started out of the Nacchio family's small baker, which they leveraged into a large-scale manufacturing soft pretzel bakery business using a secret recipe and leading the way in utilizing organized pushcart vendors through the city. The bakery also hired children, who could earn money as street vendors by carrying and selling baskets of pretzels on the streets of Philadelphia. An ongoing relationship with the public and Catholic schools led to sales for daily student snacks. The Federal Baking pretzel style became recognized by the general public as what became known as the iconic Philadelphia Soft Pretzel for the 20th century Philadelphia.
1922Maria and Giuseppe Nacchio owned a small
Italian American vitalian
artisan bread bakery where Maria Nacchio would make baked-styled soft pretzels added for variety. The bakery was located in the heart of an Italian American neighborhood, enclaved in
South Philadelphia. During the 1920s, her son, Edmund, saw a business opportunity in the popularity of the soft pretzel and the family recipe. He started a factory to bake them in larger quantities, and combined workers' hand-twisted pretzels manual skills and added a conveyor system of equipment, which was imported from German; that moved them to a soaking solution and then through baking ovens. The structure for mass production operations thereby became established at the Federal
Pretzel Baking Company.
1940The Federal government
Department of Agriculture consulted the American Institute of Baking and advanced bakers of the United States of America, like the Nacchio family to address the shortage of
wheat flour. During the
World War, they innovated alternative ingredients and baking techniques, such as using corn flour as a percentage substitute to compose a mix of flour(s) for bread and other bakery goods like pretzels.
1947The company was forwarded by the four brothers, following the death of Edmund in 1947, and continued by Joseph, Carmine, and Anthony.
1963The record for the largest pretzel ever baked was baked by Joseph Nacchio of Federal Baking, Philadelphia,
Pennsylvania. It was 40 pounds, 5 feet across. This record was repeated with the largest pretzel appearing in a Hollywood movie at 20 lb., 4-foot pretzel shown in the 1963
film production of “It’s a Mad Mad Mad Mad World.”.
1978First mass-machine-produced soft pretzel was extruded at 7 per second with 60,000 baked daily by Federal Baking Company. The original 1922 recipe continued to be used but stopped making hand-twisted pretzels with the signature overlapping knot.
1990Second-generation daughters, Anna Nacchio and Norma Nacchio-Conley (with her son Thomas), opened "PretzCo", a pretzel-baking business independent of Federal Baking several city blocks nearby. And included a backroom exhibit to document the family story as presented by the daughters of the founders. Also, they introduced their own modernized recipe that was less crusty and softer.
1992 The Pretzel
Museum was opened by members of the Nacchio family (a partner Norma Conley) to highlight the area’s preference for Federal Baking's; distinctly shaped pretzels were being baked soft and unlike the dominant, more circular hard pretzels, were produced in western Pennsylvania. There were three locations for the museum. The first was built at Washington and
Delaware Avenue, then 7th and Markets streets next to Ben Franklin's historic house, and finally a full design located just north of the historic district of the center of Philadelphia. Champion hand pretzel twister Helen Hoff demonstrated how to produce 57 pretzels per minute at the first museum dedicated to the Philadelphia soft pretzel. The Museum was closed prior to 1995.
2000The family owned and operated company was continued by the various family members for four generations until it was sold to a conglomerate business, J & J Snack Foods Corporation in the year 2000.
A soft pretzel is a double-looped bread dough, baked with a soft inside and then topped with coarse salt. The pretzels are often slathered with yellow or brown mustard. Federal Baking estimated it at a quarter for each 200 pretzels sold. During the 20th century, street vendors sold them on street corners in wooden, glass-enclosed cases or employed young boys who walked through the streets carrying baskets loaded with soft hot pretzels ,yelling aloud the phrase "Fresh Pret-zels", to make extra cash for 80 years. The soft pretzel became a recognized staple cuisine of Philadelphia , and an established food institutionalized for snacking at schools, at work and home, or as an item for party trays. The soft pretzel was often considered to be a quick meal by most.
