Beaming at us with her trademark smile, Arliss would take my family’s doughnut orders. Then, eyes darting hesitantly between me and my sister, she would ask, “Now, which one of you is Hannah?” For years, this sweet lady has been consistently smiling out from behind the counter at the Third Street Bakery in the small town of Phillipsburg, Kansas. With kind eyes and warm greetings, she takes the orders of every early bird customer in the morning hours.
My family actually lives in an even smaller town fifteen miles away, so the occasional trip to Phillipsburg during our childhood marked quite the special event in my and my siblings’ world, thus rendering our memories of visiting Arliss all the more vivid. For the most part, we refer to Phillipsburg as “Town”: it’s home to almost everything, including our lone coffee shop, the grocery store, and the only stoplight in the county.
The Third Street Bakery first opened in 1995 and has grown to become an epicenter of the Phillips County community ever since. Throughout the twenty-one years I’ve called Phillips County my home, nothing at the bakery has changed: the same well-worn carpeted aisle leads you past the same customers sitting at the same tables draped with bold cherry and loud golden floral tablecloths. You’ll never make it through to the counter without stopping at least two or three times to exchange the usual how-do-you-do’s with other customers. The bakers begin preparing the homemade doughnuts, bread, and pies as early as two or three in the morning daily, except for on Sundays. Third Street Bakery’s dedication to quality has not gone unnoticed by those outside Phillips County: the bakery has even been recognized in Kansas! tourism magazine for its decadent cherry and coconut cream pies.
Aptly named for its location on Third Street, the family-owned and family-run bakery is located in one of the buildings along the original brick roads in downtown Phillipsburg, a small town with big spirit: picture Kansas’ Biggest Rodeo (yes, that’s it’s real name) in a town of 2,500 people. It happens every year, ninety years running. The annual event began in 1929 in a farmer’s field north of town and has since developed into one of the busiest seasons of the year for the county as rodeo fans and competitors pile in from neighboring states.
Now, it’s impossible to picture Kansas’ Biggest Rodeo or the county fair without considering the bakery as well. Every year the county fair takes place during the last or second-to-last weekend of July, and it gives Phillipsburg youth a huge role. 4-H is a youth development program which helps kids ages 7-18 develop leadership and life skills ranging from animal care to volunteer work to arts and crafts. At the fair, 4-H kids get the chance to proudly showcase their myriad of projects—think baked goods, photography, fiber arts, horticulture, woodworking, entomology, and geology. The list goes on.
4-H kids also raise a variety of animals, including rabbits, poultry, sheep, goats, pigs, dogs, cats, handpets, horses, bucket calves, and market cows, all of which make appearances at the fair. This work does not go unrecognized: over the past three years, the two alpacas owned and adored by a young 4-H member have emerged as new fan favorites among fair-goers. Other anticipated events throughout the fair weekend include the greased pig contest, the livestock show and auction, barrel train rides, cornhole tournaments, mechanical bull rides, bingo, and classic kids’ games like balloon darts and cake walks hosted by local businesses. Entertainment varies consistently, with some years bringing a beer garden and others a petting zoo or dutch oven cook-off. Regardless of the projects, animals, and events each year, you can always count on finding the Third Street Bakery’s finest pies on display at the food stand.
These pies aren’t the only thing notable about the county fair, however. Our town’s version of bingo isn’t your average game of bingo. Instead, we play what’s known as Cow Chip Bingo—and if you know what cow chips are, this is exactly what it sounds like. In June, before the county fair takes place, the Cow Chip Bingo board is displayed on an easel in a downtown Phillipsburg business. For a mere $10, you can sign your name on a square and enter yourself in the contest for a $500 prize. How is the winner decided? Well, on a chosen day at the county fair, the bingo board is drawn up in the arena and a nice full cow is released to do his or her business. The lucky square where the cow chip lands decides which competitor receives the cash prize.
In a small county with few events throughout the year, the Phillips county fair stirs up quite a bit of excitement for those in and around the community. The county fair gives us somewhere to go, things to do, and people to see—even if this just means going out to the fairgrounds to meet friends for the Friday taco lunch special. The spirit of fair time is all-encompassing enough that there’s room for even the Third Street Bakery to take part in the festivities. Each of the six 4-H clubs in Phillips County are asked to contribute a certain number of pies to the public fair food stand. Luckily, as a 4-H alumni I have an inside perspective to the behind-the-scenes motions that take place for the fair food stand to come together. The county’s 4-H clubs are asked to bring a certain number of crème and fruit pies to help the head cook, Sandi, with the food preparation. After the club votes on and approves the motion, most clubs order their catered pies from Third Street Bakery. It’s unimaginable to escape the fair without caving to a slice of their oreo crème! For some of the loyal daily customers, it’s hard to leave even the bakery itself without giving in to the mouth-watering temptations of crisp and flaky fruit pies topped with a smattering of sugar crystals, or the whipped meringue peaks atop a classic cream pie.
My own involvement with the Third Street Bakery and the fair stretches into the months preceding the fair and rodeo weekends. My old 4-H club takes care of the annual selling, painting, and cleaning of rodeo window advertisements for local businesses. What’s a rodeo window advertisement, you ask? I’ll give you an example: a rodeo-themed picture, sold by a 4-H member and selected by the business owner, painted onto the business window with the caption, “Welcome Phillips Co. Fair\ July [dates] \ Kansas’ Biggest Rodeo Aug [dates].” The pictures range from cute cartoon horses and lasso spinning cowboys to more intricate bronco riders and cowgirls bearing American flags.
While most businesses leave the painting decisions in the hands of the 4-H members, each year a handful make special requests or ask for specific colors—we’ve even branched out so far as to paint detailed rodeo horse trailers’ windows. One year as we prepared to paint the window at the furniture store downtown, the owner rushed out to meet us, apologizing and asking, “Could you maybe come back tomorrow? My daughters will be with me and I said they could choose the colors for the advertisement this year.” The next day, after some serious deliberation on behalf of the seven and nine year olds, I painted the first purple and turquoise horse that the rodeo advertising business had ever seen.
But whether the requests are simple or extravagant, none of them are quite like that of the Third Street Bakery. Every year, they choose the same image of a Charolois bull from the neck up, and every year, they ask us if we can paint doughnuts on its horns—some with frosting, one with sprinkles, one with sugar. How can we refuse?
As surprising as it is, the bakery succeeds in spreading its warmth even farther than the rodeo fans from neighboring states. The proof is in the little index cards they keep set up on the doughnut display case, each card filled out by a visitor. They’re asked to write where they’re from and answer the prompt, “My favorite thing about the Third Street Bakery is…” To pass time in line, I love to skim through the different countries and states that are listed by visitors whom the bakery welcomed into the community with open arms: our foreign exchange student studying abroad from Japan, a distant family member visiting from South Carolina, a random couple passing through from Washington state. The lines on every card are scrawled with various styles of handwritten compliments and praises for the Third Street Bakery. Somehow, the lone bakery in small-town Kansas managed to find its way into the lives of strangers, who in turn left a small piece of themselves with the bakery to remember.
In fact, whenever I have a friend visit from out of town, the bakery is a top place on my list of must-sees. When my friend and her brother from Louisiana were passing through, we spent the last hour of their only morning in Phillipsburg sharing three different doughnuts between us, just to get a small taste of them all; we settled on the maple bacon Long John, a classic cinnamon bun drizzled in a sticky glaze, and the pretzel drizzled with peanut butter and chocolate. No other place in the county would have given them such an accurate and full taste of my town and my community.
Mornings at the bakery are defined by well-known elderly faces of the community, all gathering with the rising sun for a strong cup of coffee, a hot breakfast, and a good conversation. As the town awakens and assembles for lunch, the atmosphere shifts from the underlying murmur of peaceful morning patrons to a lively noon chatter that swells and falls in time with the harsh jangle of the old bells attached to the top of the restaurant door. By this time, my late pastor’s husband Larry slowly rolls up on his golf cart and comes in with his walker for the daily special.
I can’t remember exactly when I met Larry because there was never a time I didn’t know him. All I know is that during my childhood, he was always there in church on Sundays in the second pew from the front on the left-hand side. On days my family would end up sitting beside or behind him, he would turn to me during the service with his rumbling baritone voice, encouraging me not only to sing, but also to smile. Now, on the occasion that we bump into one another in line to buy doughnuts, he still turns to me with a wink and jokes, “We have to stop meeting like this.”
Another pair of familiar faces amongst the lunch tables are the farming brothers from Agra, a 250-person town ten miles due east from Phillipsburg. Without fail, Mark, the younger and more boisterous of the two will catch my eye as I stroll by and, with a teasing grin, make some smartass remark: “Don’t you ever work?” or “Staying out of trouble?” Yet, no matter how much he loves to give me a hard time, he always follows up by asking about any of my recent or upcoming travels and wishing me well before I leave town again. Since starting college 3 years ago, my time in my home county has become limited, and these occasional run-ins are all the more valuable.
Mr. Rahjes, a carpenter who has lived his entire life in Phillips County, is another person the bakery wouldn’t be the same without. When I first met Mr. Rahjes, he was working a remodeling job for my family. On his last day, as I helped carry his tools to the trailer, I asked if he would ever let a girl work for him—imagine my excitement when he said that he had employed female assistants in the past! Two years later, when I found myself in need of a steady job, I called him up out of the blue and asked if his offer still stood—he not only gave me an affirmative, but also the address of the place where he’d be working the next day. That was the fall of 2013, and ever since, I’ve worked the job during summers and school breaks, seeing him as both my friend and mentor.
Throughout the summer work week, we normally head home during the noon hour before returning to work in the early afternoon, with the crucial exception of Thursdays. The Thursday daily lunch special at the bakery is your choice of fried white or dark meat chicken, a wallop of mashed potatoes with gravy, a pile of baked beans, and a freshly buttered roll. Thankfully, this comes in half orders. Whenever we’re working a site in Phillipsburg, this meal is a tradition I can rely on: every working Thursday at noon (or 11:30, if you really “want to get the good chicken,” according to Mr. Rahjes), we’ll load into his truck and he’ll drive us up to the town square.
Mr. Rahjes will pay for both our meals, and afterwards he’ll return to the counter for an ice refill to chew on back at work; until this spring when the machine broke down, everyone agreed that the bakery had the best munching ice in town. Despite the unfortunate change in ice quality, Mr. Rahjes remains a man of habit, never leaving the bakery without his to-go cup in hand.
Through late August into September, the square across from the bakery teems with locals selling or buying homegrown fresh fruits and vegetables on tables beneath tents; my favorites are the tender peaches that practically drip with juice and the succulent sweet corn that reminds you why we have butter. My interaction with the community travels beyond the square, floating through my social media timelines in the form of pictures of freshly baked pies or stacked jars of appealing canned goods—and, of course, a post could never be complete without tagging one of the local producers.
Another lunch option that is unique to the area is the Phillipsburger. Who is Phillip, and why does he have a burger, you ask? The Phillipsburger, actually named after the town of Phillipsburg itself (sorry, Phillip), is the town equivalent of a McDonald’s Big Mac, but with its own secret specialty sauce. Nearly every dining place in town has its own version of the Phillipsburger, composed of a cheeseburger, tomato, lettuce, onion, and its own variation of the specialty sauce that distinguishes it from its couterparts. Because the specific ingredients of the sauce are kept a secret, the Phillipsburger maintains its air of mystery.
Bierocks, another local favorite, are available only at Third Street Bakery. A German recipe, bierocks are small pastry pockets with savory fillings. While they occasionally have bierocks on hand, the bakery only takes orders for these rolls twice a year, and offers three different varieties from which to choose: mushroom and swiss, meat lovers, and the traditional beef and cheddar cheese. Due to the lengthy process of making these rolls and the high demand from local families, fulfilling the bierock orders can quickly become overwhelming for the few hands that bake them all—hence the small window to order!
On the sweeter side of their menu, two of the bakery’s noteworthy creations are the sundae doughnut and what we lovingly refer to as “the honker.” The sundae comes in two sugar-loaded options: stuffed with strawberry and cream cheese with a splash of strawberry frosting, or chock-full of chocolate and Bavarian cream with a layer of chocolate frosting. Both flavors are topped with a dollop of whipped cream. The honker, on the other hand, is almost the size of a dinner plate, consisting of nearly four regular doughnuts put together with a creamy chocolate frosting slathered across the top. This doughnut makes the perfect breakfast to split with a friend or to save for later. One of the best things about the honker is getting to see the way kids’ eyes light up and widen with incredulous awe when they see it.
The Third Street Bakery plays a role in the lives of the older members of the community, but it’s also important to some of the youngest members as well. Every year in June, the Phillips county high school dance team helps organize the Little Mr. and Ms. Panther contest. Any parent can enter their child between ages two and seven to be voted upon as a potential crown bearer for the Homecoming King and Queen during the high school football season. Around three or four businesses display poster boards with small photographs of the candidates and their names. In front of the poster on the table are small glass jars with each of the children’s names where you can place your vote with pocket change. At the end of the voting season, the change is counted up and goes to the dance team as a fundraising benefit: the boy and girl with the most votes are given the title of Little Mr. and Ms. Panther and have the chance to star in the homecoming parade before the football game that evening.
Whether it’s an unexpected run-in with a friend you haven’t seen in weeks or months, filling your time in line with hugs and well wishes, a catered family reunion, or even a free glass of ice water while painting rodeo ads, the Third Street Bakery is woven into the threads of our community. Although the bakery wins over hearts and tastebuds from far and wide, it still remains nearest and dearest to those of us who live or grew up in Phillips County. Even now, there’s no other way I’d prefer to be greeted while ordering a doughnut than with sweet Arliss’s friendly smile and, “Good morning! It’s Hannah … right?”
Mediocre Issue | October 2019