The picture below is the Home Service Company bought by Charles Woodbury Whitney in 1941, the same year Jon Whitney was born. Charles quit High School when he was 16 years old just before the Great Depression. He worked for Herkimer County during the warm months as a laborer and was a professional trapper of mink, fox, muskrat, etc. during the winter months. He later established himself as a independent routeman who sold bread and bakery items house to house. He bought Kleen-Maid Bread and Williams Cakes in Utica and had a route in the Frankfort - Ilion - Mohawk area. When he gave up his route and opened the store in 1941, he still had his green Chevrolet panel bread truck and used it to deliver groceries and beer to Home Service customers - many that he had delivered bread to. In 1953, "Chuck" died and the running of the store fell to his wife, Marion Lindsay Whitney. The original idea of doing a great deal of grocery and beer-soda deliveries to customers was largely replaced by the Home Service Company being the go to place for cold beverages and grocery items from 9 am to 12 midnight, 7 days a week. Notice the big neon BEER sign over the door. The store was known in the Mohawk - Ilion - Frankfort area as "The Beer Store." The only day the store closed was Christmas, from 2 pm to 5 pm, so that all employees could have their holiday dinner. The store started staying open all week until midnight during World War II to capture the business of the second shift "Arms" workers on their way home. Marion operated the store from 1953 through 1978 when she retired.
