When the Depression hit in 1929, it didn’t take Sam Locke from Mexico, and his dad long to lose a chain of 34 grocery stores.
To economize, Sam bought a load of cheap coal to heat his house. Only thing wrong, the coal wouldn’t burn in his stove. Using a shed in his back yard, Sam built a stove that not only would burn any grade of coal, but would stay warm all night after the fire went out.
Sam named the stove “Locke’s Warm Morning” stove and it would revolutionize the heating coal industry. This was in the early 1930’s.
He started selling them out of the back of his car, selling 35 the first year, and 200 the second year for $27.50. He finally leased his patent to the Sinclair Coal Company in Kansas City. They sold 50,000 Warm Morning stoves in 1941, and 400,000 in 1942. In 1943, they were selling 2,000 per day, and building them in 14 factories. A lot of the stoves were going to the Army, Navy and Marines. In 1946, with much fanfare and publicity, the millionth stove was purchased.
Sam invested his royalties in farmland, and he wound up being the largest landowner in Audrain County.
My folks bought our Warm Morning stove out of the Montgomery Ward catalog. My mom renamed it “Cold Morning, Warm Evening”, since it took a long time to heat the three slabs of firebrick inside the stove that held the heat. The firebricks, made by the A.P. Green factory in Mexico, made the stove so heavy my dad decided it would be a good idea to just go ahead and leave it set up all summer.
Well, mom said no to that idea, and dad and I cussed Sam Locke as we carried that heavy stove on out of the house and into the barn.
Jack can be reached at PO Box 40, Oak Grove, MO 64075 or jackremembers@aol.com
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