Wild Earth Bakery might be quite new to the neighbourhood as a bakery, but there’s a lot of history associated with our store at 8902-99 Street. For example, who knew that Stantec got its start in a second floor office, right here?

If you have anything to add to our history, please go to our Contact Us page and let us know. For instance, the woman who is helping us design the new kitchen told us that her parents first met at 8902 when it was a drug store in the 1960s!

In 1932, Tubby Bateman opened a butcher shop at 8920-99 Street in 500 square feet adjacent to the Red & White grocery store. A few years later Tubby purchased the dry goods store, knocked a hole in the wall of the butcher shop, and became a full-service neighbourhood grocery store.

In 1948, Tubby purchased the property at 8902 and built a new Bateman’s Red & White. Jimmy Brown was the grocery manager, Johnny Bowmeester was the meat manager, and Mickey Parks was in charge of deli meats. Tubby couldn’t find a buyer for the old building at 8902 so he converted it into the Bateman’s Milk Bar. The Milk Bar served hamburgers and fries, coffee, ice cream from Mello-Moore Dairy, and built a reputation for the best milkshakes in South Edmonton. The Milk Bar was run by Stanley Doucette, who for many years delivered milk by horse and wagon in the Mill Creek area for Edmonton city dairies.

The Bateman family lived at 9838-89 Ave. With six kids in a three bedroom house, there wasn’t much play space for the kids, so Tubby had an idea: fix up the basement at 8902 with card tables, ping-pong tables, and a small kitchen and call it “Bateman’s Rumpus Room.” Pretty soon, neighbors were inquiring about renting the room for birthdays, anniversaries, and stag parties. The kids lost their play area because soon the Rumpus Room was booked 3 or 4 nights a week. Of course Tubby provided the food and mix.

Almost by accident, Tubby found himself in the Banquet Hall business. Tubby used to tell his staff, “Don’t worry if an item doesn’t sell in the grocery store today; we’ll cook it and feed it to those guys renting the Rumpus Room tonight.”

At the back of the lot there was a four-stall garage used to house the fleet of delivery trucks. In those days the store took phone orders and offered free delivery. If the truck drivers couldn’t handle all the calls, there was always a bunch of schoolboys available with bikes to deliver after school. Every December the trucks got left outside because the garage was turned into a processing plant for the locally raised, farm-fresh turkeys.

In 1957, Tubby acquired the property at 8910-99 Street and built a new building for his busy grocery business. It was then the most modern supermarket in Edmonton. Also, it was the first store in Western Canada with an in-store bakery. A banquet hall called the “Captains Cabin” occupied the lower floor and Stanley Engineering (the forerunner of Stantec) occupied the offices on the second floor.

The old grocery store at 8902 was leased to Tony Romaniuk who operated Tony’s Drugs. When Tony retired in the mid 1980s, the drug store survived for a few years, but without Tony’s smiling face behind the counter, the store lost favour in the neighborhood and eventually closed.

United Video was the next tenant in the premises and they occupied the entire ground floor until 2002. That year, United Video moved to the back half of the store and Dee Bateman (Tubby’s granddaughter) opened a Booster Juice franchise. In 2005, Joanne (Dee’s sister and another of Tubby’s granddaughters) and Norm Joly purchased the Booster Juice and converted the premises into the Wild Earth Bakery. Joanne and Norm Joly also own the grocery store at 8910-99 Street.

In 2008, Dee Bateman and Greta Sieben purchased the Wild Earth Bakery. On July 1, United Video closed its doors and the Wild Earth Bakery is in the process of expanding its bakery and cafe operation in that space.