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The student news site of Clayton High School.

The Globe

The student news site of Clayton High School.

The Globe

Defying authority

A group of anarchists co-own the historically rich, environmentally conscious Black Bear Bakery.

Anarchy is often used as a synonym for chaos, but for the owners of Black Bear Bakery, anarchy is about creating community and equality.

“One of the basic ideas of anarchists is the idea that no one should have power over another,” Black Bear Bakery owner and worker Mark Bohnert said. “Anarchism is people coming together to make decisions as a group.”

Blsck Bear Bakery on Cherokee Street offers locally grown food in a historic setting. Formerly the Lickhalter Bakery, this workerowned collective opened in 1998. Every worker is both employer and owner of the business. (Emily Wack)
Blsck Bear Bakery on Cherokee Street offers locally grown food in a historic setting. Formerly the Lickhalter Bakery, this workerowned collective opened in 1998. Every worker is both employer and owner of the business. (Emily Wack)

Black Bear Bakery is located on 2639 Cherokee Street.  This worker-owned collective opened in 1998.  Every worker is both employer and owner of the business. The maintenance of a workers’ collective, or cooperative, involves group decisions and consensus. The owners would rather not have wages, but acknowledge the paycheck as an unfortunate necessity.

“We’ve had high school kids work here who went to Metro and people in their sixties,” Bohnert said.

Anarchist views are not a requirement for working at the Black Bear Bakery; in fact, not all of the employers completely buy into the idea.

“There are 14 people [working] at Black Bear and 80 percent are anarchists,” Bohnert said.
As their website, blackbearbakery.org, acknowledges, “Anarchists are not a united movement, and anarchists are not necessarily in agreement on ideas and actions.”
This is true for the workers at Black Bear. Their views vary even within the group of individuals who consider themselves anarchists.
“Some consider themselves progressive and others radical,” Bohnert said. “There are more working class anarchists and green anarchists.”
Bohnert’s own political ideology has transformed significantly over the years.
“I spanned the political spectrum from conservative to liberal to pacifist to democratic socialist to anarchist, and that’s where I felt most comfortable,” Bohnert said. “I was just kind of exploring. I started with the politics my parents dumped on me and then I started looking around the world at the inequality and oppression. I felt to undermine that dominance would lead to a better world.”
Bohnert’s disgust with government dominance eventually led to his current views and continue to inspire his radical opinions.
“The worst part of the U.S. government is its global domination of other countries and their resources for our benefit,” Bohnert said. “Locally, the government is instrumental in racist and sexist oppression and maintaining the ugly, wage based, mass production system that is harming people and destroying the planet at an alarming rate. Regardless, we must resist this destruction with all our might while creating alternative collectives and institutions and ways of relating to other people in a fair egalitarian way.”
Though opposing government power, Bohnert chooses to vote in order to influence his community.
“I haven’t voted in a national election for years because I refuse to vote for people that believe in global domination and local oppression,” Bohnert said. “I do vote in local elections because it often makes a difference.”
In addition to working for a business that clearly expresses his political point of view, Bohnert has worked on building cooperative houses and contributes to a kids program, CAMP, which has been dedicated to promoting social change since its creation seven years ago. In the past, Bohnert helped with the publishing of the Confluence, a bi-monthly journal with an anti-authoritarian angle.
The historical Lickhalter Bakery became the Black Bear Bakery in 1998, and the Lickhalters’ influence is apparent today.
“The Lickhalter Bakery, founded in 1915, grew to be the largest bakery in St. Louis,” Bohnert said.
Black Bear’s rye bread and whole grain sweets are products of Lickhalter recipes. The bakery was founded by Samuel Lickhalter in downtown St. Louis.  The Lickhalters were Russian Jewish and their family lived above the bakery.
The Black Bear Bakery is rooted deeply in St. Louis history. It was originally named The City of Little Bread after the 1877 St. Louis General Strike.
But the bakery’s recipes aren’t the only part of the operation that has history. The owners reassembled an enormous oven that dates back to 1948. One of the mixers was made in 1926, the other in 1964, and the refrigerator originated in the ‘80s.
“The handrails came out of the dumpster and the trim came from an old building,” Bohnert said. “The tables came from an old Subway restaurant.”
These unconventional materials were inspired by Black Bear’s desire to use sustainable methods of design. The eclectic interior of the bakery reflects their success.
“We used to be located in an old warehouse; kids knew where we were because they could smell the cookies,” Borhnert said. “Then we moved to Jefferson for eight years. We are located now in the old Vandora Theater that we renovated.”
Purchased by the Black Bear Bakery in 2004, the Vandora Theater was built in 1907. The worker co-op was conscious of the rehabilitation process, hiring local companies with a diverse group of employees, using re-used and abandoned materials and avoiding chain stores when possible.
“We want to live in a world that’s not only locally focused based but sustainable too,” Bohnert said. “This building was a huge mess when we bought it, but we worked on it to make it look it does now. We reused a lot of materials and incorporated lots of energy efficient products.”
Extending on the environmentally friendly design of the bakery, Black Bear strives to use organic ingredients when possible. Their flour is imported from an organic farm in Minnesota. A garden in the back provides organic and local ingredients.
“We started growing food in the back vacant lot behind the bakery,” Bohnert. We try to eat locally and grow neighborhoodly. It’s only our first year, but we have a lot of fruit trees and herbs.”
Black Bear reaches out to the community by displaying the artwork of local artists and hosting meetings of various community groups. Black Bear hopes to “to support the needs of the community through our bakery and encourage healthier eating and thinking” and “support efforts to keep this community culturally diverse.”
Black Bear Bakery sells to restaurants and grocery stores in the St. Louis area and sells products at the Clayton, Soulard, Tower Grove and Maplewood market.
“The whole purpose of the bakery is to put our anarchist political views out there,” Bohnert said. “We do sustainable food and sustainable rehab of this building, all the while supporting ourselves with food and a wage.”
The workers at Black Bear Bakery are well aware of the paradox of their business and ideology.
“It’s very contradictory,” Bohnert said. “We’re an anti-capitalist business in a capitalist society. It’s a paradox, and we accept that inconsistency. If you reject everything then you’ll just sit around doing nothing. You have to try something, even if it’s imperfect.”
The Black Bear Bakery’s goal is more than just selling bread; they want to impact the St. Louis community politically and socially.
“Anarchism is more than a political ideology,” Black Bear Bakery owner and worker
Mark Bohnert said. “It’s a holistic approach to life; respect everyone and undermine authority and power every chance you get.”

To see more photos,Click here.

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Defying authority