The 12 South neighborhood is hot, and getting hotter. How hot is it? Let’s check the temperature with Lynne Wallman, an agent with Zeitlin Realty, who recently advertised a property for sale on 12th Avenue South. “Since I put my sign up a couple days ago, my phone has not stopped ringing,” she says. “I was getting calls until 9:30 last night. It has been crazy!”
The property Wallman is listing isn’t much to look at. In fact, it is sort of shabby, in an endearing kind of way. But three-quarters of a century before this rapidly developing neighborhood coined a trendy name for its trendy reinvention, Becker’s Bakery was a solid cornerstone. Not only a destination for generations of Nashvillians picking up birthday cakes, chess pies, gingerbread cookies, rye bread and Parker House rolls, but a city landmark. I know this, because I live one block away, and I have used the bakery countless times in giving directions to my house. (In a vivid illustration of how diverse this neighborhood is, I give both Becker’s and the Islamic Center catty-corner as signposts for travelers on 12th Avenue South.)
Becker’s Bakery was opened at the corner of 12th and Montrose in 1925 by Frank Anderson Becker and Frank Neiderhauser. The business began as a nickel-loaf bakery; the 5-cent loaves of bread were loaded onto the store truck and delivered to wholesale customers. When the Depression struck, the two Franks took Marie Antoinette’s advice and began selling cake—little white cakes they called Mrs. Becker’s Little Cakes.
Becker’s Bakery was opened at the corner of 12th and Montrose in 1925 by Frank Anderson Becker and Frank Neiderhauser. The business began as a nickel-loaf bakery; the 5-cent loaves of bread were loaded onto the store truck and delivered to wholesale customers. When the Depression struck, the two Franks took Marie Antoinette’s advice and began selling cake—little white cakes they called Mrs. Becker’s Little Cakes.
The business grew during World War II, and as the nickel loaves were phased out, the line of sweets grew, along with dinner rolls and biscuits. In 1964, Frank Becker’s sons Nicky and Tom took over; like his father and uncle before him, third-generation Frank Becker Jr. began working in the store as a child. Though he took a long detour into law enforcement, in 1995 Frank Jr. and his wife Bethe took over the business. The couple added some new products—gourmet cookies and sweets decorated with the Titans logo, for instance—and began taking checks for the first time in 70 years of business. But they never abandoned the items that lured customers to drive across town, forsaking the convenience and lower pricing of nearby grocery chains: white cake with white frosting, Becker’s best-selling cake; their most popular pie, chocolate meringue; and everyone’s favorite cookie, the fancy-colored wafer.
It was those wafers—white, pink and green most of the year, seasonal hues at the holidays—that shades some of my children’s earliest memories. My daughter was 3, my son almost 2, when we moved to this neighborhood in 1993, when it was still considered transitional. Not a walk around the block was complete without a trip to Becker’s, where they availed themselves of the free cookie given to eager children. They both liked the ones covered in confectioner’s sugar; I was always amazed at how much white powder could come off a little white cookie onto their mouths, their fingers and down their shirt fronts.
We purchased our fair share of items as well; I was Best Mommy when I brought Becker’s clown cookies to my children’s elementary school classrooms. A store-bought birthday cake provoked little guilt when it came from Becker’s. And I rarely felt as much a member of old Nashville as when I joined the folks purchasing their dinner rolls and chatting easily with total strangers in the long line that snaked out the door on Christmas Eve.
On Wednesday morning, Jan. 7, I went to Becker’s to buy a birthday cake for my children’s father, who lives just down the street from the bakery himself. My mouth dropped open when I found the windows of the store covered with the brown paper that I recognized from some of the baked goods I had purchased over the years. A small sign hung on the door: “After 79 years, we are closing our doors. We have loved being a part of your lives.”
Reportedly, the Beckers, after much soul searching, made the decision to close just after the first of the year. Action was shockingly swift. On Jan. 6, the day the bakery was supposed to reopen after its annual holiday break, they told their 10 employees, and by mid-afternoon that same day, the doors of Becker’s Bakery, as we know it, were closed for the final time.
Not long afterward, the “for sale” sign was posted. According to Wallman—who happens to be a cousin of the Beckers—there are three parcels on the property: the bakery building, about 3,600 to 4,000 sq. ft.; a duplex; and a vacant lot. It is still being appraised, but obviously, in this stretch of 12 South that now includes two restaurants, two hair salons, a Mexican Popsicle store, three clothing stores, a yoga studio, a catering company, art galleries, a coffeehouse and—opening any day now—a gourmet market, it will fetch a pretty penny. Wallman has been fielding calls from interested parties “all across the board.”
But the indelible memories Becker’s leaves behind are priceless, as sweet to me as the powdered sugar that used to circle my children’s mouths on our weekly stops at Nashville’s oldest bakery.
I love living in and being a part of the exciting revitalization of one of the city’s most storied neighborhoods. But I am sorely going to miss a piece of that history that has vanished along with the racks of gingerbread men, pecan pies, chocolate éclairs, cloverleaf rolls and pastel-colored wafer cookies. Speaking as a 10-year friend of Becker’s Bakery, I loved having them a part of my life as well.
