What would become Banquet Foods started in Clifton Hill, Missouri in 1892. F.M. Stamper, a schoolteacher needed a second income, so he began marketing eggs and poultry to local merchants. He set up shop in a barn in Clifton Hill. Finis McClean Stamper was born November 24, 1861, near Clifton Hill Missouri to Hiram Stamper and Sarah Stamper (nee Cobb). He was named for Finis McLean, brother to the infamous “Bison’ McLean. He was married to Margaret Richardson.
Stamper’s business grew rapidly, and before long he was selling his products to merchants in St. Louis and Kansas City. In 1898, he moved the company to Moberly, locating it on Fourth Street in the building later occupied by Montgomery Ward. In 1904, he sold the company to Swift and Company. A year later, he bought it back for half what he paid for it. Also in 1905, he moved the plant to a location next to the Wabash Railyard, and by 1907 the nucleus of the plant on Dameron Street was compete. In 1914, F.M. Stamper opened a creamery in Moberly to add to the poultry plant. Then in 1915, two developments happened that would change the poultry industry. First, refrigeration allowed poultry to be slaughtered at its point of origin and the meat shipped. Second, rail cars were created to haul live poultry as there was still a demand for live poultry.
The way eggs and poultry were shipped remained unchanged until World War II. The war developed a need for dehydrated eggs. By 1943, the F.M. Stamper Company was the number one producer of dehydrated eggs in the nation. The war also created a need for canned meat as a field ration. This was an important development as it would lead to the birth of the TV dinner. Swanson using new technology allowing inexpensive aluminum trays produced the first TV dinners in 1954. In 1953, pot pies were introduced by F.M. Stamper and Company, and the Banquet label was born. They would soon be producing their answer to Swanson’s TV dinner in 1955. With Swanson and Morton, they produced most of the TV diners in the late 1950s and throughout the 1960s. in 1966, Banquet merged with Bright Foods of Turlock, California, and in 1970 RCA bought the newly combined company. In 1980, ConAgra purchased Banquet. In 1988, microwave safe trays were developed allowing pot pies and dinners to be microwaved. By 1988, Banquet Foods had long left its birthplace in Randolph County. Stamper Feed Mill closed in 1977, leaving its 50 workers to find new jobs. The cream pie plant closed in 1980, after ConAgra purchased Banquet Foods. The headquarters of the company had been moved to Saint Louis many years before. Yet, Banquet Foods owes its origins to a barn in Clifton Hill, Missouri.
