EDWARD C. HANDY. As treasurer and general manager of the Indiana Ice & Dairy Company at Anderson, Mr. Handy has the practical control of one of this city’s most servicable industries. The United States Department of Agriculture estimates that milk and cream together furnish fifteen percent of the total food of the average American family, and with this fact before us it is possible to estimate the importance of the milk business in every community. The Indiana Ice and Dairy Company, with which Mr. Handy has been connected as manager for the past fifteen years, manufactures and bottles pasteurized milk and cream, and at the same time manufactures butter. The company has built up a very large local business and from a small beginning has been obliged to enlarge the capacity of the plant from time to time in order to handle the largely increased trade. The milk is gathered in from the dairy farmers of the surrounding country, and through the medium of this model plant is distributed to a large patronage in the city. The capacity for butter-making is five ton per day, and the plant has a capacity of bottling milk at fifteen hundred gallons per day. The plant is a brick building, and is equipped with the latest and most improved machinery, and the entire service is conducted on the most approved sanitary principles. The Indiana Ice & Dairy Company was incorporated in 1907, and the chief officers at the present time are: Otis P. Crim, president; William C. Collier, vice-president and secretary; and Edward C. Handy, treasurer and general manager.
Edward C. Handy was born in Hancock County, Indiana, July 7, 1865, and has had a varied career since he began life on his own account. His parents were Minos F. and Elizabeth (Chandler) Handy. His father was horn in Indiana in 1837, was a farmer for a number of years, and was for a long time court bailiff of Hancock County. In politics he was a staunch Democrat. The grandfather on the father’s side was William Handy, who was born in Virginia and became one of the pioneer settlers in Hancock County, Indiana. The maiden name of his wife was Smith Eldrige, who was also born in Virginia.
Mr. Handy, one of nine children, five of whom are still living, attended school in a school house of Hancock County which was known far and wide as the old Handy schoolhouse, and was a landmark in that section of the country. He attended school during the winters and assisted his father on the farm during the summers. After leaving the farm he went to Tipton. Indiana, where he became clerk in a general store that being the beginning of his general business experience. He subsequently lived with his Uncle John Handy until his seventeenth year. Three years after that he was clerk in a general store at Morristown in Shelby County, and at the expiration of that time entered a drug store and thus equipped himself for another line of enterprise.
Mr. Handy has been identified with his present line of industry for more than thirty years. In 1891 he became connected with a creamery at Morristown, Indiana, and while there laid a solid foundation of experience in that business. Then in 1897 he came to Anderson to take charge of the Indiana Ice & Dairy Company, and his management has been largely responsible for the success and large growth of this business.
In 1891 Mr. Handy married Miss Mabel Boes, of Kenton, Ohio, daughter of James and Elizabeth Boes. Mr. Handy is affiliated with the Knights of Pythias, and his attractive home is at 303 Jackson Street in Anderson.