Frederick Michael Switzer Sr., 1865–1949

Switzer’s Licorice is well known by many St. Louisans as a former St. Louis candy company. Its founder was Frederick Michael Switzer Sr. He was the youngest of five children born to Michael Switzer, 1827–1865 and Margaret Morkin Switzer, 1835–1895.

Michael was born on 21 October 1827 in Rathkeale, County Limerick, Ireland, and was a descendent of Palatine Irish who came from the old German Empire to Ireland in 1709. He seems to have arrived in New York from Dublin in 1851. He made his way to St Louis where he worked on riverboats and married Margaret Morkin on 30 November 1857.

Margaret was from Borrisnoe, County Tipperary, Ireland, and arrived in New York about 1853–54. We were fortunate to have a copy of a letter she wrote on 15 February 1854 from Syracuse, Onondaga County, New York, which told of her voyage over and how she was looking forward to her brother Patrick’s coming over. The next record we have of her is her marriage to Michael in Springfield, Sangamon County, Illinois, witnessed by John T. Stuart and wife. John Todd Stuart was Abraham Lincoln’s first law partner and the first cousin of Lincoln’s wife, Mary Todd Stuart.

With F.M. Switzer’s birth, the Switzers had five children. Unfortunately, Michael drowned in the Mississippi River thirteen days after his son Fred’s birth. The newspaper said Margaret was left with four children in “destitute circumstances.”

It is fair to say that Fred started at the bottom. He picked up coal off the railroad tracks, sold candy from a push cart, worked in a candy company, and finally partnered with Joe Murphy Sr. to start their own candy company, Murphy-Switzer. Years later, after several ups and downs, F.M. became sole owner and continued his illustrious career. When he died in 1949, he was the proud father of three daughters and five sons. The sons continued the growth of Switzer’s Licorice until its sale to Beatrice Foods in 1966.

There is an excellent accounting of Fred Switzer and his candy company in the book Candy Men written by Michael Patrick Murphy, the great-grandson of Joseph B. Murphy Sr., the sometime partner of F.M. Switzer.

Written by Thomas A. Switzer, grandson of F. M. Switzer Sr.
April 2021

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