05/19/2026
🏛️ Historical Marker: Orange Dairy Company
The City of Orange Historical Preservation Commission proudly presents a series of monthly spotlights featuring historical markers throughout Orange, Texas. This month, the HPC is highlighting the Orange Dairy Company.
Clyde Spears established the Orange Dairy Company at this site in 1941, where he pasteurized and bottled 800 gallons of milk every day. The Orange Dairy Company collected raw milk from at least 16 local dairies, including the Peveto Family and the Eddleman Family's Moonglow Dairy, which supposedly milked its cows by the light of the moon. The two-story red brick building retains many features of the original dairy processing plant, including the ceiling hooks which held a cooling system. Ceramic tiles, which were originally installed at the dairy for sanitary purposes, still cover the walls and floor. But in the postwar economy, Orange's thriving dairy industry could no longer operate on a small scale. The necessity of pasteurization, as well as the invention of new milking technologies like the rotolactor, significantly raised operating costs.
At the same time, better refrigeration and lowered transportation costs brought Orange into competition with dairies as far away as Wisconsin. Even a 1945 city ordinance requiring all milk sold in Orange to be pasteurized in Orange could not save the local dairies. The number of dairy cows in Texas, which had been slowly growing through the first half of the 20th century, plummeted 80 percent between 1945 and 1971. The Orange Chamber of Commerce boasted in 1940 that its dairies had produced one and a half million gallons of milk, but by 1953 most of this production had to be dumped because it cost twice as much as out-of-state milk. Borden, a nationwide dairy company with Texas roots, bought out and closed the Orange Dairy Company in 1948.
Today, the historic Orange Dairy Company building is home to the beloved Old Orange Cafe & Catering Co., owned and operated by David Claybar. A lifelong Orange resident with deep family roots in the community, Claybar purchased the restaurant in 2004 and continues its tradition of warm hospitality. Filled with vintage photographs of old Orange and generations of local families, the cafe offers guests a welcoming step back in time, where historic charm, old-fashioned service, and great American cuisine come together inside one of Orange’s treasured historic buildings.
📜 Stay tuned for next month’s spotlight as the HPC continues to explore Orange’s storied past!
🍊 Discover more about the history of Orange by browsing through the historical markers listed on the City of Orange website at https://orangetexas.gov/479/Historical-Markers.
