The scent of ground cinnamon hasn't wafted over the Inner Harbor since McCormick & Co. shut down its Light Street spice factory in the 1980s.
But a new kind of factory may eventually fill the air downtown with aromas that are just as pleasant: roasted almonds, hot caramel, milk chocolate.
The local owners of Mary Sue Candies say that would be just one of the benefits of a candy factory and museum they want to build near the Inner Harbor.
For much of 1994, company president Mark Berman has been searching for a location to open an expanded version of the factory he and his family have run in West Baltimore for nearly 50 years, most recently at 707 S. Caton Ave.
At year's end, he still has not found a home for the proposed "Mary Sue Confectionery Insti- tute," which would be open daily for public tours. But working with the Baltimore Development Corp., he has focused his search on Market Place, the future setting for a $25 million children's museum and an adjoining National Children's Center.
His preliminary plans for a Willy Wonka-style factory could help the city inject new life into the Market Place area, which has never been able to capitalize on its proximity to the Inner Harbor. By tempting potentially hundreds of thousands of visitors annually to venture north of Pratt Street, it also would put Mary Sue in the limelight and help it sell thousands of boxes of candy.
A color rendering prepared by Mr. Berman's architects, Design Collective of Baltimore, indicates the factory would be a multi-level attraction featuring exhibits on the World of Candy, the History of Candy and the Magic of Candy. There also would be a Candy Hall of Fame, a "sensorium" featuring the smells and tastes of candy, a candy shop, a desserts-only cafe and the world's largest chocolate waterfall.
But this confectionery institute also would be a bona-fide manufacturing center where Baltimoreans actually make and package the Easter eggs, saltwater taffy and other treats for which Mary Sue is known, while visitors watch.
"We want it to be entertaining," Mr. Berman said. "But we're not just putting on a show. We'll be making something, too."
Children's museum representatives say they are intrigued by the notion of a candy factory nearby when the museum opens in late 1996 inside the former FishMarket entertainment complex on Market Place.
"Nothing goes together like kids and candy," said Janet Marie Smith, head of the museum's building committee.
City development officials are enthusiastic about the concept, but they have been reluctant to commit any publicly owned sites to Mary Sue without the concurrence of the children's museum board, which has just begun to select its design and construction team.
Mr. Berman is already convinced that the candy factory and museum would be a hit on Market Place. Part of the attraction of opening a candy factory to the public is the wide range of activities under way at any given moment, he said during a tour of the Caton Avenue facility earlier this month.
"Today, almonds are roasting in front; chocolate-covered pretzels are coming down the conveyor belt, and we're making peanut crunch in the back. We're going to divide [the new factory] into segments so visitors understand what's going on. They'll be able to see the giant steel kettles and the nut roaster and the machine that makes the taffy. It'll be fun to follow because there will be something different at every turn."
Architect Richard Burns said the candy factory would be a treat for the senses, somewhat like the World of Coca-Cola exhibit in downtown Atlanta but more engaging and interactive.
"You can't deny the power of candy," he said. "Candy puts a smile on everyone's face, and that positive feeling is what we're hoping to create with this experience. It'll be a real-life version of 'Willy Wonka and the Chocolate Factory.' "
The design team includes Active 8, a high-tech exhibit design team with offices in Baltimore, and Sussman/Prejza & Co., California-based graphic designers who are best known for their work for the 1984 Olympic Games in Los Angeles. Much of their job will simply be to show how candy is made, Mr. Berman said.
"It really is an amazing process, considering how many ingredients have to come together: cocoa beans from Brazil, sugar from the Dominican Republic and Louisiana, pecans from Texas and Mexico, coconut from the Philippines, corn syrup from Iowa. And it all comes together here in Baltimore."
Candy central
Baltimore once had dozens of candy makers, each with its own specialty. But the number dwindled over the years as the result of mergers, consolidations and closings.
Many hard candies are now made in foreign countries, where sugar and labor are less expensive. But most foreign candy makers won't try to ship chocolates long distances for fear they will melt, and that leaves a niche for regional candy makers such as Mary Sue to fill.
Mr. Berman declined to release Mary Sue's annual sales figures. But he said the privately held company, which employs 12 to 50 people depending on the season, is in the mid-range of eight candy makers still operating in Maryland.
Although it does not have a retail shop of its own, Mary Sue makes candy for sale by others up and down the East Coast. From spring to Labor Day, it makes saltwater taffy sold at the ocean resorts. From August to December, it makes Christmas candy, including chocolate bars that local companies give employees and customers as holiday presents. This week, with Christmas over, the factory began making chocolate Easter eggs and pecan nougats, two of its most popular products.
The Caton Avenue plant is reminiscent of the famous "I Love Lucy" episode in which Lucy gets a job as a packer in a candy factory but can't keep up with the speed of the conveyor belt. In fact, the episode could have been filmed there.
With its complex machinery and giant vats of chocolate, the factory turns out more than 200 different varieties of candy in a year.
A cook spends the day making batches of "fondant," a sugary white paste used as filling for candies, or pouring hot caramel over nuts to make peanut crunch bars. The dippers dip the candy in melted chocolate. Then the Lucy-like packers box the chocolate-covered pretzels, candy bars and other treats.
The cinder block building where they work fills with the aroma of whatever ingredients they're using: cashews, fruit, peanut butter and seven different kinds of chocolate.
The chocolate "comes in looking like giant Hershey bars," Mr. Berman said. "At any one time, we have at least 5,000 pounds of chocolate waiting to be melted and 5,000 pounds that have been melted and are ready to be used."
Mr. Berman, 30, represents the third generation of his family to make candy in Baltimore. His great-grandfather, Morris "Pop" Spector, arrived in America around the turn of the century carrying a certificate from the czar of Russia noting the family's ability to make marmalade and other sweets.
Other family members who emigrated from Russia included Mr. Spector's sons, Samuel "Sacha" Spector and Henry "Getzi" Spector. They began making candy in the basement of a tiny rowhouse at Smallwood and Eagle streets in west Baltimore under the name Eagle Candy Co. The business soon grew out of the basement and into the house next door -- and eventually into the house next to that.
In 1948, Sacha Spector, Mr. Berman's grandfather, founded Mary Sue Candies with partner Bob Ashton. Their business was originally at 601 S. Smallwood St. But by the 1950s, the demand for Mary Sue Easter Eggs and other confections was so strong that the company built the factory on Caton Avenue.
The company was named Mary Sue in honor of Ashton's two daughters, Mary and Sue. Ashton left the company after several years and both daughters grew up to be nuns, but the combination of the names stuck.
As Mary Sue grew, so did its offerings. Over the past five decades, it has manufactured hard candy, fancy boxed chocolates and candy bars. Its old tins and metal pails have become collector's items.
Mr. Berman went to work full-time at Mary Sue in 1986 and became president in 1993. His grandfather, now 85, still goes to work every day to help supervise production.
Mr. Berman said he got the idea of turning the business into an Inner Harbor attraction after driving past the Pier 4 Power Plant, empty since the late 1980s.
For some time, he said, he has been intrigued with the idea of creating a candy factory that can be toured, like the Jack Daniels distillery in Tennessee or the Ben and Jerry's ice cream factory in Vermont. And he thought the Power Plant, with its millions of Inner Harbor visitors all around, would be an ideal setting.
But when Mr. Berman first approached city redevelopment officials with his idea, the Power Plant was under contract to a group that wants to create a sports-themed entertainment complex there. The development officials persuaded him to consider other waterfront sites.
One issue with the Power Plant and other buildings, Mr. Berman said, is that a candy factory is technically an industrial use, and most of downtown Baltimore's old working waterfront has been rezoned for commercial and residential use.
Turned into parking lots
The last industries were McCormick's spice plant and the News-American printing plant, both parking lots today. But Mr. Berman believes that since only part of the new operation would be a manufacturing site, it could qualify for a waiver from the zoning board. He said he will keep his storage space on Caton Avenue or another site, cutting down the need for truck deliveries except during the early morning.
In all, he said, he needs approximately 20,000 square feet of space -- about the equivalent of one floor in a new downtown office building.
The children's museum is expected to draw 400,000 visitors a year when it opens inside the FishMarket in late 1996.
Possible candy factory sites nearby include the upper floor of the Bazaar building, the two-story structure that has a Bennigan's restaurant on its first floor, and a portion of the former Brokerage shopping complex at 34 Market Place. Both are city-owned properties that fall within the area where planners are working to create a multi-faceted children's center, tentatively called Port Discovery, which would include children's-oriented retailers and offices for children's advocacy groups.
Museum board member Janet Marie Smith said her group has asked Mr. Berman to wait until its plans are farther along so it can tell whether there is room on Market Place for the candy factory.
"We thought the smartest thing to do was to get our design people on board, and have them help us make the decision," she said.
The design team will be selected by mid-January. Mr. Berman said he is willing to wait for now, and will use the time to refine his plans for Market Place.
If it turns out that no sites are available or workable on Market Place, Mr. Berman said he will consider properties on Key Highway near the Baltimore Museum of Industry, which already has exhibits on candy making.
His architect, Mr. Burns, said he favors a Market Place location because the candy factory would help draw visitors to the children's museum and the children's museum would help draw visitors to the candy factory.
"A lot of projects on Market Place haven't been successful because they were isolated" from their neighbors, Mr. Burns said. "The key is to take a comprehensive approach to the whole area. I see Mary Sue as a piece of a larger puzzle that needs to be put together to revitalize Market Place."
Sweet smell of success
Wherever it goes, Mr. Berman said, the candy factory will be a tribute to the sweet smell of success his family has enjoyed -- and that others can enjoy as well.
He has asked the designers to create a factory tour in which visitors will be able to make their own candy to take home -- as a reminder of what they saw and learned. Such a memento, he said, could impart an important motivational message for young people intimidated by the world of business: that they can
accomplish something worthwhile with their lives, even if they don't spend four years in college, as long as they do something well.
"In today's society, people are waiting for jobs to be offered to them and things to be done for them," he said. "If the experience we're creating does anything, I would like it to show young people that if you're good at making something, no matter what it is, and you can sell it, you don't have to wait for a job to come to you. You can make it happen for yourself."