1 Kopeck 1908.
Court Supplier D. I. Filippov.

The Filippovs were a Moscow merchant family, founders of a famous bakery business. The founder was Maksim Filippov, a former serf from the village of Kobelevо in Kaluga Governorate, who arrived in Moscow in 1803 (1806). At first he worked part-time as a baker; then, having saved some money, he became the owner of his own bakery at the corner of the Boulevard Ring and Myasnitskaya Street. Maksim Filippov, together with his family, baked and sold kalachi and pies with various fillings in the city’s trading rows.

After his father’s death, the business was continued by his son, Ivan Maksimovich (1824–78). By that time the Filippov family had three baking establishments: a kalach shop, a roll shop, and a baranki shop—on Tverskaya, in Manukhin’s house; on Sretenka, in the Spas house; and on Pyatnitskaya, in their own house.

Ivan Maksimovich had strong commercial instincts and enterprise. He was among the first to revive in Moscow the “field-to-counter” production chain. A pound of well-baked bread in Moscow before the first revolution cost 1 kopek. This was the so-called “sour bread” (the black bread of the Russian countryside). Filippov was the first in Russia to organize a bread shop attached to a bakery. In the bakery on Sretenka, the city’s soon-famous pies also appeared for the first time—filled with offal, kasha, cabbage, dried sturgeon cartilage (viziga), and more.

In Filippov’s roll shops, loaves were checked for freshness as follows: the shop assistant put the loaf on a perfectly clean counter, pressed it down with all his might, and then lifted his hand. After 5–6 seconds, fresh baked goods, slowly letting out air, returned to their former shape. A spoiled loaf or round bread, a saika or a krendel could not make it to the main counter—by established rule, a lopsided krendel was sold at half price.

From 1855, I. M. Filippov held the title Supplier to the Court of His Imperial Majesty, awarded for excellent quality and a wide assortment of products. In 1864, Filippov opened his first roll shop in St. Petersburg, at 45 Nevsky Prospekt. But the Neva water was not suitable for Filippov’s kalachi. The court baker had to transport oak tubs of Mytishchi water on courier trains of the Nikolaev Railway so that the dough for court bread in St. Petersburg could be kneaded with it.

How Ivan Maksimovich “invented” raisin saikas was vividly and entertainingly described by journalist V. A. Gilyarovsky in his famous book “Moscow and Muscovites.” In 1848–1859, the “all-powerful dictator of Moscow” was Governor-General A. A. Zakrevsky, whose breakfast every morning included hot saikas from Filippov. Once, one of those saikas contained a baked cockroach:

“- Wh-what is this filth! Bring me the baker Filippov!—roared the ruler over his morning tea.

The servants, not understanding what was going on, dragged the frightened Filippov to their superior.

- Wh-what is this? A cockroach?—and he shoves the saika with the baked cockroach at him.—Wh-what is it? Huh?..

- It’s a raisin, sir!

- You’re lying, scoundrel! Are there such things as raisin saikas? Get out!

Filippov ran into the bakery, grabbed a sieve of raisins and, to the great horror of the bakers, dumped them into the saika dough.

An hour later Filippov treated Zakrevsky to raisin saikas, and a day later there was no end of customers.

- And it’s very simple! It all comes out by itself—just know how to seize it,” Filippov would say when raisin saikas were mentioned.”

In his business, Ivan Maksimovich liked doing things on a grand scale. The author of “Moscow and Muscovites” wrote that “when a cart carrying a birthday pie ordered from him by rich people drove out of the yard of the bakery on Tverskaya, the gates had to be taken off, because the pie was so large that it would not fit through them. It was an astonishing sight. All Moscow would run to watch.”

According to recollections of Filippov family members, “he was an unusual man.” It is known, for example, that his office was “papered with banknotes—‘katenki.’” Around the city, Filippov’s horses were recognized by the fact that they were shod with pure silver, in a regal manner. Filippov was selective and did not seize every opportunity to make money. He had a peculiar honesty. Where other bakers did not even consider it sinful to make money through cheating, Filippov acted differently.

The famous entrepreneur was also renowned for his charity. On holidays he baked large batches of bread to order and sent these “bread gifts” to prisoners in Butyrka Prison. At the same time, as V. A. Gilyarovsky testified, first, he “never sent rejects to the prisoners, but always fresh kalachi and saikas; second, he kept a special account showing how much profit these orders for alms produced, and this profit he personally took to the prison in full and donated to improve the food of sick prisoners. And he did all this ‘very simply.’ Not for gain, nor for medals, nor for the uniform distinctions of charitable institutions.”

In addition, Ivan Maksimovich was an “agent” of the first Sushchevsky district office of the guardianship for the poor in Moscow, and a member of the Council of Moscow children’s shelters. It is known that he supplied baked goods to the Nikolaev Home for the Care of Poor Widows and Orphans. All his life I. M. Filippov belonged to the Moscow Merchant Society, and a year before his death he was elected a member of the City Duma. For his charitable activity and services to entrepreneurship, he was awarded the Order of St. Anna, 2nd class, and became a hereditary honorary citizen of Moscow.

From 1877, I. M. Filippov was elected a member of the Moscow City Duma. For services to entrepreneurship he was awarded the Order of St. Anna, 2nd class.

In 1878, after Ivan Maksimovich’s death, the firm “Filippov, Ivan’s Heirs” was established, headed at first by his widow Tatyana Ivanovna, and from 1881 by his son Dmitry. From two marriages I. Filippov had seven sons; three continued their father’s business. As they grew up, Ivan Ivanovich received his own roll shop on Sretenka, and Nikolai Ivanovich (where—unknown). The main roll shop remained the store on Tverskaya. After the brothers’ deaths, all the roll shops were again concentrated in the hands of Dmitry Ivanovich Filippov (by the end of the 1890s).

D. I. Filippov had roll shops-confectioneries on Tverskaya, Sretenka, Myasnitskaya Street, and in other prestigious locations. In the roll shop on Tverskaya, by the beginning of the 20th century, a factory was already operating, which included: rusk, baranki, and pastry-confectionery departments; two departments for German bread; departments for Starodub bread, Riga bread, St. Petersburg table bread, black bread, white bread, and Swedish bread; fried pies; and kalach and rasstegai departments. The factory had caramel workshops and a marmalade shop. In the basement they cooked fruit; the Filippovs did not use imported candied fruits. Back in Ivan Maksimovich’s time it had become customary to make agreements with owners of orchards near Moscow, Voronezh, and Kursk for the supply of fruit and berries.

At the beginning of the 20th century, D. I. Filippov rebuilt the building of the main roll shop on Tverskaya (architect N. A. Eikhenvald), and opened a fashionable coffeehouse in the corner part of the building—later the “Central” restaurant. The interior design involved artist P. P. Konchalovsky and sculptor S. T. Konenkov. In 1911, premises for the “Lux” hotel for 550 guests were added to the left part of the building. (In 1920 it was converted into a Comintern dormitory; now it is the “Centralnaya” Hotel.) By that year, D. Filippov already owned 16 roll shops and bakeries.

The working day in the bakeries reached 16 hours, and for apprentices up to 18 hours a day. For backbreaking labor from early morning until late at night, the owner paid 15–20 kopeks, more rarely 30–40 kopeks. Apprentices’ wages did not exceed three rubles a month at all. At the same time, almost no one received their full earnings because of a flourishing system of fines. Working and living conditions did not meet even basic sanitary standards or safety requirements.

Filippov’s bakers first went on strike back in 1903. The police were called in; the strikers began to be pushed back toward the roll shop. They took up cobblestones—the good old weapon of the proletariat. The troops, just in case, fired on the store. In 1904, a workers’ circle arose in the bakery on Tverskaya, turned into a center from which overall leadership of the preparation of collective actions was carried out. In 1905, 650 workers of Filippov’s roll shop organized a bakers’ strike in Moscow. On September 25, there was a clash between strikers and police and Cossacks—there were killed and wounded, 197 people were arrested; by October, Filippov’s bakers created a fighting squad, and later took part in the December armed uprising.

The consequences of the strike for the roll shop were quite lamentable—the shop became shabby, turning from a luxurious and respectable establishment into a place that was almost disreputable. Ivan Bunin, for example, wrote about a certain Kazimir Stanislavovich: “In Filippov’s coffeehouse he drank chocolate, leafed through tattered humorous magazines.” Although only quite recently the management would not have allowed in the coffeehouse either tattered periodicals, or all the more “humorous” ones. All sorts of dubious characters began to appear there. For example, Mayakovsky.

In July 1906, the situation became even more acute. The strike continued, and Filippov, like other bakery owners, suffered losses. Then he decided to make concessions to the workers, offering holiday rest, work in two shifts, and a pay raise, thereby provoking dissatisfaction among other entrepreneurs. However, he did not retreat, taking an independent position based on sober calculation. As a result, his workers returned to their jobs and resumed baking bread. The daily turnover of Filippov’s roll shops increased. But by that time the firm already owed creditors about 3 million rubles.

To save the business, the firm declared bankruptcy. By decision of the Moscow Commercial Court, management of the firm’s affairs from 1905 to 1915 was carried out by an administration consisting of company employees and representatives of creditors. In 1913, a total of 2,951 people worked at the Filippovs’ enterprises: in Moscow—1,558; in St. Petersburg—943; in Tsarskoye Selo and Gatchina—189; in Rostov-on-Don—150; in Tula—97; in Saratov—114.

The opening of a new store and bakery on Posolskaya Street in Tula was the last thing Dmitry Ivanovich managed to do in his life. A month after the housewarming—on December 9, 1908—the court baker died. After Dmitry Ivanovich’s death, his business was continued by his sons Nikolai, Dmitry, and Boris. In fact, the head of the firm became his stepson Nikolai. After the end of the administration’s trusteeship in March 1915, he organized, as a full partnership, the “Trading House of the Filippov Brothers.”

The family firm existed until nationalization after the revolution. The owner of the firm was forced to emigrate to Brazil. From the once-famous Filippov empire, only the “bread” names of Moscow streets and lanes have survived to this day: Kalashny, Khlebny, and others.

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