His first job off the Wisconsin farm where he was born was to war torn France in 1917. At 21, Benjamin Moss served as a corporal in the United States Army during World War I. His immaculate handwriting and propensity to take care of details led to his assignment as a company clerk. It was a skill that lent itself well to his future career as one of the most successful businessmen in Riverton history. Ben was a grocer.
After the war, he moved back to Wisconsin to try his hand at farming. It didn’t pan out.
“He wasn’t good at it,” his youngest son Norman Moss said. “So, he moved west.”
Ben worked as a shoe salesman, worked in an ammunition factory and tried other jobs, but nothing clicked. He and his wife Marie moved to Montana.
It was a move that changed not only his life, but the economic lifestyle of Riverton, Lander and Thermopolis as well.
“He went to work for Sawyer Grocery in Montana and Wyoming,” Norman said. “He ended up in Thermopolis. They loved him.”
Ben worked as a manager for Sawyer’s earning $100 a month.
Ben worked for Sawyer from 1935 to 1945, but stepped out on his own as well, opening Moss Trading Company in Greybull in 1942 and ’43.
“It didn’t work out,” Norman said. “They eventually moved to Riverton.”
Ben and Marie had a large family, five boys and five girls.
In order of age Beverly, Avis, Owen, Kenneth, Marlyn, Evelyn, Allen, Richard and Lois arrived by 1937. In 1945, the couple had a surprise, a 10th child, when Norman arrived.
Ben’s younger brother Harry opened the Pay ‘N Save on Main Street in Riverton in 1939. Ben joined him in a partnership that had Harry managing the produce and dry goods and Ben running the meat counter.
The partnership didn’t work for the two brothers, and Ben purchased property on the corner of East Fremont and North Federal in Riverton.
Ben built a grocery store and a café at the location. Ben’s Supermarket was born.
“Dad was an enterprising guy,” Norman said. “Safeway was still on 3rd Street across from the Gem Theater.”
Safeway wasn’t the only competition in town in the grocery business.
Riverton from the World War II years until the late 1970s was home to many grocery stores.
When Ben opened his supermarket the Food Liner was in operation at the site of the present-day Wells Fargo Bank on Federal. Red and Black was selling groceries on the north side of the intersection of Main and Federal along with the Wyoming Market a few blocks west on the south side of Main Street. Pollard’s Grocery, Hartman’s and Marty’s Market continued up Main Street to the top of High School Hill.
And there was still Safeway, the only corporate store in town.
Ben had a nose for business, he was frugal in his dealings, worked with his own capital, never borrowing money to expand and was a whiz with numbers.
“He went to business college for just a year,” Norman said. “But he was keen with numbers.”
Ben hired Roy Cassidy to expand the existing building on the North Federal property and to renovate it into a state-of-the-art grocery store.
It was a family business. The boys all worked at the store growing up.
Norman, the youngest by almost a decade, started by bagging groceries, managing carts and cleaning up when he was 10.
“I was promoted to stocking shelves when I was a teenager, “Norman said. “I had my own marker. I was up town.”
Norman competed with other employees in stocking shelves as he grew up.
“We had friendly competitions,” Norman said. “Somebody would claim they’d stocked 45 boxes, then someone else would say he did 54. It went on like that, but we worked faster.”
The store remained lucrative through the 1950s as the kids grew up, went to school, the military, or were married and moved away. All five boys served, Norman joining Army ROTC as a business student at the University of Wyoming and eventually reaching the rank of captain.
“In 1956 and ’57, Dad sprouted wings,” Norman said. “He was doing well because everything was internally financed.”
In 1957, Ben purchased Ireland’s Market in Thermopolis and opened his second Ben’s Supermarket.
Ben’s eldest son, Owen, ran the Thermopolis store.
Ben decided to expand the store at North Federal and build another one on West Main.
The 1960s were boom years in Riverton as the uranium mines in the Gas Hills went into full production, eventually bringing over 4,000 workers to Fremont County and creating the boom town of Jeffrey City in the process.
“We have almost as much business as we can handle, Dad told me one day in the late 1950s,” Norman said.
Safeway was hampered by limited parking on Third Street. Residential neighborhoods to the south and other established businesses in the other three directions limited customer access.
Safeway purchased land a quarter mile north of Ben’s Supermarket on North Federal on the east side of the street in the present Rocky Mountain Sports building.
A rivalry began between Ben Moss and the corporate managers just down the road at Safeway.
The growth of grocery stores from 1940 to the 1970s reflected a different lifestyle than today.
There weren’t any fast-food restaurants in Riverton until the 1960s. A&W and the Dash-In were the only drive-ins for a long time. There were established sit down restaurants, but most people ate at home, cooked their own meals and didn’t go out to eat.
“If you wanted to eat, you went to the grocery store,” Norman said. “That’s why business was so good in the 50s and 60s.”
In 1963-64, a shopping center was built next to Safeway, and another competitor arrived with Woodward’s IGA soon after.
The work continued at Ben’s, expanding to the West Main location in 1964.
“When we built the store on West Main, Marty’s Market went out of business,” Norman said.
The work at the West Main store was identical to that done by Norman back in the 1950s.
“When I cleaned up, we used oiled sawdust on the floors,” Norman said. “I’d spread the sawdust, then sweep it. It made a nice shine on the tile.”
Norman was promoted again, to run one of the three registers in the store.
“It wasn’t like today with scanners,” Norman said. “You had to check, weigh, and figure tax in your head, or from a chart next to the register.”
Ben purchased merchandise locally, and from Associated Grocers in Salt Lake City.
“We drove a Diamond T truck to Salt Lake,” Norman said. “We did all our own trucking. My brother Allen was our driver.”
Allen lived in Thermopolis and drove the truck to Thermopolis on Sunday, arriving in Salt Lake City on Monday, and filling orders for both stores.
“Allen came back on Tuesday, and we unloaded and stocked shelves,” Norman said.
Ben had an eye for fresh fruit as well and preferred Utah peaches to those grown in Colorado.
“We sold a whole truck of peaches in one day,” Norman said.
Ben sent Allen a little further west to Idaho where he often picked up entire truckloads of onions, peaches and potatoes.
The Idaho potatoes were only an occasional purchase. Ben bought locally from John Suppes. Suppes raised quality potatoes north of Riverton and sold them in 100-pound burlap bags.
“We’d open the 100-pound bags and put them into 10-pound plastic bags to sell,” Norman said. “John was a great guy.”
Young Norman accompanied Allen to Salt Lake a few times and was amazed by the “banana room” at Associated Grocers.
On one wintry trip, Ben rode with Allen to Salt Lake. On the way home, it began to snow hard on South Pass. Allen went off the road.
“Dad was there to help Allen put chains on the truck and they made it back home,” Norman said.
Ben was an unassuming man, driving a 1948 Packard well beyond it’s intended lifetime.
Dr. Hal Makin, a well-known Riverton physician of the era said of Ben, “What you see is what you get with Ben Moss.”
When the grand opening took place KWRL (Riverton, Worland and Thermopolis AM) did a remote at the location. Ben was taciturn, with single word answers to the broadcasters’ questions. Owen stepped in and elaborated on the many new features the store offered including dairy cases, produce chillers and freezers.
“We had an advantage over Safeway,” Norman said. “We let customers charge on account. We had many Native American customers who came in, signed a ticket and paid in full once a month. We had a lot of Native American customers.”
One year, Ben decided to open the store on Labor Day. It was a fantastic sales day, but nearly broke the staff.
“We thought we were prepared,” Norman said. “We got swamped. We had three registers, and I ran number three. We checked for eight straight hours. We ran out of milk, bread and emptied the meat case.”
Opening on a holiday was new to Riverton, but it soon became a practice.
“Bob Woodward came in and asked Dad if he would close on Sunday. Dad said no,” Norman said. “He enjoyed every part of the business.”
Tragedy struck the store in Thermopolis. A late Saturday night fire destroyed the original Ireland building and the entire stock. The loss was estimated at $60,000
“They built a new store, but Owen wasn’t happy in Thermopolis, he didn’t think the market was big enough,” Norman said. “Owen was a go getter. He proposed they build a store on Lincoln Street in Lander.”
Norman was home from college in Laramie when Ben said, “Let’s go to Lander and look at the footings.”
Norman didn’t share his father and brother’s enthusiasm, “I wasn’t impressed. There were weeds growing all around the site and it was off Main Street,” he said.
Ben didn’t want to pay the much higher price for a location on Main Street, so he built a block away on Lincoln.
“It was a bad idea,” Norman said. “But Owen wanted to get out of Thermopolis.”
Mr. D’s was already established in Lander and Safeway was on the other side of Main Street, also on Third near City Hall.
“It was a bad deal,” Norman said. “We tried a 30-foot-wide sign with arrows pointing that said “Ben’s. We rented a spot on Main Street for a sign pointing to the store, but none of it worked. You never want to put more on your plate than you can handle. The Federal store in Riverton kept Lander afloat.”
Ever the innovator, Ben opened a bakery inside the Federal store.
“Carl Hawk was the Safeway manager, Dad really liked Carl,” Norman said. “Soon after we opened a bakery, Safeway did too.”
Owen added a bakery in Lander.
“We were doing well, despite the competition,” Norman said.
That competition soon began to fade. The Food Liner closed, followed by Marty’s Market and the Red and Black.
The town was down to Woodward’s, Safeway, Pay ‘N Save and the two Ben’s Supermarkets.
While the Federal store was doing well, the West Main location wasn’t paying its way.
“Dad decided to change the name to Shoprite,” Norman said. “He called it a discount store, and it worked, people came in.”
Ben’s had later hours than the competition. Pay ‘N Save closed at 7pm. The Main Street Ben’s store closed at 8 pm and the Federal location at 9.
“One evening I was with my dad in the old, old store. A man came in with two boys about 12 and 14 years old. He approached my dad at the check stand and asked for something to eat. I noticed he had a cigarette in his hand. Without hesitation my dad rounded up some lunch meat, bread, and milk. I mentioned to my dad that apparently, he had money to buy cigarettes. So, I asked him why did you give them something to eat? He said I didn’t do it for him, I didn’t want the two boys to go hungry,” Norman said.
Shoplifting hadn’t been a problem, but as Riverton changed, so did petty crime.
“Pilferage ate away at your profits,” Norman said. “But we never prosecuted anyone.”
He related the story of a teenager he encountered with a watermelon on his shoulder sneaking through the trees.
“I wrote down his license plate and called the police,” Norman said. “We didn’t prosecute him, but just wanted him to know we’d seen him do it. He came down to the store and apologized.”
Ben was in his 70s and growing tired of the business. He turned it over to his sons but couldn’t stay away.
Around 1971, he purchased the corner lot where the Sundowner is now located for $25,000 and opened a final store, The Consumer Market.
He bought a liquor license as well and for the first time in his business career, he sold alcohol.
“He just couldn’t stay out of the business,” Norman said.
Ben passed away in 1973, at 77.
Ben’s Supermarket closed for good in 1983.
Bob Woodward purchased the West Main property.
The Hardee’s restaurant chain tried to purchase the North Federal property, but a survey discovered gasoline and other petrochemicals under the property and the sale didn’t take place.
The Lander store sold as well, and the new owners tried to keep it going, but closed after three years.
At one time, Ben’s Supermarket was the largest Wyoming owned chain in the state, but time, corporate marketing and the end of the boom times in Riverton took their toll.
The buildings remain, but the businesses that raised 10 children in a rapidly growing community are gone forever.