Check please: Krispy Kreme's Minnesota legacy

The hype has been Harry Potter huge. Even when combined, Ricky Martin (in his Livin' La Vida Loca period, not that unfortunate She Bangs phase), R.T. Rybak 30 minutes after the polls closed and a post-Oprah Jonathan Franzen clutching his National Book Award couldn't generate half the heat of this juggernaut.

The name alone triggers a kind of toneless brainwashed trance normally associated with Ali McGraw line readings. "Krispy Kreme," the devotees whisper in a faraway voice, their eyes cloudy and unfocused, Krispy Kreme.

This blind devotion to the Holy Grail of doughnuts continued unabated last week. "Minnesota's First Krispy Kreme Breaks Ground Nov. 15," trumpeted the headline on the press release, a reference to a dignitaries-with-shovels ceremony in Maple Grove marking the fabled doughnut chain's entry into the state. Every media outlet in the state undoubtedly was there. Even a flip-flopping Sara Jane Olson doesn't get this kind of press.

Just one thing, though: The Maple Grove Krispy Kreme is not Minnesota's first. Just ask Sylvia Jesse. Her parents, Earl and Evelyn Jesse, have dibs on that legacy. Theirs was the Gopher State's first Krispy Kreme, a modest Richfield landmark -- marked by a large doughnut-shaped sign emblazoned with the words "Donut Shop" -- from the mid-1950s to the early '70s.

So much for our collective institutional memory. It has been about 18 months since the news broke that Krispy Kreme was considering blessing Minnesota with its presence. Several weeks after the stop-the-presses news first hit, Jesse attended her Richfield High School class of 1965 reunion.

"At the reunion, all my friends were coming up to me and saying, 'What's wrong, don't they remember your dad's doughnut shop?'" Jesse said.

She certainly does, and maintains a cherished archive that chronicles the history of her parents' shop. Besides a stack of black-and-white pictures and yellowing newspaper clippings, Jesse has held on to her parents' original Krispy Kreme licensing agreement, dated Jan. 1, 1956, and signed by her father and Vernon Rudolph, the company's charismatic founder.

The Jesses got into the doughnut business in 1948 with a Dixie Cream franchise at Lake St. and Columbus Av. in south Minneapolis. They moved their operation to fast-growing Richfield in 1952, setting up shop at 6405 Lyndale Av. S. Four years later, they switched corporate allegiances, dropping Dixie Cream and signing on with Krispy Kreme.

Unlike most contemporary Krispy Kremes, the Jesses' shop was open 24/7/365, with Earl managing the doughnut-making and Evelyn handling the bookkeeping and delivery. In the early days, Earl rolled and cut the doughnut dough by hand -- a far cry from the automated production lines that draw curious onlookers to today's Krispy Kremes -- and Evelyn would stack so many doughnut boxes into her car for her school delivery routes that she could barely see out the windows.

When they retired in 1972, the Jesses had 28 employees; two of them bought the couple out for $25,000 (about $107,000 in 2001 dollars, a far cry from what it costs to nail down a Krispy Kreme franchise today). The shop changed hands again before closing a few years later. It's still there, minus the giant doughnut, although it now is home to a tanning business. Earl Jesse died in 1976, and Evelyn Jesse in 1990.

Neither of the Jesse children chose to follow their parents into doughnuts. But their daughter, a retired flight attendant, doesn't want her parents' legacy forgotten.

"My parents worked hard, and they were successful," she said. "I want them to have credit for that."

Although she hasn't indulged in a Krispy Kreme since her parents sold their shop almost 30 years ago, Sylvia Jesse said she can still remember exactly how her favorites (a toss-up between the French and the chocolate-covered raised glazed) tasted. Her brother, Marvin, carries that same sense memory, too. He recently attended the grand opening of a Krispy Kreme in Oxnard, Calif.

"Marvin told me they don't taste like they used to," Jesse said. "He said, 'They're just not as good as Dad's doughnuts.'"

Still, when the "first" Krispy Kreme opens its doors in Maple Grove in the spring (a second will open at the Mall of America a few months later), will Sylvia Jesse be there?

"I think I should have a place of honor," she laughed. "First in line for a doughnut, don't you think?"

-- Rick Nelson is at rdnelson@startribune.com .