THE ‘EGG MAN’ DELIVERS

For 75 years, farm has brought service to customers’ doors

Eichner’s Family Farm on Richard Road in McCandless has been in the same family for four generations since it was purchased in 1897 by German immigrant John Richard. It’s known for its fresh eggs available at the farm’s market or from two egg routes in the North Hills that have been run continuously for 75 years.

Every other week, Richard “Dick” Eichner, 84 — the “Egg Man,” as his customers call him — packs up his worn 1993 Buick Roadmaster station wagon and heads out on his deliveries.

“I think I am the last of the egg men,” he said.

But while Mr. Eichner may be one of the last of his kind here, other areas of the country — especially California and Colorado — are seeing a resurgence of home deliveries of fresh eggs and milk.

Customers call Mr. Eichner’s eggs the “freshest in Pittsburgh,” but they also cackle about the conversation they get during deliveries.

“If I want to know what’s going on in the neighborhood, I ask Dick,” said Walter Klingworth of the Perrysville section of Ross. “It’s the friendship that grew — and the eggs are still warm when we get them, pulled out from underneath a chicken that day.’’

Ron Eichner, a fourth-generation farmer — and one of Richard and Vi Eichner’s four children — calls the delivery service the “original farm-totable movement.” On a recent egg run with his dad, Ron Eichner recalled how the tradition began. He said his dad was about 7 years old when he accompanied his father, the late Michael Eichner, to Benton Avenue on the North Side to buy a watering trough for the farm’s livestock.

“Mr. Gruber, who owned the store there, said to my dad, ‘The next time you come in, bring some eggs. My neighbors might want some, too.’ ”

From three original egg buyers, the delivery route has grown to 500 customers today who receive eggs from Eichner hens, which produce nearly 1,500 eggs a day on the 18-acre site off Route 19.

“And I was the young legs for my father and grandfather,” Ron Eichner recalled of earlier egg runs.