Our Story
People holding freshly baked pies beside racks filled with homemade pies and baked goods
Family group posing with a green John Deere tractor outside Marilyn's Bakery and Johnson's farm market, decorated with pumpkins and cornstalks.
Child wearing a Marilyn's Bakery apron holds a large freshly baked crumb-topped pie.
Four people, including three chefs in black uniforms and a woman in a red dress, pose inside a bakery or confectionery shop.
My Mother’s Legacy
There was no glamorous beginning, no investors, and no business plan sitting in a leather binder. Just determination, exhaustion, and the belief that if she worked hard enough, she could build something meaningful for her family and community.
In 1986 my mother, Marilyn Pearson, found herself at one of life’s crossroads. Her husband was terminally ill and could no longer support the family. It was Marilyn’s time to step forward.
At a family gathering, Aunt Carol approached Marilyn and said, “Why don’t you open a little bakery inside the market?”
And that was that. Marilyn’s brother, Rod Johnson, not only gave her space inside the market, but helped her husband build the walls. Aunt Carol brought over her equipment, her recipes — and her patience — and helped Marilyn through that first summer.
The menu was simple: apple and cherry pies, white bread, and cinnamon rolls. Everything was done by hand.
Those early days were something else. We were brand new, just trying to make it through that first summer. Prices were rounded to the nearest 50 cents to make the math easier, and we made change out of our own pockets. The days were long, hot, and exhausting. There was no air conditioning and no real breaks.
That first year, it was just us, while my dad was sick. He still helped when he could. My mother worked in the kitchen with the help of Aunt Carol, Ruth Wilkinson and Carol Wheeler. We worked seven days a week, open to close. That was our summer.
Before I was a baker, I was a teacher. And it turns out... baking is mostly math (and science) anyway. Before Marilyn’s Bakery, I worked as a special education teacher at a high school in Chicago serving students with behavior disorders. When the school was eventually bought out and closed, my mom said to me, “Why don’t you come help me get organized and work for a year... or so.” That was the beginning of what I now refer to as the quiet manipulation to secure her retirement.
It has been meaningful to look back over the years and remember all the stories, the joys, the heartaches, the hard times, the wonderful people we have met. It really is a lifetime.
This is my mother’s bakery. It has always been Marilyn’s Bakery, and it will be her legacy. I am proud to be part of that story. It’s an honor to run the family business, and a joy to work with my son Tracy, who now runs pie and kolache production.
— Barbara
Barbara & Tracy making toffee
Shared Traditions
Some of our bakery recipes were handed down in our family, but many came from the local Northwest Indiana community!
Years ago, a woman came in asking for nut roll — a traditional Eastern European pastry. Marilyn was not familiar with nut roll. So the woman offered to teach her. “Come to my house, I will show you the way my grandmother taught me.”
This recipe was a legacy — something passed down from grandmother to granddaughter — made by memory.
In that kitchen, she didn’t just share a recipe, she shared a piece of her family. She taught Marilyn step by step, correcting, guiding, and insisting it be done the right way. Only when she was satisfied did she say, "Now you can make it."
That recipe has been part of our bakery and the Eastern European family’s legacy now continues as a part of our tradition.
Not Perfect, but Homemade and Heartfelt
Each year as Easter approaches, we’re reminded of one of Marilyn’s Bakery’s more… unfortunate traditions.
For many years we made classic Easter lamb cakes — pound cake baked in a lamb mold, frosted with buttercream, and covered in coconut. The coconut was traditional… but it also helped hide our decorating imperfections. (We didn’t even have a cake decorator until the early 2000s.)
In the early days, Jennifer Johnson helped before and after school, and one year our son-in-law Ed Jones — who had absolutely no bakery experience — joined in decorating the lambs.
And for years, everything went fine. Until suddenly… it didn’t. For reasons we never fully figured out, the lambs developed a structural weakness in the neck. One by one… their heads would fall off. We tried adjustments without success: More eggs. Longer baking times. Careful frosting “support systems” (toothpicks).
After too many decapitated lambs, we finally retired them. Unfortunately, not before a few children were traumatized at Easter dinner when the lamb’s head toppled off at the kids’ table.
Since then, we’ve switched to bunny cakes, which you can safely order without fear of anything falling off.
Stories like these remind us that Marilyn’s Bakery has never been perfect — but it has always been homemade, heartfelt, and full of stories worth sharing.
