B&Bs SERVE UP HEARTY HELPING OF HOSPITALITY

There's a stranger in the house. Yet, in the span of few hours, the stranger has become a friend.

"Bed and Breakfast hosts normally don't think of the people that stay with them as customers, rather they're guests," explained Tom Neumeyer of The Olive Branch Bed & Breakfast, 25 S. Lorimier.

Few businesses incorporate the elemental hospitality that is involved with the opening of one's home.

Such lodgings and customs, deeply ingrained in European heritage, are only recently attracting wide-scale attention among potential hosts and patrons across the United States. Locally, more than a half a dozen residents have opened their doors as Bed and Breakfast homes since 1988, several within recent months.

The opportunity to form new acquaintances in relaxed surroundings attracts guests and hosts to the burgeoning field.

Bed and Breakfast guests are often "looking for an opportunity to meet people and talk with them, whether they be other guests or the owner," said Fred Hoelscher of The Bellevue Bed & Breakfast, 312 Bellevue St. Hoelscher and his wife, Jackie, opened their Bed and Breakfast in September, 1993.

Oftentime, Bed and Breakfast patrons are seeking "something to take them away from the mad rush," said Trisha Wischmann of Trisha's Bed & Breakfast in Jackson.

Wischmann and her husband Gus were ground breakers in the Bed and Breakfast field in the region. They opened their 203 Bellevue St. home to overnight guests in the autumn of 1988.

"We were introduced to Bed and Breakfast in Europe when my husband was in the army," Wischmann said. "You really get to know an area and the people in the area if you're actually in their home and experience their food."

Subsequently, the Wischmanns decided that the Bed and Breakfast experience could fit well within the southeast Missouri landscape.

It was a hunch that was right on target.

"There are very few weekends when I don't have someone," Wischmann said. April and May are particularly busy months at Trisha's and "October is always the biggest month," she said.

The camaraderie a Bed and Breakfast offers does not end with host and guest. Referrals among the local inns are commonplace.

"The more Bed and Breakfasts there are, the better," said Wischmann. "People tend to be drawn to an area that has a lot of Bed and Breakfasts."

Wischmann, who was the 1993 president of Bed and Breakfast Inns of Missouri, an organization with some 60 members, noted that the number of Bed and Breakfast homes in the state has increased from 150 in 1988 to the current number of 350.

That trend is reflected in the region.

Other Bed and Breakfast Inns in the area include: The River Walk, 444 Marie St., owners are David and Cheryl Kinder, her parents, William and Jannette Pogue, and a cousin, Jeannie Stout, who is innkeeper; The Rivendell, 151 S. Spanish Street, owners are Dr. and Mrs. James T. Hall; The Whitehouse, Washington and Bellevue streets, Jackson, owners are Vi and Norman Colyott; and Ricketts House, Marble Hill, with innkeeper Mary Hennemann. Hennemann's mother, Alma Ricketts, owns the home.

Tom Neumeyer, who with his wife, Terri, opened The Olive Branch Bed & Breakfast four years ago, noted that "you cannot pigeon- hole people that stay at Bed and Breakfasts."

Likewise, each inn is as unique as its owners.

From broad verandas to cozy parlors graced with fireplaces, from gourmet breakfasts to flap jacks and grits, styles and tastes vary.

It's that color that also prompts homeowners to plunge into the growing industry.

"We've had people from all over the U.S. and the world -- Germany, Russia, Israel, for example," Neumeyer noted. Meeting such a cross section of people is an enriching and rewarding experience, he said.

Running a Bed and Breakfast, he said, is more than a business. "It's somewhere between a lifestyle and a way of life," he reflected.