An Aliquippa original since 1958.
Four generations of McKittrick family ownership, one corner on Brodhead Road, and the same recipe handed down since the beginning.
In 1958, Lawrence McKittrick bought a small donut shop in downtown Aliquippa. Everyone called him Mac, so the shop became Mac's. He ran it the only way he knew how. Make it fresh, keep it simple, and treat people like neighbors.
It started with a steelworker named Mac.
Mac was a mill man first. He kept his shift at Jones and Laughlin Steel and made donuts on the side, the way you did in a steel town when you wanted to build something of your own.
The shop started on Kennedy Boulevard, moved out to Brodhead Road, and in 1970 crossed the road to the corner the family would call home for the next sixty years.
A family business, one generation at a time.
When Mac and Wanda retired in 1978, their son James and his wife Twila took the reins. They had three kids and not a lot of money, and plenty of people told them it was a risk. They built the shop that still stands today and kept the fryers going seven days a week. In the early 1990s, James suffered a brain aneurysm. It could have been the end of Mac's. Instead his son J.W. came home from college, put on an apron, and stood beside his mother at the counter.
A mother and son making donuts, just like the generation before them. James passed in 2002, and a piece of him stayed in the shop every morning after. Four generations of McKittricks worked that bakery. Kids who once climbed the stacks of donut mix grew up to run the place, and their kids washed trays and swept floors on Saturday mornings. That is how a recipe survives sixty-eight years. You hand it down.
Made by hand, before sunrise.
The work always started the night before. The crew came in at night and turned out more than three hundred dozen by morning, glazed and cream filled, custard and sprinkled, the long johns people drove out of their way for. Glazed was always the best seller. Cream filled was right behind it. The custard and the cream were made from scratch, every single day.
By dawn the shop was open and the route was running, fresh donuts heading out to dozens of spots across Beaver County so the earliest risers had something warm waiting. Hot glazed on weekend mornings. Cakes with a day's notice. Specialty donuts when the mood struck. The same fresh donut, made the same way, since 1958.
The town showed up.
In 2012, a national chain opened a quarter mile down the road. People worried about the little shop that made everything by hand. They did not need to. Friends and regulars organized a Mac's Donuts Appreciation Weekend, and the town came out in droves. The lines never stopped. It turned out you cannot truck in what Mac's had spent decades building, one name and one face at a time.
For years the same people stood behind that counter, some of them for thirty and forty years. They knew their regulars by name, knew the order before it was spoken, and once sang to one of their own on her way to be married. That is the part you cannot put in a fryer. That is the part we intend to keep.
Still Mac's.
In June of 2026, after sixty-eight years and four generations, the McKittricks served their last batch and handed Mac's to a new family. We do not take that lightly. The recipes stay. The counter stays. The red and white bag your dad carried home off the midnight shift stays.
What changes is what should change. The biggest one is the coffee. We rebuilt it from the ground up, so now there is a cup worth ordering right next to your dozen. From there the cold side is growing too, with cold brew, iced drinks, flavored sodas, and made-to-order specialties for the afternoon crowd. A shop that is easier to find, easier to reach, and ready for the next sixty years.
Sixty-eight years on Brodhead Road.
Lawrence "Mac" McKittrick and his wife Wanda buy a donut shop in downtown Aliquippa. Mac keeps his shift at J&L Steel and makes donuts on the side.
The shop settles into its home on Brodhead Road. The corner that becomes Mac's for the next sixty years.
Mac and Wanda retire. Their son James and his wife Twila become the second generation and build the shop that stands today.
James suffers a brain aneurysm. His son J.W. comes home from the University of Pittsburgh to run the shop alongside his mother. The third generation begins.
James McKittrick passes. The family keeps the fryers going.
A national chain opens a quarter mile away. The community answers with a Mac's Donuts Appreciation Weekend. The lines never stop.
Four generations of McKittricks have now worked the bakery. A legacy built one batch at a time.
After sixty-eight years, the McKittricks hand Mac's to a new family. Same recipes, same counter, new ownership.
Fresh donuts every morning, plus an expanding lineup of coffee and cold drinks. Still made by hand on Brodhead Road.
Built by the people who showed up every morning.
For decades, the same faces stood at this counter, some of them for thirty and forty years. That kind of loyalty is rare. It is part of what Mac's is built on.
The counter on Brodhead Road
Ready before sunrise
Same fryer, same recipe
The red and white bag since 1958
The local press has written about Mac's for years.
Word from the neighbors
Sixty-eight years on Brodhead Road earns a few opinions. Here's what people say about Mac's.
Time for a fresh donut, don't you think?
Fresh every morning on Brodhead Road since 1958. We open at 5am, and the first batch goes fast.