Sublunar Photography

The Armour Meat Packing Plant in East Saint Louis was constructed in 1903 and it closed in 1959. It was used to some capacity for a decade or two after the Armour Meat company left, but for all the subsequent years since, this industrial relic whose massive De La Vergne Double-Acting Refrigerating Machine (of which there are surely very few left in the world) and other assorted compressors and antique machinery stood here mostly undisturbed. The Double-Acting machine was a new technology in the late 1800's which produced compression on both strokes of the piston and this doubled the machine's capacity without changing its size footprint. The site had become something like an Industrial Revolution era museum slowly being overtaken by nature. Rarely do things like this last as long as it had here. This is what made Armour one of the most interesting locations I've had the opportunity to visit and I did so many times over the years. There was basically nowhere else like this still standing.

This post is from our last visit to Armour and was shot entirely on 35mm film. The light streaks/etc in some of the photos are a result of some technical film/developing issues-they were not intentional and are not edited-in/effects. My film attempts on this trip were nearly thwarted by the 40 year old camera I was using. First: the light meter stopped working. And then: the film/winder malfunctioned such that my first roll was totally ruined and my second roll was just barely spared. When I got to the end of the 24 exposures on the second roll and wound it up, the film was ripped out of the canister and was left on the internal winder of the camera. I suspected this to be the case and opened the camera in a (mostly) dark room, blindly verified the situation, and carefully pulled the film out and stuffed it into a lightproof can with warnings for the developer "BARE FILM INSIDE - DO NOT EXPOSE TO LIGHT". I wasn't sure any of these photos would even turn out. Eventually, I photographed the negatives themselves on a lightbox using my digital camera and then tediously converted them to "positives" and did my best to color correct them. They turned out.. not good.. but hey it's better than nothing. Shooting Armour on 35mm film was more of a creative experiment anwyway. Knowing that its days were numbered, I wanted to take the opportunity to capture Armour in a way that would differ significantly from any of my previous visits and if nothing else, I at least succeeded in doing that.

Unfortunately, just days after these photos were taken the venerable Armour Meat Plant was demolished in a controlled implosion, a video of which exists on youtube. In some of my shots below you can already see the holes drilled in the walls where the explosives were to be placed days later.

I knew someone who had worked hard to convince the owner of the site to do something with the steam engine along the lines of working with a museum to preserve it -anything but just cut it up and sell it for scrap. But as the video of the demolition shows, the awesome De La Vergne Engine was not removed prior to the implosion. I myself contacted the STL City Museum in hopes they'd pull it out of the rubble but I guess they had better things to do. As it turns out, the American Farm Heritage Musem came to the rescue at the very last minute and pulled the engine out of the rubble. I visited their location to confirm and was absolutely thrilled to know that, at least it's in good hands now and not a scrap pile. This museum has very little money/resources to set aside for the De La Vergne so you should totally go visit them (its worth it) and/or go to their website, become a member and donate to the project: The American Farm Heritage Museum.

Click here for the video from this trip.

See my previous photos, shot on newfangled digital technology, here.

Check out this sectional view of the Double-Acting machine. And this interesting diagram of the entire system here. Source: 1.

-RIP Armour-

This site started out in the 1870's as a locomotive repair shop for the Clover Leaf District of the Nickel Plate Railroad (which was formed through a merger of the New York, Chicago and St. Louis Railroad). The roundhouse and turntable were added in the early 1920's. "The Nickel Plate Road was one of the last major steam railroads to switch to the new diesel-electric locomotives. One reason for this was the famed 'Berkshires' a 2-8-4 wheel arrangement steam locomotive capable of pulling heavy freight trains at high speed. In the early 1950s, the Nickel Plate took a look at the diesels and decided to stick with the Berkshires."(3) Nickle Plate, with other mid-western railroads, eventually merged with Norfolk Southern in 1964 but the roundhouse here continued to service locomotives and rail cars through the 1970's. These buildings eventually fell into disuse and after 40 years the structure is unfortunately experiencing demolition through neglect and as of the time of this trip, most of the roof has collapsed.

Here's an awesome video of the last time this roundhouse saw action.

Source: 1, 2, 3.

The Armour Meat Plant was constructed in 1903 and operations began on June 15 under general manager Robert Conway. Tours of the facility and its operations were made available to visitors, most of whom consisted of the metropolitan and agricultural press and they were served a luncheon in the Exchange restaurant. This plant was located in East Saint Louis, Illinois in the center of a large conglomeration of stockyards and slaughterhouses. Farmers from all over the surrounding area would visit the stockyards to buy and sell cattle and other livestock, meats and related goods. In the first half of the 20th century, this was one of the busiest such locations in the United States.

These stockyards were devised to compete with the larger firms already well established in Chicago and and elsewhere. The first shipment of cattle arrived here, at was was called the "National City Stockyards" in 1873. By the turn of the 20th century, the stockyards were processing 50,000 animals a week and reaching annual sales of $2 million.

Philip Armour had already been established as a baron of meats. By 1883, he had established his own refrigerated fleet of rail cars. His plants were renowned for his large-scale pioneering efforts. Armour & Co. became one of the largest meatpacking companies in America by the 1890s, generating $110 million dollars in revenue in 1893.

Armour & Co. were also one of the first to take advantage of the byproducts of the slaughtering process and make use of what had otherwise been waste products. They sold every kind of product made from animals, from glue to oil, fertilizer, hairbrushes, buttons, and drugs. Armour famously declared that he made use of 'everything but the squeal'.

In 1948, Armour & Co. developed a deodorant soap by adding the germicidal agent AT-7 to their soap. This reduced bacteria on the skin and thereby limited body-odor. The new soap was named "Dial" due to its 24-hour protection against odor.

The stockyards continued to thrive during two world wars before eventually reaching peak production in 1947. The following decade, however, would see the decline of not only Armour but the stockyards in general. The advent of the automobile along with the interstate and rising labor costs all combined to bring about the decline of the out-dated stockyard operations and facilities. Meat was now being sold at terminal markets and the stockyards were swiftly becoming obsolete. The industry had shifted from its dependance on the railroads to interstate truck deliveries. Industrial farming had taken over much of the demand while individual farming was also on steep decline.

Armour, despite being owned by a major national firm with many other plants across the country, closed operations in East Saint Louis in 1959, laying off some 1,400 employees.

The centerpiece of this facility today is the giant De La Vergne Double-Acting Refrigerating Machine. More information on that coming soon.

Sadly, This Armour plant has been demolished.

Click here for the video from this location.

See our last visit to the great Armour Meat Plant, captured on 35mm film, here.

Source(s): 1, 2