Knights of the Golden Circle links to Tabor, Iowa

[L.C. BAKER]

There was speculation that had already taken place prior to 1858 concerning railroad money and who was going to make it and where it was going to stop along the way. S.F. Nuckolls and partners were all over it, of course they had quite a bit of inside information and help doing it. https://www.thehistoricalsociety.org/ewExternalFiles/A Railroad History of Council Bluffs UNIT1.pdf

 

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[senior deacon]

L. C. Perhaps a mafia hit. Seems as if after the rails hit Omaha they ran north and south. Sioux City stock yards up until the 1960's were bigger than Chicago, Omaha, or even Ft. Worth. 4 packing plants, Ice for shipping it back east. Armour, Rath, Swift, Hormel, Morell all the big boys had plants in Iowa. Before the railroad no big plants. From about 1870's on the big meat packers showed up in Iowa. Waterloo, Cedar Rapids, Dubuque, Ottumwa, Ft. Dodge, and Sioux City. If there was a railroad and a large town a packer set up shop. This was only the tip of the iceberg the support people and businesses added. Know doubt he had his fingers in those pies too. Kickbacks, bribes and investments. The era of the robber barons one reason General Dodge's home is one of the largest on the high bluffs overlooking the Missouri River.
At the time the Railroads were coming thru Iowa they could make or break a community. I have read that the Railroads were given traces of land to use as they wished to bring a road thru a town. Even in our small county no less that three towns disappeared because of the by pass of the Railroads. The larger town grew and smaller towns on the lesser lines stayed small and finally when the Railroads pull the tracks they are drying up. Not dead but close and are fading fast.

Senior Deacon

 

[L.C. BAKER]

Not much has changed S.D. as far as the rails go anyway. The main trunk line of the "transcontinental" turned South just West of Omaha, but the hub became Omaha instead of Nebraska City. That put a kink in their investment plans as far as the hub went, but they made damn sure everything else West of Nebraska City was still a go!

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[senior deacon]

Dang L.C. we may be missing something. Rivers it occurred to me that a packing plant needs water both summer and winter to run. Along with fast transportation. Back in the day they didn't have over the road trucks with swinging beef and refrigeration. They had box cars and rail roads. Look at where the packing houses were located all along rivers. The Ceder, Des Moines, the Iowa, Missouri, and Mississippi. Ice and water. Think we need to look hard to their basic needs as to where they were.

They weren't dumb they had most of their early operations in the north. You need cold weather like we are having now to have a successful operation. Come on cold weather good for business bad for people.


Senior Deacon

 

[L.C. BAKER]

Dang L.C. we may be missing something. Rivers it occurred to me that a packing plant needs water both summer and winter to run. Along with fast transportation. Back in the day they didn't have over the road trucks with swinging beef and refrigeration. They had box cars and rail roads. Look at where the packing houses were located all along rivers. The Ceder, Des Moines, the Iowa, Missouri, and Mississippi. Ice and water. Think we need to look hard to their basic needs as to where they were.

They weren't dumb they had most of their early operations in the north. You need cold weather like we are having now to have a successful operation. Come on cold weather good for business bad for people.


Senior Deacon

Selling the ice of the Mighty Mo was an industry back then for sure. Some of the first train cars that were refrigerated were also packed with ice until they started building refrigerated train cars in Chicago, and by they I mean the same crew that had the monopolies on the rails.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mark_Morton_(businessman)

L.C.

 

[senior deacon]

Yes and the ice business was a big business back before people had a Norge in the kitchen. I have been talking to a 92 year old fellow who's family was in the ice business here in town. He remembers the older boys cutting ice above the dams in the winter. It wasn't until the 1930's that they got ice machines to make ice. He was then old enough to help in the ice plant. Most of the ice was sold to the local coke-a-cola bottling plant. By the early 1950's it was a thing of the past and he came back from the war and went to work for the county.

In our case it is a follow the money trail. Like a giant spiders web. Get close to the center a get sent in a different direction. Will we ever reach the center of the web. We are caught right now when we reach the center will we escape?

Senior Deacon

 

[L.C. BAKER]

Some truth in every story.

https://history.nebraska.gov/publications/h-p-bennet-and-nebraskas-first-territorial-legislature