Development Part 5: Industrial Suburb and Ethnicity David A. Lanegran Geography Department Macalester College Geography of the Twin Cities

Gate to St. Paul Union Stockyards. In 1885, the expansion of the cattle industry on the northern plains caused the Cattlemen's Associations to request larger and better livestock transfer facilities and slaughter houses in the Twin Cities. The first yards located in the St. Anthony Park industrial area of midway was too small, and the owners were unwilling to invest in upgrades. As a result, the developer A. P. Stickney developed huge stockyards in what became the city of South St. Paul.

This old post card depicts the exchange building in South St. Paul. This building housed the commission companies that sold the producers' livestock to the meat packers and made money by charging a commission on all the sales. The stockyards were essentially a very large auction with several meat packing companies such as Swift, Armour, Rifkin, Cudahy, Hormel and smaller companies biding for livestock.

Stickney and his associates built huge stockyards but did not build a town to house workers, nor did they build the slaughter houses. Here we see the main street in South St. Paul in about The large buildings are the commission building, a bank and a department store.

As the livestock industry expanded during the 20th Century, South St. Paul became the second largest stockyards in the United States and therefore the world. The pens hold animals awaiting sale; Swift Packinghouse (slaughter house) is visible at the north end of the stockyards.

The livestock business was somewhat seasonal. Here we see the huge flocks of sheep that were shipped via trains from the high plains during the fall. Hogs are visible in the covered pens along the alley way.

This rare photo, taken from inside a packing house at the turn of the century, shows hog carcasses cooling.

Here we see some of the special livestock operations that developed around the large slaughterhouse. This is the Luers Dairy cow sale barn. Swift's barn is in the background.

This photo shows the development of the commercial strip adjacent to the stockyards and railroad yards.

There were not enough people living in the upper Midwest to operate the huge stockyards and slaughterhouse complex built in South St. Paul. Therefore, labor was recruited in industrial cites in the eastern United States and in Europe. The labor recruiters went to the empires of eastern and southeastern Europe to recruit workers. Because the slaughtering operation was based on traditional agricultural craft activities, many Europeans could move from village life to the industrial city and use their existing skills. Here we see the Romanian Orthodox Church built in 1924 on the hill above the stockyards.

This is the front door of St. Sava Serbian Orthodox Church built in It took the small Serbian community several years to build their own facility.

A close-up view of St. Sava Serbian Orthodox Church.

Similar to many other immigrant groups, the Croatian community built an ethnic-based organization to provide insurance and cultural support for its members.

The Croatians were Roman Catholic, so they did not build their own church. Instead they built a social hall that now serves the entire community.

The Serbians also built a social hall, one block from the Croatian Hall, but the community's small size prevented the community from supporting the Hall.