Topic: Found Film

[Bryan]

More 6X6 negatives, shot on November 29, 1954.
1819 & 1821 - Congratulations to Ralph Pemmons on winning the 5th Week's Prize! Looks like he's showing his wife what he did to win the prize.
1822 - I guess this guy is showing his wife why he didn't win the 5th Week's prize.  Looks like he broke something. 

[Indofunk]

New photo theme: a man kneeling in front of a woman, ostensibly showing her something, while another man stands by in the background.

[Francois]

I showed the pictures to my mom and she said that the one with the computer (1896) on the far wall looks a lot like the Burrows Business Machine she used when she worked at the Bank of Montreal.
The big form was the Bank accounting and the small cards on the left were the client cards

[Bryan]

New photo theme: a man kneeling in front of a woman, ostensibly showing her something, while another man stands by in the background.

Some serious mansplaining going on there. 

[Bryan]

I showed the pictures to my mom and she said that the one on the far wall looks a lot like the Burrows Business Machine she used when she worked at the Bank of Montreal.
The big form was the Bank accounting and the small cards on the left were the client cards

The one against the back wall looks like an IBM Type 82 Sorter.  That model came out in 1949.  At it's peak they had about 4,000 people working at this plant, that would be a lot of payroll to sort through. 

http://www.columbia.edu/cu/computinghistory/sorters.html

[Francois]

I'm talking about the other machine with a wide sheet in the middle and a small card on the left...

[Bryan]

I'm talking about the other machine with a wide sheet in the middle and a small card on the left...

That looks like an IBM 407 Accounting Machine.  http://www.computercollector.com/cgi-bin/exec/compcol/menu-st.cgi?directory=/archive/ibm/pcaa/accounting&mode=2&image=407-p1

The machine to the left of it in photo 1896 is an IBM Type 521 Card Reader/Punch.  https://www.computerhistory.org/collections/catalog/102645462

I bet they had a really happy IBM salesman that year.  Most of this stuff looks like 1949 models. 

[Francois]

I know my mom sometimes talks about how much she loved those machines.
She'd spend the whole day working on them and at the end of the day, she's put in it the large card, press a button and the thing would start printing like mad and fully balance the bank's accounting. And then she took the card out and it was YES, the whole sheet balances!

You don't have things like that with today's on demand computing.

[Bryan]

Box 1902-2000. 
1905 - February 12, 1955.  All it says in the log book is "Refining Cell".  Looks like he's busting ingots out of the molds.  The photographer is P. Maddux.
1911 -   February 12, 1955.  All it says in the log book is "Refining Cell Startup".  The photographer is P. Maddux.
1916 and 1918 - March 2, 1955.  New ambulance.  Ambulances have come a long way since 1955. 

[Bryan]

Some training department employee portraits.  February 25, 1955.

1919 - R. Perkins
1921 - H. Hughes
1924 - J. Murry
1925 - E. Reeves

[Bryan]

1929 - March 24, 1955.  Green Carbon Building
1944 - April 14, 1955.  Pure Metal Section
1958 - April 14, 1955.  D.C. Casting Construction.  Looks like he's building forms to pour a concrete footer. 
1963 and 1964 - Photos to show truss work for construction of pneumatic lube system.  We were calling these structures pipe bridges.  The pipe is covered in what's called TSI insulation.  That's a friable asbestos material that was crumbling and falling on the ground.  We encapsulated the pipe and removed it in sections.  You can see the insulation on the pipes in these photos, they must have been moving a hot fluid through them.  I think some were hot oil and some were steam.  The sign says "Mead Reduction Plant Welcomes Western Customers of Kaiser Aluminum".

[Bryan]

1973 - April 22, 1955.  Byron Congleton showing off his guns.

[Bryan]

I'm slowing down a bit getting through these because work is getting really busy but I'm going to keep at it when I can.  These are from box 2001-2100. 

2012 - August 1, 1955.  Training class.  I zoomed in where you can see the photographer left a box of Westinghouse No. 5 flash bulbs on the table.
2016 - August 12, 1955.  Picture of the plant from a distance.  It's a beautiful area around the plant, some of it is quite built up now but there is still a lot of farm land in that area. 
2054 - October 7, 1955.  This seems a bit out of place.  The log book says S. & F. rock crushing equipment. I'm not sure what that has to do with the factory.

Edit: I think they are using the rock crusher to crush used carbon anode butts.  They are probably testing a method for recycling the anode butts using a local rock crusher. 

[Bryan]

2059 - October 10, 1955. Pouring metal from crucible. 
2060 - October 10, 1955.  Carrying metal from pot room.  This one is cropped with tape.

I think these may have been for something like a training class as you can see they labeled items with letters. 

[Bryan]

2074 - October 10, 1955.  Pouring first sample.
2077 - October 10, 1955.  Pouring start of first cast
2079 - October 10, 1955.  Cast from machine platform
2081 - October 10, 1955.  Crane pulling first two ingots. 

It looks like these are all for something called DC Casting.  It must be for something like a new customer or product.  These look like the largest ingots they have made so far.  It looks like the molds extend below the floor so they can pour into them and have room to pull them up and out of the casting. 

[Bryan]

Would it be to naive for me to expect to see any people of colour due to when these pictures were made, the type of work being done and segregation laws of the time? Not meaning to start a discussion on race and politic on here, it was just something that I noticed and was wondering.

Box 2251-2300 - Irv, this is the first I found working in the factory. 

There's a gap in the log book from number 2177 to 2293.  It's as if they just forgot to log a bunch of photos.  These are either from 1955 or 1956, that gap in the log book spans from October 18, 1955 to April 19, 1956.

2274 - Looks like they are pouring a crucible into ingot molds.
2276 - Looks like the same work area as 2274.
2289 - More of the large ingots from my previous post. 

[irv_b]

Would it be to naive for me to expect to see any people of colour due to when these pictures were made, the type of work being done and segregation laws of the time? Not meaning to start a discussion on race and politic on here, it was just something that I noticed and was wondering.

Box 2251-2300 - Irv, this is the first I found working in the factory. 

There's a gap in the log book from number 2177 to 2293.  It's as if they just forgot to log a bunch of photos.  These are either from 1955 or 1956, that gap in the log book spans from October 18, 1955 to April 19, 1956.

2274 - Looks like they are pouring a crucible into ingot molds.
2276 - Looks like the same work area as 2274.
2289 - More of the large ingots from my previous post.

Glad to see it wasn't a menial job that he was assigned, as it actually looks like he is part of the crew.

[Bryan]

Would it be to naive for me to expect to see any people of colour due to when these pictures were made, the type of work being done and segregation laws of the time? Not meaning to start a discussion on race and politic on here, it was just something that I noticed and was wondering.

Box 2251-2300 - Irv, this is the first I found working in the factory. 

There's a gap in the log book from number 2177 to 2293.  It's as if they just forgot to log a bunch of photos.  These are either from 1955 or 1956, that gap in the log book spans from October 18, 1955 to April 19, 1956.

2274 - Looks like they are pouring a crucible into ingot molds.
2276 - Looks like the same work area as 2274.
2289 - More of the large ingots from my previous post.

Glad to see it wasn't a menial job that he was assigned, as it actually looks like he is part of the crew.

It looks like he's working with some serious equipment pouring molten aluminum into molds.  The timing of the shot is interesting, it was right after Emmett Till was shot in Mississippi, August 28, 1955.  Also about the same time that Rosa Parks refused to give up her seat, December 1, 1955.  Makes you wonder if those events were on any of their minds then, right as the Civil Rights movement was really getting started in the US.

[Bryan]

Box 2301 - 2350.

2303 - Arpil 30, 1956, Hydraulic unit for dumping PR crucibles.  I like the art work on the drum.  The Celanese Corporation is still in business today. 

These next 4 are more of the large ingots from previous posts.  They must have been quite proud of them, they took photos of the whole process until they were loaded on the train.
2311 - May 18, 1956, sawing ingot for shipment.
2313 - May 18, 1956, putting on paper cover.
2315 - May 18, 1956, Hyster loading packaged ingot.
2316 - May 18, 1956, ingot loaded on test car GN67368.

[Bryan]

Some then and now shots.

2327 - The then shot has no entry in the log book but it looks like it was in June 1956.  my now shot was taken with a Pentax Spotmatic using an Auto Tamron f/4.5 21mm lens.  The film is Kodak Panatomic-X that expired 3/1963, developed in Beer.  This crucible has been sitting in the same spot since 1956 or longer.  I turned the wheel and it still tips like it's supposed to.  It was surprisingly easy and smooth the turn the wheel. 

2333 - June 11, 1956, New addition, West end of Chem lab building 41.  North room upstairs.  This was part of the chem lab in 1956, not a creepy dental office back then.  I shared  this on the weekend thread a few weeks ago.  Photographed with a Leica IIf using a Leitz Summaron 3.5cm f/3.5 lens.  The film is Kodak Max 400 shot redscale.

[Francois]

I didn't know Celanese ever sold raw chemicals.
They were mostly (and still probably are) in the textile business. They made carpets and specialty fabrics that were hugely popular in the 60's and 70's.
They were the inventors of Naugahyde and Fortrel, the polyester fabric that is now infamous because of the leisure suit 

[Bryan]

I didn't know Celanese ever sold raw chemicals.
They were mostly (and still probably are) in the textile business. They made carpets and specialty fabrics that were hugely popular in the 60's and 70's.
They were the inventors of Naugahyde and Fortrel, the polyester fabric that is now infamous because of the leisure suit 

Are you telling me Naugahyde doesn’t come from a Naug?

[Francois]

Pretty close. Though they did have a mascot.
Maybe they simply were secretly hearding them at a secret facility.

[Bryan]

Pretty close. Though they did have a mascot.
Maybe they simply were secretly hearding them at a secret facility.

That's funny, I didn't realize they had a mascot but I think I have seen that thing before.

https://www.smithsonianmag.com/smart-news/nauga-belgian-velcro-and-other-synthetic-creatures-180964811/

[Francois]

When I first saw this, I said to myself that these were the days.
I don't know of any product who now has a physical mascot.

[Bryan]

Box 2351-2400.  Looks like something broke.

2365 - July 9, 1956.  Broken pillow block, damaged safety cage and broken V-Belts.  In the zoom image you can see the upper half of the pillow block is gone, the bearing was ripped out of it.  It says something about the cage bar being thrown about 20 feet.  This machine that broke is called 69 Dixie.
2377 - July 23, 1956.  Good thing they have this guy to put everything back together. 
2379 - July 23, 1956. Pile of butts waiting repair of 69 Dixie.  I'm guessing that 69 Dixie was used to crush spent anode butts for recycling into new anodes. 
2380 - July 23, 1956.  Butt wagons and butt pile.

[Bryan]

I'm not sure this has anything to do with the other mishap, there's no log book entries for these.  They were all taken in July of 1956.

2385 - It looks like they are trying to straighten this part using that huge hydraulic ram. 
2388 - I doubt that part is supposed to bent like that. 
2389 - I think this photo is from before number 2385, that part on the right looks like it's bent.  Note the drum holding up the hydraulic ram is buckling, not the safest setup.  Photos were often numbered out of sequence when they were all taken on the same day.  They probably assigned numbers to film holders and then just used grabbed whatever.
2400 - After spending a few months at this factory I got to know all the buildings quite well.  These ones are all unrecognizable to me.  Some buildings had already been demolished before I got there so this could have been one of them.  Or, they were demolished a long time ago to make room for something else.

[Francois]

On machines this size, when they broke it must have made a pretty incredible snapping sound.

[Bryan]

On machines this size, when they broke it must have made a pretty incredible snapping sound.

I'm sure there were all kinds of snaps, bangs, clanks and crashing sounds when those chunks of metal were flying around and bouncing off stuff.  Not to mention whatever was going on inside the machine. 

Box 2401-2450.  The last log book I have only goes up to number 2408.  We're probably still in 1956 here and I suspect that it probably goes into 1957 before the end.  The negatives in this box were in pretty bad condition, some were so warped I couldn't get them flat for scanning.  You will see some damage on them.

2418 and 2420 - Looks like they're getting that part straightened out.
2436 - Everyone was into classic cars back then   This is the first model of corvette, the C1 produced from 1953 to 1962.  I'm not sure what specific year this one is but it is a very early one.  I love the old corvettes, a guy in my neighborhood had a later model C1 that was in beautiful condition.   

[Bryan]

As I'm sure you may have realized the carbon anodes are an important part of the production of aluminum.  You need to use electricity to refine it but the temperatures are too high to use metal conductors.  I'm sure a copper anode would just melt and contaminate the aluminum. 

2437 - The anode train full of fresh anodes.
2439 and 2440 - These are the copper bars that attach to the carbon anodes and supply electricity to them.  Looks like they are cleaning and preparing them for a fresh set of carbon anodes.
2440 - anodes in a pot with the white alumina powder placed around them. 

[Bryan]

I found these next three photos interesting because it looks like they are doing stack testing for whatever gas is flowing in those pipes.  This was long before the EPA and air emissions were not much of a concern so I'm curious what they are testing for.  Years ago I ran a few soil treatment plants that basically cooked contamination out of soil by heating it.  The EPA was very strict about our stack emission.  We were required to first do a test burn where they conducted a stack test to make sure we could meet the emission requirements.  Once we went into production we were required to monitor the stack with what's called Continuous Emission Monitoring (CEM) equipment.  This was a bunch of sensors connected to the stack that fed data to computers in the control house.  I had to constantly watch the CEM's along with hundreds of other things and balance the plant operation to both treat the soil and not exceed emissions.  By the end of a 12 hour shift doing that you can imagine how tiring it would be.  These photos brought back nightmares of that for me. 

2410 - The short stacks to the left in this photo and the horizontal ones are the ones being tested in the photos below.  These stacks are for the emissions coming from the pot line, that's where the worst contamination comes from at these smelters.  It looks like they are testing the emissions before and after they go through some kind of treatment process.  All of these stacks and most of the pipes were gone from the facility when I arrived.
2445 - The pipe over his head is drawing the sample out of the stack to his test equipment.  This is the stack the emits to the atmosphere.
2449 - One of the horizontal pipes coming from the pot line.  I think this goes to some kind of treatment process before going out the stack to the atmosphere.
2450 - Testing equipment.  pumps to draw the sample from the stack and glassware to either collect the sample or conduct the test right there on site.  In the zoom photo you can see that the sample is drawn into the glass tube and bubbled through a solution.  Then it goes into the next glass tube and bubbles through another solution. 

[Francois]

I'm surprised that they did testing at all. In those days, everybody was essentially free to pollute the neighbor's air.
I remember when I was a kid, when we went to Grandma's, we used to drive through Montreal East which was mostly heavy chemical industries. We could smell the Union Carbide plant miles ahead. It was really stinky. Just thinking people actually worked and lived near that plant was mind boggling.
Now, they've cleaned-up the city and the stench is gone. I still think of it from time to time...

[Bryan]

I'm surprised that they did testing at all. In those days, everybody was essentially free to pollute the neighbor's air.
I remember when I was a kid, when we went to Grandma's, we used to drive through Montreal East which was mostly heavy chemical industries. We could smell the Union Carbide plant miles ahead. It was really stinky. Just thinking people actually worked and lived near that plant was mind boggling.
Now, they've cleaned-up the city and the stench is gone. I still think of it from time to time...

There used to be a large pulp mill in Tacoma, WA, everyone called it the Tacoma Aroma.  It smelled like rotten eggs.  Everyone knew to roll up the windows when you drove through.  It's gone now but I guess if you live near something like that you get desensitized to the smell. 

Several years ago I was doing a project in Eureka, Nevada.  It had several smelters for various metals that were mined in the area.  It was know as the Pittsburgh of the west because of all the air pollution stuck in the small valley.  They built a large smoke stack up the side of a mountain, not free standing, to get the smoke out of the town.  There are some remnants of it that you can still see on the mountain.  I guess if your factory is killing everyone in town you probably did something regardless of the lack of regulations.

[Francois]

Paper pulp definitely has that smell. We used to have family living in Trois-Rivières which is the paper making capital of the province. Haven't been there in decades but I remember that you could see logs streaming down the river. They would just float the wood all the way to the factory. And when there was a blockage, they would send some guys with long poles to walk on the floating logs and push them back in the current. Probably was the most dangerous job in the province at the time as there were countless accidents (most of them fatal). Still, labor was cheaper than changing things so the practice kept on going and going.

[kentish cob]

Paper pulp definitely has that smell.

That's bringing back some unpalatable memories, Francois... Bowater's Kemsley paper mill by Milton Creek, near Sittingbourne where I spent my early years used to emit a foul smell... We'd return frequently to visit grandparents, and always had to wind up the car windows when we got close... We called it the "Milton Whiff".

[Bryan]

Box 2451-2500
2482 - This may explain why they were doing the testing in the last photos I posted.  That's probably a scrubber system that they have for the exhaust from the pot room.  The gas was probably corrosive and destroying their equipment.  These bolts look pretty bad considering how old they are.

A few shots with zooms.
2452 - More construction, I did a zoom of this so you can see the construction company bus.
2480 - This small lunch room with no windows doesn't look like a great place to take a break.  They drew a checker board on the table and are using washers for playing pieces.

[Bryan]

2484 - Let's gamble with your safety!
2500 and 2483 - Looks like they developed a conveyor system to pour ingots.
2461 - Train loaded with precious ingots.  Before the smelting process was perfected aluminum was considered a precious metal, used mostly for jewelry. 

[Bryan]

Box 2501...  The last box of 4X5 negatives.  Hopefully I didn't bore everyone to death with this but I enjoyed going thru these old photos.  It's kind of an uneventful end, I think the earliest photos were the most interesting.  After most of the factory construction ended and the excitement of a new factory faded the photos slowly turned more toward operational and quality control stuff. 

This may be the end of the 4X5 negatives but there are some color 35mm photos that I will be sharing. 

These last few photos are the new conveyor system they developed for casting ingots.  These show the back end where they are removed and stacked for shipment. 

[Blaxton]

Brian, many thanks for this thread.  It is a treasure. 

[Skorj]

Whoa, some seriously good stuff here.
Thanks for taking the time...

[Bryan]

The color film was brought to me to scan by someone on the site.  Not sure where they found them but these negatives are in bad condition.  They were probably in one of the office buildings with smashed out windows being exposed to the elements the last few decades.  There were a total 11 negatives in a plastic sleeve, 3 were multiple exposures.  It looks like a fabrications shop with pictures of their new Black and Decker coring drill.  Probably 1980's or 1990's. 

[Bryan]

These are from one of the two slide carousels, looks like training to work on the Pot Line.  I think these date from the 1980's or 1990's

2147 - The proper way to hold a stick.
2163 - Don't put your foot in here.
2165 - Installing the anodes
2174 - Looks like they re-designed the anodes since the 1950's
2190 - View of the pot line doesn't look like it has changed much since the 1950's

[Bryan]

Now let's recap our lesson. 

[Francois]

The non-conductive shoe part made me laugh a bit...
You just have thousands of volts flowing through those conductors, what could go wrong?

And for some reason I'm reminded of something my dad saw when he was working in the aircraft industry.
There was a foreman who was really annoying, always yelling at everyone. He wore construction boots with steel heels (those things existed in the early 70's). One day he was walking on mesh scaffolding boards (you know the ones made from a metal grid that you can see through?) yelling orders to everyone. One of the welder who was working just under him got tired of hearing him, so he reached with his electrode and tack welded his boots to the floor. Then everybody left leaving him to scream his head off...

[Bryan]

The non-conductive shoe part made me laugh a bit...
You just have thousands of volts flowing through those conductors, what could go wrong?

And for some reason I'm reminded of something my dad saw when he was working in the aircraft industry.
There was a foreman who was really annoying, always yelling at everyone. He wore construction boots with steel heels (those things existed in the early 70's). One day he was walking on mesh scaffolding boards (you know the ones made from a metal grid that you can see through?) yelling orders to everyone. One of the welder who was working just under him got tired of hearing him, so he reached with his electrode and tack welded his boots to the floor. Then everybody left leaving him to scream his head off...

When I was I college I worked on a concrete crew during the summer.  We had foreman that was a complete jerk.  One time when he went to use the portable toilet the forklift operator picked it up with the door against the forklift cage.  He raised it about 20 feet in the air and left.  Everyone else was too afraid to let him down because they thought they would get the blame.  I think he was up there for over an hour.  He was pretty angry when he came out.  In my defense I didn't know how to operate the forklift, that's my excuse anyway.

[Francois]

Lucky for him that they didn't just tip over the porta-potty 

[Bryan]

Lucky for him that they didn't just tip over the porta-potty 

Porta-potty's are all kinds of fun, especially when you put wheels on them.  We use trailer mounted ones when we do the wildfire cleanup work.  The crews are traveling all over the countryside to they need to take them with them.  On one fire cleanup, in the span of a few weeks I had to talk about porta-potty protocol several times in front of about 250 people.  One incident the wheel came off one in transit.  Another incident the trailer detached from the truck on a highway, the police were involved in that one.  The topper was someone driving off with someone in the potty.  Luckily they had a radio to call for help.  That one job made me a believer that it's not a good idea to put wheels on a toilet.

[Bryan]

These are from the second slide carousel.  There's no documentation with these to date them but the following will help with that.  I figure they are from the mid 1980's at the earliest, possibly into the 1990's.  The plant shut down in 2000 so it's not likely to be after that date.  I think this carousel was showing the degraded state of the plant, maybe this played into their decision to close. 

2205 - Lunch room.  The Rainier Beer poster on the back wall looks like 1980's vintage.  By the way, that's the beer I use for developing film.
2209 and zoom - This was the best indicator of the date, I think that car is a mid 1980's Cadillac or some other GM car. 
2253 - Junk food looks 1980's or later.

[Bryan]

2208 - Yuck
2216 - That piece of equipment is ancient if it's riveted together like that.  The steel looks like it's completely rotted away.
2261 - The door has taken a beating.
2264 - Pot line building looks unchanged since the 1950's

[Bryan]

These are the last of the photos to post.  There's plenty that I didn't post but they would be redundant or boring. 

2263 - Someone didn't proceed with caution.
2268 - This guy looks guilty to me.
2269 - Damaged steps
2270 - Another pot line.