Armour, Philip Danforth

In the history of Chicago's manufacturing might, one of the key sources of employment for Chicago, as well as a key part of its growth, was the meatpacking industry of the Stockyards district (from 39th to 47th streets, Ashland to Halsted). Of the major employers in the Stockyards area, the two largest were the Swift company, run by Gustavus Swift, and the Armour company, run by Philip Danforth Armour (1832–1901).

Born into a farming family near Oneida, New York, in 1832, Armour sought riches early on. At the age of 17, he left for the California Gold Rush. After spending time in California, where he earned a small fortune ($8,000, by some accounts), he moved to Cincinnati, then Milwaukee, where he worked in the meatpacking industry. Finally, he moved to Chicago and set up operation where he could be closer to the railheads and therefore the animals from the Great Plains.

Armour believed that all of the animal should be used in production. He was innovative in the use of the disassembly line, where dozens of workers, usually lesser skilled immigrants, would cut apart a pig or cow with an efficiency that would make the Stockyards a tourist attraction in Chicago. A crew of up to 200 men was able to process an animal from a living beast to processed meat in less than 10 minutes. Armour believed that all parts of the animal should be used, and his fortune was made on the byproducts that would be thrown away by smaller butchers: hair for brushes, bones for glue, hides for leather, and so on. Armour was proud of his work. In fact the motto of the company was quite simple, yet bold in scope: “We Feed the World.”

To achieve the profits necessary to operate, Armour invested in new ideas such as reefer (refrigerated) cars on trains, icecutting stations (to furbish the reefer cars), and butcher shops on the East Coast in cities like New York and Boston. Whenever local butchers posed any sort of resistance to Armour, he simply undercut them, and then hired the butchers to sell Armour meats.

He had connections to the greatness that defined Chicago in the Gilded Age. His offices were in the Home Insurance Building (the first skyscraper), and his patronage of education resulted in the Armour Institute, now known as the Illinois Institute of Technology. He had his detractors, however. His use of pacers to speed up production often resulted in injuries on the job. He also had no compunctions in firing anyone who encouraged unionization of the workers. In the late 1800s, his offices were rocked by scandal, when it was revealed that the company mixed in tainted meat to make a profit. Regardless of how employees felt about him, his stature was large in Chicago. When he died in January of 1901, the papers noted that a driving force of Chicago had passed. If Armour had lived through the muckraking attacks several years later, his reputation may have been tarnished. But as it was, his name was synonymous with the opulence of Chicago.

...