On the Kill Floor at the Pack in Dubuque

Andy Gross, production employee and supervisor at FDL Foods from 1992 to 1995, recalls his experiences working second shift on the kill floor at the Pack in Dubuque.

Andy Gross currently lives in St. Louis, Missouri. He teaches English at Madison High School in Madison, Illinois. Andy’s email address is vw72@yahoo.com.

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I worked at the Pack after coming to Dubuque to go to school in 1992. It was supposed to be just a summer job during the summer of 1993, but it turned into a full time endeavor for nearly three years. I started off as a production employee, then was promoted to supervisor the last six months of my tenure there. I worked second shift on the kill floor and made many good friends, many of whom I am still in contact with. I left Dubuque in 1995 after FDL Foods closed. Farmland Foods bought them in 1996 and operated the plant until their closing in 2000.

When I was there, as I mentioned, we ran two shifts killing and cutting nearly 10,000 hogs a day. The line was actually capable of running up to 14,000 a day, but the coolers could only hold 11,000 hogs. We ran the line to nearly 800 an hour on the two shifts. The third shift was used to clean and sanitize the facility.

After Farmland bought it, they ran only one shift on the kill and cut floor, and ran the line at 1000 an hour to process nearly 8000 a day, sometimes going into overtime to process more. Smithfield Foods bought the plant in 2000 and shut it down. Many say they did it in order to reduce competition. Smithfield said the plant was too old to run efficiently, but when I was there, we ran extremely well. Much of the workforce had been there a long time. The plant had been in operation so long that it ran basically on its own. I have worked in two other ‘modern’ pork facilities since that time, and neither of those ran as well the Pack.

I have a lot of fond memories of that place. I wish I had looked around more before they tore the building down. There was so much history in that building. Before the Dubuque Packing Company shut down in 1983, they used to run a beef kill and sheep kill in addition to the hog kill. They even had a Kosher beef run, where a rabbi would slaughter the beef. There was so many nooks and crannies and a lot of interesting stories from the old-timers who worked there.

I am now a teacher, which is quite different from my time working the line on the kill floor, but I will always have the memories of that place. My students are also very fascinated with some of the stories I have to tell!

My first time in the Pack was when I went into human resources to turn in my application for my summer employment. I recall that it smelt like smoked ham. In fact, that scent seemed to pervade most of the offices in the front of the building (the part that was closest to the street.) The smell really wasn’t that unpleasant. My first negative experience was when I was going through orientation and they walked us through the kill floor. It was the beginning of June, and it was stifling hot. We walked on one side of the floor, and one of the first things I saw was a cart of pig skulls (these carts, or trucks as I learned they were called later, held upwards of two thousand pounds and were pulled by hand). I was disturbed, mainly because the pig eyes were there staring out at you, absent of eyelids, or any skin for that matter.

My first job on the kill floor was cutting out pig rectums, or bung dropping, as it was called. I also happened to have a horrible cold this first week, and the whole experience was quite unpleasant. I was on this job for one week, as a cross-training position (I guess), then moved on to chitterlings, which was not much better. We pulled the pig intestines apart, which was a filthy and stinky job. As I began to get to know people and become more familiar with the whole process, I became intrigued by the work and eventually approached my supervisor about learning new jobs. I was not one to want to do the same job over and over, day in and day out. My supervisor obliged and I eventually, over my nearly three years there, learned 90 percent of the jobs on the floor.

As for being loud and chaotic: The one sound you heard as you approached the kill floor was the whining of the giant saws they used to split the backbone (loin) of the hog. There were two saws continually running, operated by two people doing every other pig (these saws weighed nearly 150 pounds but were on a counterbalance pulley). As long as the line was running, these saws were running. Everyone who worked in the plant walked past the entrance to the kill floor on the way to the locker rooms, so everyone heard the saws daily. The plant itself was loud, with the refrigeration running and the chains, or conveyors moving. We were required to wear earplugs at all times.

I spent most of my time on the kill floor, but did venture to other parts of the plant. For the most part these were slightly quieter. Shipping was comparatively quiet. The coolers where the pork carcasses were chilled were very, very loud due to the blast fans running.

The kill floor was exceptionally hot in the summer time. There were no coolers in this area. I worked first shift for a short time towards the end of my time there, and in the morning it would be 95 on the floor first thing in the morning. When I worked the line on some of the more strenuous jobs, my rubber boots would fill up with sweat. It was brutal. We would sometimes get into water fights (of course, these were not sanctioned by the plant management) and these cooled us off. It really was miserable during these hot times.

Most of the other areas of the plant were chilled. Sausage cooking was warmer, but the employees there went in out of cool areas too, so it wasn’t as bad. The entrance ways, locker rooms, and other non- production areas of the plant, with the exception of the offices, were not air conditioned, so when it was hot out, these areas were very warm. Also, due to the grease and fat that often was found on the floors, the whole facility had an interesting, but not overly unpleasant odor.

I never spent much time in the stockyards at the Pack, but from my experience at other facilities where I spent a good deal of time herding hogs, this area can be very stinky. I preferred the smell of blood over pig feces. In the sticking area (where the pigs were actually killed), the sound of pigs screaming and the scent of fresh blood was quite strong. It would probably make an outsider quite ill.

There were three main areas on the kill floor (the stockyard area was a separate department). We had the lower kill, were the hogs were killed and de-haired, the main kill floor where the pigs were disassembled, and the offal area, were various byproducts such as hearts and livers were processed. Each area was sort of its own clique, but for the most part everyone got along. Since I moved from job to job, I got to know most of the people. The cleaner jobs were occupied by people with more tenure at the plant. Sometimes though, old timers stayed in their same, relatively dirty jobs, I guess due to their comfort level in them.

I worked nights most of my time there and we had a relatively young crew. We often went out after work (too often, in many cases) and danced and drank until the bars closed in East Dubuque. The day shift was much different. Many of the old timers were there, and some of them were quite ornery or downright mean. There seemed to be less teamwork on the day shift and more tension. Some of the people had gone through the plant closing in 1983 and hated the company. Many had taken large pay cuts after that closing and still seemed to hold grudges. (Many of the old timers in the plant did not like the company – I will expand more on the later. Ultimately, I believe this attitude contributed to the plant’s demise.)

As for chaos – I have worked in two other plants since the Pack, and those plants were absolute chaos. The Pack was not. It was faced-paced work, but the line ran very smoothly and we were very efficient. Most people knew their jobs and did them well. The kill floor had been in operation many years, and the processing was smooth and succinct. I think this held true in the other departments as well.

As for the life outside the plant: There was a bar across the street called the Airport (it might still be there). People would often go there to cash their checks after work. Directly across the street from the employee entrance, there used to be a bar called the “Avalon.” It had shut down many years before I worked there. However, when we took breaks, people would say time for “Avalon.” Apparently, during break times, people would go across the street for a beer then return to work. Also, I heard stories of the old days when the stockyard employees would bring in coolers of beer to consume during the day. This didn’t happen during my time there, but I did notice from time to time that some of the older employees would venture to their cars on break time and come back a bit more relaxed (technically, we weren’t supposed to leave the facility on breaks).

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To be continued . . .