Pittsburg Plate Glass Factory

October 18, 2015 valmontcsz Abandoned 1800's, 1900's, Abandoned, Chemical, Company, Factory, Glass, History, New Jersy, Newark, Photography, Pittsburgh, Plate, Urban Exploraton, Urbex

Factory Floor

Most abandoned factories are associated with loss. Almost every one of them has a similar story: founded in the late 1800’s, profitable until the late 1900’s, and then shut down, leaving behind poverty and urban blight in the communities that once worked them. With this in mind, it’s hard to imagine that the complex of ruined industrial buildings between the Passaic River and a stretch of unused railroad track once belonged to a company that today makes more than one billion dollars annually.

A flooded ground floor in one of the buildings

The Pittsburgh Plate Glass company was founded in 1883, and became the first successful plate glass manufacturer in America. As cars and tall buildings grew more popular throughout the early 1900’s, the company expanded, buying new factories(this one included) and diversifying its products. It became one of the first American companies to expand overseas when it bought a plant in Belgium. In more modern times, the company is responsible for many things we see day to day, from the printing material used in passports to transition lenses.

Rusted Chemical Vats

The history of this particular factory is almost unknown, including when it opened, when it was abandoned, and what it made. My guess, from the number of vats, pipes, and the environmental investigation sign out front, is that it produced paint, varnish, or some other chemical product.

I have no idea what these things did

The inside stairs of the factory are falling apart. Use extreme caution, or better yet, the still intact fire escape outside.

Most of the floors look something like this

The roofs of the various buildings are easily accessible and provide a nice view of Newark’s skyline.

Rusty ladders are often not intact enough to climb, but the ones here were still solid

Pipes and the skyline

Will the modern PPG Industries step up to tear this place down? I don’t really think so.

Maas & Waldstein Company Chemical Factory

September 10, 2015September 10, 2015 valmontcsz Urban Exploration 1800's, 1900's, Abandoned, Building, Chemical, Factory, History, Industrial, Industry, Newark, Passaic River, Ruins, Urban Exploraton, Urbex

“ATTENTION!! THIS CONTAINER HAZARDOUS WHEN EMPTY. Since emptied container contains product residue (vapor or liquid), all labeled hazard precautions must be observed.”

Urban exploration, in general, is much better in the winter than in the summer. Truly abandoned places get overgrown fast, making it harder to move(and almost impossible to do so quietly). Your respirator gets sweaty and uncomfortable, exposed skin gets scratched up, and the heat generally makes things less enjoyable. I faced all these problems at the old Mass and Waldstein Company’s chemical factory, but by far the worst part were the relentless mosquitoes coming from the stagnant, muddy puddles i had to slog through on the way to the interior of the area. Please, if you go here in the warmer months, take some bug spray. Or just wait until winter.

Inside the chemical factory, with huge overturned chemical vats seen on the right side

The Maas and Waldstein Company’s factory was founded in 1876 near the shores of New Jersey’s disgusting Passaic River. Over the years it grew, adding on new buildings and producing everything from soda flavoring to explosives used by the WWI French Army. It was abandoned sometime around the 90’s.

Despite being abandoned fairly recently, the factory is in terrible condition.

The Maas and Waldstein Company Factory has a grim side to its long history. In 1916, workers went on strike for better hours(they only wanted to work 10 hours a day, how lazy is that?) and better pay(they wanted a whole 30 cents per hour!). The company did not listen to their complaints and hired new workers, causing many to lose their jobs. One of the company’s most exploitative ways to get new workers was to send recruiters down south to try and sign on as many poor blacks as possible. To increase the numbers of workers they brought in, recruiters would describe the lynchings of the south in gory detail in attempt to scare blacks to move north and work. They advertised that “To die from the bite of frost is far more glorious than at the hands of the mob.” Blacks came seeking opportunity, but found poor wages, long hours, and dangerous work. The factory had multiple fires and explosions during its history, some so large that people in the area felt their houses shake.

Chemical vats

Today, the Maas and Waldstein Company Factory’s many buildings are in very poor condition. If you’re interested in exploring here, try to go soon. I have a feeling it won’t be around much longer.

“NO SMOKING”

Evil looking black ooze

Factory room

Spray paint cans on an old shelf

A can of kerosene, probably used by arsonists

Total chaos

Pretty standard abandoned factory sights

The standard red brick smokestack

Colt Gun Mill/Allied Textile Printers

May 10, 2015 valmontcsz Urban Exploration 1800's, 1900's, Abandoned, Colt, Factory, Gun, History, Industrial, Industry, Mill, New Jersy, NJ, Paterson, Photography, Textile Mill, Urban Exploraton, Urbex

“Abe Lincoln may have freed all men, but Sam Colt made them equal”

Long before the Colt Revolver would become one of the most iconic American guns, Samuel Colt opened up a small factory in in the town of Paterson, NJ. Here, from 1836 to 1841, he would produce the very first Colt Revolvers, as well as various muskets and rifles. Many of the guns produced here would be sold to western settlers out on the frontier, and some probably even saw service in the Civil War. After 1841 and the closing of the gun mill, this site’s history becomes far more complicated, hosting a multitude of other industries, including a silk mill, cotton manufacturer, and dye works. The area finally died in the 1980’s, ending around 150 years of service. Today, all of the different mills and factories sit jumbled together in an overgrown and chaotic landscape.

I believe this is the original gun mill from the 1830’s

Exploring this area is tough, as you are almost always climbing over collapsed buildings and through thick plant growth. The buildings here are also in terrible condition, some of them so bad that you can’t even go inside.

Falling apart

With great care to avoid collapse, I entered this building.

The inside isn’t in very good condition either…

A stairway

Upper Floor

Nature has begun to reclaim the various factories

A wall in the woods

Darkness

Another Factory on this site

The inside of that factory

Chemical tanks inside another building

Santa Fe Grain Elevator (The Damen Silos)

January 14, 2015January 15, 2015 valmontcsz Urban Exploration Abandoned, Chicago, Factory, Grain Elevator, Grain Terminal, Industrial, Industry, Photography, Urban Exploration, Urbex

In the 1800’s, Chicago, at the southern tip of Lake Michigan, became one of the largest centers of the nations growing grain trade. Obviously, industrialists searched for the best way to participate in this lucrative business, and came up with the concept of the grain elevator: a massive, usually concrete industrial building that can receive, store, and distribute grain in the most efficient way possible. Chicago’s ideal location near the Midwest, where grain is grown, and on the Great Lakes, where grain can be shipped, meant that soon grain elevators were popping up as fast as industrialists could make them. One of the main issues with these grain elevators was that grain dust + oxygen + spark = explosion.

The story of the Santa Fe Grain Elevator starts in 1905 with an explosion and a fire. The old grain terminal in that area, on a river a short distance away, exploded, and burned to the ground almost immediately. While some saw this as a disaster resulting in thousands of dollars of property gone and multiple lives lost, others saw it as a business opportunity. The next year, architect John S. Metcalf and the Santa Fe railroad company, among others, built a new and modernized grain elevator not far from the one that had been destroyed.

The Santa Fe Grain Elevator Today

The Grain elevator was truly an amazing example of industry. It surpassed its now deceased counterpart’s capacity, now able to reach 1,700,000 bushels of grain when full. It drew water from the canal right into its own power plant, which generated the 1,500 horsepower needed to keep the elevator’s machinery going. However, for all of the impressive industrial technology it had, the old problem of exploding grain dust never went away.

An old piece of machinery

In 1932, an explosion destroyed part of the elevator and killed 3 workers. To the owner’s credit, they did attempt to repair the elevator to make it as fireproof as possible, but a series of fires and explosions in other grain elevators around the city crippled the Chicago grain trade as a whole. Soon, Chicago was thoroughly out-competed by other Midwestern cities. The end came in 1977, when a huge explosion and fire put the Santa Fe Grain Elevator out of commission for good.

Inside the grain elevator itself

The Grain Elevator made an appearance in the movie Transformers 4, where the bridges that connected the two sections were blown up. The city is currently trying to sell the property for a steal of a deal at only 11 million dollars.

The abandoned warehouse is dwarfed in size by the massive silos of the elevator

Shattered windows in the abandoned warehouse

Large open space inside the warehouse

An abandoned… Building? Frame? Take your pick

There are many rumors about ways one can still get to the top of the silos, although i found no ladders during my exploration. The property is fenced off, but if you look hard enough, jumping the fence is not necessary. This building has been abandoned for a fairly long time, so watch out for collapse and condition issues, although it definitely seems to have been built to last.

Thanks for reading!

Sedgwick Machine Works

December 23, 2014December 23, 2014 valmontcsz Urban Exploration 1800's, Abandoned, Factory, Industrial, Industry, New York, Poughkeepsie, Sedgwick Machine Works, Urban Exploration, Urbex

“The profit of any sale is of less importance than the opportunity the transaction affords to make of the purchaser a permanent customer and friend.” -Motto of the Sedgwick Machine Works

The Sedgwick Machine Works company’s story starts with its founding as an ironworks and furnace in Massachusetts in 1643, centuries before the idea of a factory even existed. Eventually, the company moved its headquarters to New York City, and almost 300 years later, in 1893, it built a modern factory upstate on the banks of the Hudson River. At this point, the Sedgwick Machine Works mainly produces elevators and dumbwaiters, which grow in demand as cities get larger and buildings get taller. The company had many notable customers, including Franklin D. Roosevelt, who used a Sedgwick dumbwaiter to get from floor to floor in his house after getting polio, and the Japanese Royalty, who had two Sedgwick dumbwaiters installed in the Palace of the Crown Prince of Japan. Sedgwick products could also be found in famous buildings like the Empire State Building and the Hotel Astor.

The Testing Tower of the Sedgwick Machine Works

The most clearly visible part of the factory is a tall, thin tower, still bearing the Sedgwick name in worn paint. The tower was used as a place to test the elevators and dumbwaiters that the company was famous for. Although most of the tower’s entrances we’re boarded up, some boards had fallen away, and i managed to climb through. It is a long and dangerous way to the top of the tower, climbing from floor to floor up flights of wooden stairs that seem to get more and more brittle the farther up you go. Eventually, i reached the top floor.

Long way to fall! Looking down from the top floor of the elevator testing tower.

One of the middle floors of the testing tower.

Climbing down from the tower, I proceeded into the warehouse space. The main factory, once between the tower and the warehouses, was demolished in 2005.

A warehouse interior.

Another dark warehouse. Piles of insulation and chemicals litter the floors.

Another Warehouse floor, showing insulation and chemicals.

The warehouses and offices, from the tower.

The Sedgwick Machine Works is a relatively dangerous place to explore. The only way to the top of the tower is brittle wooden stairs and floors, and the warehouses are filled with dangerous chemicals. Please wear a respirator and watch your step.

The Gary Screw and Bolt Factory

October 19, 2014October 19, 2014 valmontcsz Abandoned, Urban Exploration, Urbex Abandoned, Factory, Gary, Gary Screw and Bolt Factory, Indiana, Industrial, Industry, Ruins, Urban Exploration, Urbex

The abandoned Gary Screw and Bolt Factory is a testament to better times in the town of Gary, Indiana. In its day, Gary was home to many different industries, and economic success eventually led to beautiful architecture around the city. However, like in many American cities and towns, the industry left. Today, Gary has fallen on hard times, the many factories that once supported the economy are abandoned, and the beautiful old buildings that came about from industrial wealth are now ruins.

In 1912, the Pittsburgh Screw and Bolt Works opened up the Gary Screw and Bolt Factory. The factory was right next to the many steel plants in Gary, giving it a constant supply of quality steel without transportation costs. WWII brought 1,000 workers into the factory to mass produce parts needed on tanks, planes, and ships. As time passed, the Gary Screw and Bolt Factory was hit by the decline of the steel industry that fed it, and the rising world market that it competed with. The factory could take no more, and closed in 1986.

The Gary Screw and Bolt Factory Today

I spent a day exploring Gary’s many abandoned buildings during the summer, and the Screw and Bolt Factory was the last stop. There is very little machinery left, leaving a massive open space, which is slowly being reclaimed by nature.

Sunlight at the end of a long row of columns

After its days as a factory ended, the abandoned building was purchased by a charity to store bulk textiles that would be sent to impoverished countries. When the owners of the charity were jailed on corruption charges, the factory and the huge piles of clothing inside it were abandoned again. In one part of the factory you can still see these rotting clothes.

This factory had some of the largest open spaces of any abandoned building I’ve ever seen

Orange cloth from the “charity” sits rotting on the floor

Thanks for the read!

Crab Island Fish Factory

September 30, 2014December 26, 2014 valmontcsz Abandoned, Urban Exploration 1800's, Abandoned, Atlantic City, Crab Island Fish Factory, Factory, Fish Factory, Industry, Long Beach Island, New Jersy, Ruins, stinkhouse, Urban Exploration, Urbex

Most abandoned factories are found at the ends of dirty old streets, often next to foul urban waterways or unused railroad yards. The Crab Island Fish Factory is an exception. It sits on its own island in New Jersey’s Great Bay, the only stain on a landscape that seems remote and almost untouched by humans. The factory was built in the 1800’s to turn an inedible type of fish called a bunker, or a menhaden, into an assortment of products, such as fish oil, fertilizer, and pet food. Locally, the factory was known as “the stink house”, due to the awful smell it would emit when it was in operation. The factory brought fishing in the area to an industrial scale. Bunker/menhaden travel in huge schools, which would be spotted from above by airplanes. The planes would then direct boats to surround the school with nets, catching thousands of fish with very little time and effort. Eventually, the factory’s efficiency led to its own downfall, as it dragged the once enormous bunker/menhaden population lower and lower, until there simply weren’t enough fish left to catch and still make a profit. It also had to ship product to the railroads, which were all a great distance from its remote island. After failing in its original purpose, and overusing the resource that it had thrived on, the factory still clung on to life by composting garbage from nearby Atlantic City. In the 1970’s, the factory’s atrocities towards nature ended when it became a part of the Green Acres program. Today, the factory has been reclaimed by nature, it’s warehouses are home to seabirds and its piers (ironically) shelter huge schools of small fish.

The Crab Island Fish Factory from the kayak launch

Exploring the factory would have been fun enough, but i decided to go one step further and spend the night there. After loading very basic supplies into the kayak, I made the 1 mile journey through the marsh and across the channel to the factory’s island. Upon reaching the island, my little group dragged its kayaks into the most liveable warehouse and set up a small campsite of sleeping bags, backpacks, and lanterns. The sun was setting, but we set out to explore the island before dark.

This is the warehouse we chose to call home for a night

Huge machine pieces, my guess is they were for grinding up fish.

A doorway into another warehouse

The island has many buildings and structures, all in various states of disrepair. Some buildings were just piles of twisted metal frames and pipes, which had succumb to the winds and storms off the ocean. Even the warehouse i was staying in was only half intact, with half of the roof caved in and collapsed.

Sunset shining on the factory smokestacks

The skeletal frame of a roof over the factory
The Atlantic City skyline was visible from right in front of the warehouse i was staying in, giving a small taste of humanity to a remote and forgotten place.

This building was far away from the main factory. I’m not sure what purpose it served.

A large water tower in the sunset.

Sleeping in the factory was creepy to say the least. Dripping water falling on sheet metal sounded like footsteps. Rusty metal creaked and moaned. At around 4am there was an ear shattering mechanical roar, far louder than any of the planes or boats that passed by. I don’t know and don’t want to know where it came from.

This was my view as the night fell.

When the sun came up and made the place a whole lot less creepy, i finally got some sleep. After waking up and taking a few more photos, it was back into the kayaks to sail for home.

My warehouse in the morning.

Collapse and decay.

The Crab Island Fish Factory is a tough place to get to (you need a boat), but if you have the chance to go, i suggest you do it soon, as this place wont be around much longer. Also, pack bug spray. You’ll need it.

Thanks for the read!

Newark Denaturing Plant

September 9, 2014November 8, 2014 valmontcsz Urbex Abandoned, Factory, Industry, New Jersy, Newark, Passaic River, Ruins, Urban Exploration, Urbex

On The shores of the polluted Passaic River, on a plot of city owned land, sits a small abandoned factory. Back in its day, it was owned by International Metallurgical Services, and was most likely used to produce ethanol for the company’s other, more metallurgical uses. One aspect of the ethanol production that went on here was the addition of highly toxic methanol, which can cause damage to the central nervous system. Clearly this factory was using quite a lot of toxic chemicals, as it is is now an EPA brownfields site due to contamination by it’s many years of industrial discharge. There is little information on the history of this factory. Please contact me if you have more details.

My exploration of the building started with a quick look for entry points, of which there turned out to be many. Passing a fallen stack of tires that i assume were intended to block out explorers like me, i proceeded into the dark remains of a reception area and offices. Past here was the loading dock, where trucks would pull up to load and unload materials and finished product.

Old tires in the floor of the loading bay

Next, it was up the crumbling stairs to floor 2. Floor 2 was void of machinery and other significant objects, so it was probably used for storage, or maybe packaging There were some areas of floor 2 that were fenced off, I have no idea why…

Floor 2 gloom

Floor 2 Hallway

Floor 3 was filled with multiple, huge vats, packed tightly together in a confined space. Navigating these vats was like solving a maze, walking over old boards that previous explorers had left behind as makeshift bridges over uneven floors. Eventually, the seemingly endless vats ended, and I reached a small, open space.

There were many more massive vats behind this one

Floor 4 had some ruined furnishings, including shelves and strange machines that i couldn’t figure out at all. After taking some more photos and trying(unsuccessfully) to find a way to the roof, i headed back down the stairs and out of the building. Right outside are a sunken barge and tugboat, which probably served together ferrying trucks and cars along the river. Now they rest together, rotting away into the foul mud of the Passaic.

Tugboat and barge

If you plan to visit the Newark Denaturing Plant, please wear a respirator, gloves, and other safety equipment. The chemicals used in manufacturing here are nowhere near gone.

Thanks for the read!