It’s ephemera month at Speaking of Idaho. I’m writing a few little blurbs about some interesting ephemera I’ve collected over the years. Often there’s little or no historic value to the pieces, but each one tells a story.
I’ve written about the Blackfoot Sugar Factory before, but didn’t remember that I had this old postcard. This picture was taken sometime before 1937, going by the postmark. You’re looking more or less west from what is now US 91. At this time the road was dirt. The highway was a major route running from Long Beach to Alberta between 1947 and 1965. Today, although several segments of it still exist, including the one through Blackfoot, it has largely been replaced by I-15.
With the powerlines and trees in the way this doesn’t show much detail of the building, but there is a lot going on. The roadster parked in front looks like a Model T, perhaps dating the photo to sometime in the 20s. There’s a coupe of some kind parked under the trees with a couple of horses tied up nearby. To the left of the photo “under” the smokestack, is one of the staff houses. A string of five of those houses are still there being used as residences. The sugar factory itself is long gone.
One of the more interesting items in the picture is the ramp you can see leading up to the right and around the back of the building. The 1943 watercolor below this picture shows the ramp from a different angle, looking more toward the south. Wagons and train cars moved up those ramps to a beet dumping site behind the factory.
I’ve written about the Blackfoot Sugar Factory before, but didn’t remember that I had this old postcard. This picture was taken sometime before 1937, going by the postmark. You’re looking more or less west from what is now US 91. At this time the road was dirt. The highway was a major route running from Long Beach to Alberta between 1947 and 1965. Today, although several segments of it still exist, including the one through Blackfoot, it has largely been replaced by I-15.
With the powerlines and trees in the way this doesn’t show much detail of the building, but there is a lot going on. The roadster parked in front looks like a Model T, perhaps dating the photo to sometime in the 20s. There’s a coupe of some kind parked under the trees with a couple of horses tied up nearby. To the left of the photo “under” the smokestack, is one of the staff houses. A string of five of those houses are still there being used as residences. The sugar factory itself is long gone.
One of the more interesting items in the picture is the ramp you can see leading up to the right and around the back of the building. The 1943 watercolor below this picture shows the ramp from a different angle, looking more toward the south. Wagons and train cars moved up those ramps to a beet dumping site behind the factory.
Pre-1937 photo of the Blackfoot Sugar Factory.
This 1943 watercolor of the Blackfoot sugar factory was painted by Mable Bennett Hutchinson who grew up in Lower Presto. It shows the elevated unloading trestles better than most photos of the factory. Hutchinson went on to be a celebrated artist in California.
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