MEAT LABORATORY

The first recorded reference to this building appeared in the 21st Biennial Report (July 1, 1903 to June 30, 1905):

Among our needs for additional buildings one of the most urgent is that of a building to be used as an Animal Husbandry laboratory. A building of this kind would serve a most useful purpose in connection with both the instruction and research work of the College and Experiment Station.

It was not until 1913 that the building was approved.¹ Two years later “The Board Architect was instructed to prepare tentative plans.”² Final plans were approved in August 1916³ and the decision was made to have the building erected by Supt. Sloss. Work was started in September of that year and completed in December 1917.

Equipment for the new animal husbandry laboratory will be completely installed and the building ready for use immediately after the Christmas holidays. The work on the equipment is being carried on now and is nearing completion.

Killing and working with meats will start immediately after the holidays under the direction of Prof. J.D. Helser. The work will be carried on from then on until the end of the semester. This semester there is only one class in meats and meat cutting but next semester more work will be given to give all classes the advantage of the new building and equipment.

The building will be used also to assist in the better instruction during the short course. All of the killing for the short course banquet will be done in this building. The stock will first be judged on foot and later killed… ⁴

The original building is well described in a story in the March 28, 1918, edition of the Iowa State Student:

As a part of the program of the Cattle Feeders conference the new college abattoir was dedicated yesterday.

For years Iowa State college has desired a building suitable for demonstrating to the students the ways of making the correct meat cuts, of slaughtering animals and of judging animals with reference to their dressing percentage. The students then actually kill and dress out the animal that they may see their error and the condition of the carcass. Now they have such an abattoir as would bring a smile of joy to the eye of any man who really appreciated what part modern and up-to-date fixtures play in the successful killing, cooling, packing and preserving of the carcasses of the common farm animals.

The new abattoir contains all the modern conveniences needed in the slaughter of meat producing animals. Iowa State college can now boast of having the best equipment of any college in the country for instruction along this line.

On entering the main part of the building, one passes into a large judging ring, where the livestock is judged before being killed. On one side of the ring rises a large balcony which seats 500 people. However, room can be made, by putting additional chairs in the balcony and at the ring side, for the seating of 1,000 people. This insures seating room sufficient to hold all who wish to come at times when there is a special meat demonstration. Opposite the balcony and on the other side of the judging ring, is a platform with several meat blocks and other devices for the cutting of the carcass into the various meat cuts.

After the stock has been judged in the ring they are placed in a small adjoining room, where they are allowed to shrink for approximately twenty-four hours.

The animals are now taken to the killing pen. Hogs are put in the sticking pen, where they are first stunned and then bled. Cattle are placed in the killing stall, one side of which opens outward so that the carcass will lie on a sort of table as soon as the animal is killed. Gutters are placed in each of these pens that all of the blood may be collected and saved for future use.

From the sticking pen the hogs are rolled into the scalding vat and are then pulled out onto the scraping table, where they are thoroughly cleaned. After the cleaning operation the hog is hung on a gambrel. If a beef has been killed, it is skinned on the table upon which it fell and is then hung on the gambrel in the same manner as the hogs. The entrails are next removed and dropped through a chute into a room in the basement below. The carcasses are now pushed along a track toward the cooling rooms. Before entering the cooling rooms, the carriers pass over a portion of track suspended on scales, so that the warm weight of the carcass may be obtained.

Five of the rooms in this building are cooled by a circulating brine system. Of these rooms, two are used for cooling purposes, two as refrigerators and the remaining room is provided on one side with windows and may thus be used as a show room for the carcasses. These rooms are each under a separate cooling system so that they may be individually held at the same temperature.

The carcasses are allowed to shrink in the cooler about a week before they are cut into the various retail cuts for market. As each carcass comes out of the cooler it again passes over the scales and is weighed. After being weighed, the carcass is pushed into the room where the cutting tables are located and the students are allowed to make the different retail cuts and prepare the meat for market.

The entrails fall from a chute in the dressing room into a vat in the offal room located in the basement. Here they are cleaned and all parts that may be used as food are saved and the remainder is thrown into a rendering tank and thus converted into fertilizer.

In another room in the basement will be a sausage grinder and a wiener and sausage stuffer. This gives the student a chance to make sausage and wieners.

Another room concerns a cooking vat, where the pickled and smoked hams may be boiled for the market trade. Here is also found a rendering vat for the lard that is stripped from the intestines and cut from other pork cuts. After rendering the fat it is placed in a compressor and is then ready for sale.

The refrigeration system used is the brine circulating system.

In 1941 it was reported that “cork insulation in the four new cold storage rooms in the meat laboratory will give quick freezing of meat and vegetables. The rooms will be set at temperatures of 30, 20 and 10 degrees below zero, and 10 degrees above zero.”⁵

More extensive remodeling was undertaken in 1955. It was described as follows:

The work contemplated consists of remodeling to permit more efficient use of the space and to improve sanitation. It includes rearrangement of partitions and trackage in the cooler rooms, conversion of the hand-operated elevator to power-operated, constructions of a partition separating the cutting room from the judging arena, installation of ventilating fans, new lighting, screens for doors and windows, gas service to the building, acoustic improvement in the classroom and complete interior painting. ⁶

That work was done by the Physical Plant Department at a cost of $10,000.

The building continued in its function until 1977 when the new Meats Laboratory was completed and all of the operations were moved to the new facility.