Old Missoula

Sugar Plant Comes to Stay in 1927

Chimney Built in 1916

Constructed on the site of an earlier sugar factory that lasted only one year, the Missoula factory of the American Crystal Sugar Co. came here to stay as a valuable part of the western Montana economy in 1927.

The old Great Western plant was constructed at the same site in 1916, but due to disagreement between the plant owners and the proposed growers it lasted only a year, being dismantled and removed from Missoula.

Only the 256-foot concrete chimney and the office building, a part of the present operation, remained as a monument to this effort.

Started in Alberta

The present factory was constructed originally at Raymond, Alta., in 1903. It was moved to Cornish, Utah, in 1917, where its slicing capacity was increased from 400 tons to 600 tons per day. The white fly infestations killed the beet crops and idled the factory there. Thus, the sugar factory returned to Missoula, this time to “make good.”

And now the plant’s slicing capacity has been increased to 1,600 tons per day, producing about 5,200 hundredweight every 24 hours with high quality sugar beets.

Farmers growing beets for the local factory have received more than $30,000,000 for 2,930,211 tons of sugar beets harvested from nearly a quarter million acres. This is an average of $941,000 per year during the entire 32 years the factory has been in operation.

Labor has received approximately $14,000,000 for production of 8,156,762 cwt. of refined sugar. Missoula employes of the sugar company have received an average of more than $432,000 yearly for their services over the years.

Helps Other Business

The factory has been good for other businesses in western Montana also. How good is evidenced in the approximate $8,500,000 paid for supplies of all kinds, an average of more than $260,000 in each of the 32 years of the plant’s operation.

How good it has been for railroads, truck lines, state and municipal taxing agencies, public utilities, is reflected in the additional millions of dollars expended for their services and demands.

How good the sugar factory is for the economy of Missoula and the localities supplying its needs is shown in the average $2,000,000 yearly paid for labor, goods and services just to produce its products.

Benefits Multiplied

The compounding benefits which accrue to the economies of all communities prospering in the free enterprise system is multiplied many times as labor and materials requirements must be met, and paid for, by each tiny segment supplying any portion of that labor, or those supplies, to complete the picture. Distribution of the finished products produces additional benefits.

So, as Missoula moves into its second century of existence, the American Crystal Sugar Co. is a vital part of the community, prospering in a hospitable environment and contributing, markedly, to the prosperity of western Montana.

E. L. Swift is manager of the local plant. E. L. Greder is superintendent; M. A. McFarlane, cashier; D. C. Russell, master mechanic, and C. R. Offendal, agricultural superintendent.