Towns and Nature: Danville, IL: Bunge/Lauhoff Grain Company Corn Mill

Wednesday, February 10, 2016

Danville, IL: Bunge/Lauhoff Grain Company Corn Mill

Grayson Warbritton posted

Jim saw a GP9, I see a food processing plant of some sort. I remember that Danville had a Bunge corn milling plant (see update below) when I studied the plant in Atchison, KS.

Satellite

Bird's Eye View

Mark Hinsdale posted
Eastbound NS train of auto parts train at Danville

Mark Hinsdale posted
Westbound NS Train #21T @ Danville

3D Satellite

Udpate: In 2021 I discovered that the link I accessed in 2016 is broke. And their web site now has a map of the locations, but no information as to what each location does. I was trying to figure out why some sources call this a soybean plant and others call it a corn mill. The answer is that it was both until 2010 when it discontinued soybean processing. Given Bunge's track record for maintaining URLs, I quote the entire news release.

Bunge to discontinue soybean processing in Danville, Ill.

February 22, 2010 - St. Louis, Missouri - Bunge North America, the North American operating arm of Bunge Limited (NYSE: BG), announced that it is discontinuing soybean processing and related plant operations at its facility in Danville, Ill. effective April 23. The facility will continue to handle soybeans as a grain elevator. In addition, the co-located corn mill will remain open.

"We are faced with a soybean processing market that has more capacity than required and to operate all of our soybean processing assets as efficiently as possible, we made the difficult decision to discontinue soy operations at Danville,"said Mark Van Emon, vice president and general manager, Bunge Oilseed Processing. "As a long-time member of the Danville community, we are disappointed that we must end soybean processing but we are pleased that we will continue to operate the corn mill and serve local farmers as an elevator."

Bunge expects approximately 100 employees to be impacted by the discontinuation of soybean processing and related plant operations. The Danville site will continue to employ more than 185 workers.

Bunge will honor all existing producer contracts for corn and soybeans and will continue to contract for soybeans as well as corn for delivery to Danville. All meal and oil contracts will also be honored.

[BungeNorthAmerica]

This post is why I looked up this grain facility.

Bob Finan updated, July 1951

While trying to locate the Wabash depot in the photo, I discovered that Lauhoff Grain Co. bought a lot of houses. It appears that it not only bought houses to expand, but if someone complained about the smell, they bought those houses as well. (The depot was in the northeast quadrant of Washington and Main.)