Kendallville, IN: McCray Refrigerator Company

(Birds-Eye View, looking west)

Kendallville Public Library

Rural American History Captured posted three photos with the comment: "McCray Refrigeration. Kendallville, IN."

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Allen County Community Album

Another photo of the plant.

The NS/NYC tracks still run along the south side of the plant. The Pennsy/GR&I used to run along the west side of the plant.

No other individual in the early decades of the 20th century had a greater impact on the growth of Kendall-ville than did industrialist Elmer E. McCray.
Founder of the McCray Refrigerator Co. in 1890, his firm grew into the largest employer of the city. And the name became synonymous with efficient food-saving and health-protecting services in homes, stores and institutions around the nation. For decades the company was the largest manufacturer of commercial refrigeration worldwide.
The company was sold to Litton Industries in 1966. In June 1973, Litton announced plans to close the firm, which still had 250 employees. It finally shut its doors in early 1974.
Born in 1860 in Ohio, McCray came to Kendallville with his parents in 1867, when the city was in its infancy. He joined his father, Hiram, in the produce business in Kendallville as a young man. They traveled about the area in horse-drawn wagons, gathering up butter and eggs. They stored them in basements to keep them from spoiling.
Realizing the need to cut down the tremendous loss from food spoilage and to protect the public as well, McCray and his father built a cold storage room and in 1882 received a patent for their invention.
Seeing a demand for coolers, 30-year-old Elmer McCray (whose father had died two years earlier) founded a new company, McCray Refrigerator and Cold Storage Co. (later shortened to McCray Refrigerator Co.), with $500 in capital he had saved.
[Terry Housholder, kpcnews]

MaCray Icebox Circa 1890s from Ramona K. Cecil

Their first products were ice houses to protect their eggs and butter during the summer. Elmer developed iceboxes that were lined with tile or wood instead of zinc so their advertisements claimed "No Poison or Foul Smell." They would custom build the icebox to "fit in the nook intended for it," and the iceman could add the blocks of ice from the outside through a door in the wall of the house. [Ramona K. Cecil]

The company was sold to Litton Industries in 1966. In 1975 it was merged with Howard Refrigeration of Philadelphia, PA and production was consolidated in Philadelphia ending 80 years as an important Kendallville employer. [kpcnews, Ramona K. Cecil]

Today Howard McCray manufactures several product lines to service retail industries.

Howard McCray

When I visited Kendallville to photograph the Kendallville Terminal Railway and the Kraft plant, I wish I knew about the buildings for the McCray plant because the remaining buildings are "at the top of the tax list" and might be torn down.

REECERproperties

His mansion is evidently now an inn.

Update: Channel 15 video of the abandoned factory building burning June 4, 2018.

Rural American History Captured shared a couple photos.

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Nathan Bottjer posted several photos with the comment: "Here is some of the stuff i dug up today!"

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McCray Manufacturing Fire Reveals History (source)