Category Archives: The Companies

Dacoma account documents co-op’s contract with Tillotson Construction

by baggyparagraphs

The following account comes from the history of the Dacoma, Oklahoma, farmers’ cooperative, which appears on the organization’s website:

The first concrete elevator was constructed in the year 1941 at a cost of $27,700 by Roberts Construction Company with a 100,000-bushel storage capacity. This was the north section of the west elevator. On March 12, 1945, it was voted by the Board to build a new office building. This was just west of the present building.

Adapted from Wikipedia's OK county maps by Set...

Business was now increasing and also the need for additional storage. A second concrete elevator was built in 1948 as an annex to the south of the first, west elevator. This was built at a cost of $52,000 by Roberts Construction Company, increasing storage another 100,000 bushels. In 1949, the authorized capital stock was raised to $100,000. The steel building housing the wheat cleaner and feed storage was built in 1950 for $8,000.

Continuing united efforts of management and membership saw another expansion necessary. In 1954, following a vote of the stockholders, the contract was signed with Tillotson Construction Company for a new 250,000-bushel concrete elevator. This new one to be located to the east of the office at a cost of $138,971. In 1956 the Authorized Capital stock was raised from $100,000 to $600,000.

Related articles

Tillotson’s Vinton Street shows just how neighborly an elevator can be

by baggyparagraphs

Story and Photo by Ronald Ahrens

So many elevators are in small towns that visiting one in a big city is a bracing experience.

Tillotson’s Vinton Street elevator is at the bottom of a hill right in the midst of an Omaha residential neighborhood. The concrete silos stretch two whole blocks from Vinton on the north to Valley Street on the south.

The southernmost of the annexes leans hard against Interstate 80’s westbound lane.

To the east are bungalows and yards and gardens on the downslope from 32nd Street to 34th Street.

And the resident of any of the houses to the west, going uphill from 35th Street, get a whole faceful of imposing grain elevator.

Related articles

Viewing Tillotson’s Vinton Street elevator from the ground up in Omaha

by baggyparagraphs

Story and photos by Ronald Ahrens

One word stays in mind after my May 10 visit to Tillotson Construction Company’s Vinton Street elevator in Omaha: mighty. This elevator exudes mightiness.

The headhouse soars to an exaggerated height, towering above the residential neighborhood and looking down upon Interstate 80, which is just 100 yards to the south. 

The delicately rounded corners present a contrast to the otherwise stalwartly rectilinear character of the tower. From the look of it, I wouldn’t have been surprised to learn there were offices up there: people tapping away at keyboards, making trades, issuing policies.

It looks modern and well-designed and I can imagine how proud the Tillotsons were when they completed it.

I don’t know what year this was built. During my first twenty-one years, which were spent in Omaha, I passed this elevator umpteen times without having any idea that my grandfather’s company had built it.

Now knowing what I do, finding the manhole covers with the company’s name was a thrill.

Not knowing many other things, it would be interesting to learn the answer to questions about the elevator’s various fixtures and appurtenances. What is that big jobbie-do at the very top and when was it set there? Why are the windows located where they are?

Of course the Vinton Street elevator has received national attention because the annexes have become the canvas for a public art project; the nonprofit organization Emerging Terrain has commissioned artists to create themed banners that have been draped over the silos, and in fact a crew was just finishing up the last hanging when I arrived.

It’s a pity to see the elevator in disrepair, and I found myself wishing it would receive some attention, too.

Oh, what a fresh coat of paint and new panes of glass would do for the appearance!

Related articles

We visit the former Omaha office of Tillotson Construction Company

by baggyparagraphs

By Ronald Ahrens

On May 10, I was in Omaha with my camera. One objective was to visit the former office of Tillotson Construction Company. Uncle Tim Tillotson had recently tipped me off to this, saying he helped move out the company’s papers after Reginald’s death.

“Twelfth and Jones–the Office, the OFFICE!” he said.

I parked at 13th and Jones in the southern part of the Old Market area and walked across the intersection. In just a few more steps to the east I knew exactly what he was talking about.

It turns out, the Office was part of an Anheuser-Busch plant of four buildings erected in 1887. Besides the Office, designed in Romanesque style, there was a bottling facility, a beer storage warehouse, and a stable. The other three buildings were torn down, but the Office survives.

One hundred and one years after the Office went up, a finial above the doorway blew down during a windstorm. It was stolen and has never been recovered.

Related articles

Musings about an Absent Father

by kocart

By Kristen Osborn Cart

My dad has been writing a memoir about his life growing up in Nebraska, as the son of Bill Osborn, builder of the Mayer Osborn elevators.  It struck me that after about 1939, Dad scarcely mentions him, other than to note his absence.  Grandpa was gone all of the time. Over the years the Osborn cousins have assembled photos from those times, and it is very striking that the photos of the Osborn home became scarce from about then. The few pictures we have from later on were from visits, and from the various projects he worked on. Bill Osborn was the photographer in the family.

William Osborn, 1952.

By the time I knew him, he had long since retired from that occupation, and he was home, taking care of his tropical fish business. He would find time to take his little granddaughters fishing (my cousin Diane and me), after night crawler hunting by flashlight, of course.  He was an affectionate grandfather, and he loved my mom.  He read the morning paper over breakfast, and ate his eggs sunny-side-up, mopping up the last of them with his toast. And he didn’t talk much. The elevator phase of his life, in my mind, consisted of a framed photo of an elevator (McCook Equity Exchange), and Dad’s assurance that it was grandpa’s first elevator he built on his own.

My cousin, Diane, brought out a cache of photographs of grain elevators one day, not too long ago.  Most were not marked, though the one from Kanorado, Kansas, had it’s location and capacity written on the back.  We have identified almost all of them, but a few are still mysterious, so now that it has been thirty-five years since Grandpa died, we have something to ask him.

This summer we are planning to go find some of the grain elevators he built some sixty to seventy years ago, many of which are still in use.  The buildings can’t tell us about his jovial smile, his mischief, or his aggravation at workers who left after their first paycheck.  But I can imagine him there, just as I suppose my father had to.  At least Dad could visit sometimes.

William Arthur Osborn, 1965

Nebraska Firms get Government Contracts

by kocart

Give projects to Nebraska firms

Washington (AP).  The War Department has awarded the following government contracts (Army engineers office in charge in parentheses):

Less than $50,000.

C.C. Larsen and Sons, Council Bluffs, IA., temporary buildings, Thayer County, Neb. (Omaha).

Olsen, Assenmacher, and Rokahr, Lincoln, Neb., temporary frame building, Lancaster County, Neb. (Omaha).

Tillotson Construction, Co., Omaha, temporary building, Fillmore County, Neb. (Omaha).

Owen Mann, Rapid City, S.D., storage facilities, Box Butte County, Neb. (Omaha).

A. Borchman Sons, Omaha, temporary building, Dodge County, Neb. (Omaha).

Lincoln Nebraska State Journal, Lincoln, Nebraska, Friday, June 11, 1943.

Tillotson Construction adds six feet a day on Elkhart elevator

by baggyparagraphs
Elkhart–Construction is starting on the new 225,000 bushel elevator for the Equity Grain Co. here.
The Tillotson Construction Co. of Omaha has the contract.Hutchinson (Kan.) News-Herald, December 24, 1945

From the city of Elkhart’s website. Note elevator silos in upper left.

Work Day and Night on Elkhart Elevator 

Elkhart–Work is proceeding day and night on the construction of the new Equity elevator here.
Floodlights are rigged up to illuminate the scene for the night workers.The concrete storage tanks are going up at the rate of six feet a day. They will stand 140 feet high when completed. The elevator will have a storage of 250,000 bushels of grain.The Tillotson Construction Co. of Omaha, have the contract. It is expected the bins will be finished in three weeks.

Hutchinson (Kan.) News-Herald, March 21, 1946

Related articles

Elkhart farmers ‘raise sights,’ hire Tillotson Construction on new elevator

by baggyparagraphs

Photo taken March 19, 2011, by Kate Flint.

Stockholders of the Cooperative Equity Exchange here have raised their sights. Instead of the 100,000 bushel elevator first planned, the stockholders have voted in favor of erecting a modern elevator of 225,000 bushels capacity.

The contract has been let to the Tillotson Construction Co. of Omaha. It will be built on a “cost plus” basis, but Gale Cochran, manager of the Equity said it was estimated it would cost around $85,000.

There will be eight overhead bins, six interstice bins and eight grain tanks. The elevator head will stand 120 feet high. The plant will be built at the site of the old Elkhart mill, purchased from J.E. Heintz. The present elevator buildings will be sold.

Construction will be started in about two weeks, and the new plant is to be completed before harvest next summer.

Hutchinson (Kan.) News-Herald, November 20, 1945

♦ ♦ ♦

Note: Here’s the link to the BNSF railroad’s grain elevator index page on Elkhart.

Additional note: University of Southern California professor Kate Flint chased grain elevators in March 2011 and even stayed in one overnight.

Related articles

Marvin Richards falls 105 feet from Hinton elevator

by baggyparagraphs

Iowan Killed in Fall from Grain Elevator

Sioux City (AP) — Marvin Richards, 28, of Hinton died in a hospital here Friday shortly after he had fallen 105 feet from the top of a grain elevator at Hinton.

Richards was employed by the Tillotson Construction Company of Omaha. He was working on a scaffold atop the nearly completed elevator of the Farmers Elevator Company.

He apparently lost his balance and fell 105 feet to the concrete top of a hopper.

Cedar Rapids Gazette, October 1, 1954

♦ ♦ ♦

Special note: The obituary of Mr. Richards’s sister Deloris E. Holtz.

News of recent developments in Hinton are found on Younglove’s site, including a picture of the original elevator.

By 1930, the Tillotsons are prospering — with a radio set!

by baggyparagraphs

By Ronald Ahrens

On April 4, 1930, the census-taker knocked at the Tillotsons’ door at 624 N. 41 St., in Omaha, and found them prospering.

Charles H. Tillotson, 51, was head of household and gave his occupation as superintendent in construction. Census code 73X1 supports this. It appears he was an employee.

Rose Tillotson, 52, was home. The age given here corroborates my belief that Rose’s age, given as 38 in 1920, was incorrect.

Charles was 23 and Rose 24 when they were wed.

Son Joseph, 23, was employed as a salesman in the wholesale grocery business, as census code 4590 supports. Son Reginald, 21, as well as daughter Mary, 19, also lived in the home.

The Tillotsons owned their home, which was valued at $3500. And they cooperated in supplying an extra bit of data: they had a radio set.

By 1935, Reginald would be the father of Charles J. Tillotson, the first of six children with Margaret Irene McDunn Tillotson. The grandson would barely know his grandfather: Charles H. would die in June 1938 at Concordia, Kansas.

Related articles