Re: [CBQ] Montgomery Sheepyard question

["Steven Holding" <sholding@sbcglobal.net>]

Mike and others

The platform was of wood with the wooden gates which would extend out to the car doors.  The floors of the pens at the dock area and alleys were brick.  With the extendable gates it did not matter where the cars were spotted and or 36, 40 or 50 ft cars the gates would extend out to the doors.  No ramps for double decks.  For sheep we had a sheet of plywood to reach the upper deck.  But even with the door open most sheep would not come out.  We had no Judas goat so you had to crawl in and start chucking out the sheep bodily then all of a sudden the whole car load would head out.  Foe calves we had a two man ramp to move to reach the top deck so on the weekends(my normal shift days) I had to get the Supt. who lived in the house out front to help me.  

Henry Steele rented the south barn and got only cattle.  Most could have went to the fair they were so good.  

The middle barns were used for sheep.  They were fed Alfalfa Pellets ( came in in C-6 covered hoppers to the elevator)  and corn mixed in a truck mounted mixer for feeding by RR personal. 

There were two barns on the north end with the west barn and half the east barn rented by Weritheimer Cattle Co. a branch of the company of St. Paul.  The sold calves and also fed them.  

There was an old Chevy Dump truck for moving the manure which was piled north of the barns along the lead across Ill. 31 to the Industrial Park on the old farm grounds west of the highway.  This was moved by the day man and loaded in gons for movement to the strip mines down state for disposal.  Along with any other garbage the railroad might have.  I would use the dump truck to move hay from the hay barn by the elevator to the northeast barn for cattle feeding when they were unloaded. 

Sheep and cattle would be unloaded in to holding pens at the dock.  Then moved thru a scale into the barn pens for feed water and rest.  Sheep after being fed were taken to the processing plants in Chicago often two car loads in one possum-belly stock trailer( not much room to move)  

Steve (Now a chicken-tender)In SC

See you at the Spring Meet

.  

On Sunday, March 10, 2019, 2:15:02 PM EDT, o_rrman <mofferman@ameritech.net> wrote:

At the Sheepyard in Montgomery, IL, were the stock loading platforms at the top of the wooden ramps also made of wood or were they cement?  Based on a long ago conversation with Steve Holding I got the impression that the platforms were wider than the ramps because he mentioned that the gates could extend.  Just not sure about the platform material.  Historic aerial photos are not clear enough to tell.  Photos from Bulletins don't seem to help either.  Today there is a concrete platform to the east of the lumber treatment plant and the old north stock barn (barn 1?).  It looks old but not sure whether it's related to livestock operations.

Thanks, Mike Offerman, Oswego IL

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