BLOOMINGTON - For much of the 20th century, strange looking contraptions called portable elevators (like the one pictured here) were a common sight on farms throughout the Midwest corn belt. These elevators moved not people but rather ear and shelled corn, as well as wheat, oats and other grains, from wagon to storage crib or bin.
Bloomington-based Portable Elevator Manufacturing Co., located on the corner of Grove and McClun streets on the city's near-east side, was one of the largest and most successful makers of this type of farm equipment.
Portable elevators helped farmers escape the back-breaking limitations of scooping grain with a shovel. By cheating gravity, "corn dumps" made possible the erection of ever-larger corn cribs, well-ventilated outbuildings designed to dry and store ear corn.
These cribs enabled farmers to hold large amounts of grain, and thus hedge their bets against fickle commodity prices and market conditions. A 1909 Portable Elevator sales catalog put it this way: "You can KEEP your grain YOURSELF and HOLD it for the best price instead of hauling it from the fields to company elevator."
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G. Burt Read (or "G.B." as he was known) shepherded Portable Elevator through its first four-and-a-half decades of growth. At the turn of the last century, Read began working for White-Evans Co., a small Bloomington maker of grain scales and other farm equipment. Within four years, while still in his thirties, he had bought out his partners and reorganized the business as Portable Elevator Manufacturing Co.
The accompanying photograph, appearing in a 1927 Portable catalog, shows the company's brand name "Little Giant" steel elevator in action. Working at "lightning speed," the elevator could handle a wagonload of grain in less than five minutes.
Also shown in this picture is a four-wheel portable derrick used to pull the elevator up to the crib's cupola (the wheels put the "portable" in portable elevator). A two-horse, triple-gear "outfit," seen on the right, powered the chain-driven elevator. A steel-frame overhead lifting jack, also powered by the two-horse outfit, tipped the wagon so its load of ear corn could tumble into the elevator's trough. Later, farmers turned to gasoline engines or tractor take-offs to power elevators and jacks.
All four items pictured here - elevator, derrick, power outfit and jack - were manufactured by Portable Elevator. The sales pitch was simple: "Good equipment makes a good farmer better."
Portable took pride as an industry innovator, and it was one of the first to make the leap from wood to steel elevators.
The manufacture of farm machinery tended to be a seasonal business, leading to long stretches of down time and a furloughed workforce. Eventually, Portable branched out to make Pelco brand beverage coolers, Freez-All brand freezers, and later, Ideal Dispenser Co. vending machines. Elevators, though, remained the company's signature product.
"G.B." Read passed away in 1945, and his son Roland took charge of the company. In the next ten years, Portable's product line and financial condition deteriorated appreciably. W. A. Matheson, who early had led Williams Oil-O-Matic of Bloomington out of bankruptcy, was brought in to turn around the once-proud manufacturer.
He succeeded, and Portable rebounded to once again become an innovator in the elevator business. Matheson took advantage of the plant's skilled workforce, especially in the area of precision sheet metal fabrication, and Portable was soon designing and building sturdier, lighter elevators.
By the early 1960s, competitors in the grain elevator business numbered around 40, though Portable remained the largest independent manufacturer in North America. Sales topped $2 million with workforce at the Bloomington plant around 100.
In 1967, Portable became part of Dynamics Corporation of America. Sales were relatively strong through the 1970s, but the farm economy suffered a severe downturn in the early 1980s, and the Bloomington manufacturer never recovered. In addition, since the postwar years and gradual mechanization of the corn belt, farmers had slowly moved away from cribs for storage. Production at the Bloomington plant halted in 1985, and the last employees were let go in early 1987.
Slated for demolition, the Portable Elevator factory burned down in April 1989.
