dallashistory

Back in August of last year, I swung through McKinney, Texas to photograph the steam compress at the McKinney Cotton Compress Plant, 300 blk. Throckmorton, McKinney, Texas. It is part of an article on steam compresses I will be writing for the ISSES bulletins.

I gained access to the cotton warehouse, and took pictures of the compress itself. I also gained access to the boilerhouse, hoping to find a steam pump hiding in there. Surprisingly, the boiler I found had a construction date of 1975 (the compress was built in 1915, and used for the last time in 1999), and had an electric motor driven boiler feedpump.

On the way out of town, I spotted a smokestak. As you all can guess, I should have a bumper stack on my truck that reads "I brake for smokestacks". I drove around the perimeter of the facility until I found a way in.

Researching the location on the web; I found out it is the former Texas Cotton Mill Company at 610 Elm, McKinney, Texas, USA. According to one webpage I found; the Texas Cottom Mill was one of only two said to produce fabric with designs on it. Before it's close in 1969, it was a furniture production warehouse. Now it is being renovated for a restaurant and lofts. The development has a website at:

http://www.mckinneycottonmill.com

It is now part of the McKinney Cotton Mill Historical District in Collin County. There are views of the main building on the development page as well the urban exploration webpage at

http://www.flickr.com/photos/ntxpeach68/186502353

Let's take a look at the backside of it:



The buildings that once housed the boilers and machinery reminded me of pictures I have seen of Europe after the bombings in the second world war. I first spotted what looked like a single cylinder steam engine and boiler; it turned out instead to be an Ingersoll-Rand electric motor driven air compressor and a compressed air tank. The foundations of other compressors in what must have once been the compressed air room were also visible.



I then checked out the boiler room at the base of the stack. All of the boilers have been scrapped; leaving only the stack, steam header, and foundations for the three boilers.





The following are part of several dozen pictures I took of the boilerhouse at the plant I used to work at in Port Neches, Texas. It was built along with the rest of the plant during WWII; but the boilers had engineering plates with dates of 1917-1919 on them. I am including them here to give you some idea of what a large boiler room like this would look like when intact. Those round things on the front are the burners; the big heavy cast iron doors gave access to the ends of the boiler tubes:



This boilerhouse had room for eight boilers in two rows; only seven were installed. They all faced an asle running through the middle of the boiler house, known as the firing asle. Each boiler had three drum on top for collecting the steam generated in the boiler tubes, and seperating it from the liquid. This picture was taken across the tops of the steam drums; you can see the massive steam headers that collected the steam and routed it to a single massive header pipe over the firing asle. (You can see the header pipes and main header in the above picture.) The springs to the left are safety valves; they lifted when the pressure in the drums got too high, the vented steam was lead through the pipes to a single stack over each boiler:



I found what looked like a source of water for the boilers outside. Next door was what appeared to be machine shop for maintaining the plant equipment; a switchboard, overhead line shaft and two machine tools were all that were left. The wooden floor had a basement underneath and all of timbers looked bad; I didn't dare enter it.





So far, I was batting zero when it came to finding steam machinery, but I kept looking. Finally, I found nearby what looked like a pumphouse.

The first doorway revealed another badly rotted floor with a basement and a switchboard inside. Looked like a setup for electric pumps; but all of the pipes cut off on the walls of the building gave me hope there was a steam lizard hiding inside. Once again, the floor planks looked bad, so I dared not enter.

I then made my way to the opposite corner and peered in to find an Underwriter steam fire pump on a concrete foundation! Just about every cotton, lumber, sugar, and other mill built prior to the Depression and equipped with boiler would have one or more of these. Many of the old buidings in Dallas and elsewhere had a steam boiler for hot water and heating in the basement; they are easily spotted by the presence of a smokestack running up the side of the building; sometimes, there is an access door from the street for bringing in coal. Some of these may also have one of these underwriter fire pumps in the basement as well; even after being shut down for good; they will probably remain trapped there until the entire building is demolished.



My wife won't have to worry about me bringing this one home; it is 16 x 9 x 12 in size. The top of the pump comes up to my chest; the bottom of the capacity plate on the air chamber comes up to eye level. The top of the air chamber is nearly seven feet tall; I guesstimate it weighs several tons. (A Knowles 18 x 10 x 12 Duplex Underwriter Fire Pump that was sold on e-bay was said to weigh about 10,000 lbs and was approximately 114" long x 48" wide x 108" tall.)



All Underwriter steam fire pumps are made the same. Their design (right down to the sizes and features) was not dictated by the pump company that made it, but rather a group of fire insurance underwriters. This capacity plate is one such feature; it lists the make, size, and capacity of the pump, and includes an admonishment to maintain at least 50 pounds of steam pressure 24 hours a day, seven days a week.



Down in the "basement" I found an electric motor powered centrifugal fire pump. It was probably the primary fire pump for most of the mill's existance; with the steam fire pump for backup. It was not unusual to have the fire pumps in a seperate pumphouse away from the mill buildings; the Crownwell Long Leaf lumber mill had a similiar arrangement that also had a vertical boiler dedicated to the steam fire pumps:



They were safe from any fire that consumed the mill buildings. The pumps would feed the mill's sprinkler system; but the top of the pump end also had outlets where firefighters could hook their hoses directly to the fire pump. The big air chambers ensured a smooth supply of water; and a relief valve in the pump discharge allowed the pump to continue running at full speed (or "churn") even if all of the hoses and valves were suddenly closed; the water would be discharged through the relief valve discharge cone right above the center of the pump.

The pumps' location is probably what spared them when the other machinery was scrapped. The tight space in the pumphouse would have made it difficult to scrap them in place; removing them for scrapping would have involved removing the roof and lifting them out with a crane. They probably figured it wasn't worth it; and scrapped all of the pipework leading into it and left it at that.



It's future is uncertain to me at least. The Cotton Mill Historical district is on the National Registery of Historic Places; but as the demolition I witnessed showed; it doesn't prevent demolition on the site. (There was an individual on the site who is taking down the walls brick-by-brick, chipping the mortar off, and stacking them for reuse.) There is no sign of work around it; I left it as I found it for future visitors.

In closing, I would like to thank my wife for the extra batteries she put in my camera case. When I went to take my first pictures of the steam pump; the batteries went out. I just had to change them on the spot.

Far out! Great Pics! Please enlighten me..what were the uses for most of these boilers? I work with alot of hot water boilers, some very old like a couple of the ones you would see in McKinney. But I never really get to see pneumatic stuff and steam anymore. I'm constantly looking for more efficient/cheaper ways to control environmental conditions. What do ya know about these old boogers?

In a large mill or plant, the boilers were used to power the steam machinery on the site, and for process steam. In the case of the McKinney cotton mill, they probably had one or more big stationary engines powering the mill's machinery through overhead belts. Steam driven air compressors may also have been located there.

The plant I worked at used steam in the reactors (the big towers you see in a chemical refinery) and other parts of the chemical process. Steam was also used at one time to power some pumps and refrigeration units that were powered by small steam turbines.

The plant also had about two dozen steam pumps on site. Most of these were long retired, but a few were still in standby service; such as this one. The lower picture shows it in place; it is under the "roof" to protect it from dripping caustic:





This is the largest one I found, a National Transit 10 x 7 x 12 duplex. Note it is "close" to the Underwriter fire pump in size, but notice how different it is; it was used as backup means of unloading tank cars in the tank farm:



A certain railroad museum in Dallas was interested in this steam fire pump; and I had it set aside for them for awhile. Just five years in the sun turned it's original red paint pink; after sitting around forgotten for another year, the plant scrapped it in 2004. I almost brought it home; good thing the plant manager stopped me, or it would be still sitting next to the downed tree in my backyard las year:



A large hotel may have it's own steam engine powered generators in the basement, steam pumps for pumping water to a rooftop cistern, and steam powered hydraulic pumps for the elevators. The steam was usually rated at 250 psi; the exhaust from the engines and hot water heaters would go to space radiators in the individual rooms.

A hospital like Parkland also uses steam in sterilizers; that is why most large hospitals still have boilers; even if they have few or no steam powered machinery (i.e. their own steam turbine/generators for backup power) on site.

Many people express interest in a similiar setup on a small scale for home use; after all, a boiler can burn refuse, manure, your junk mail, anything. But, such a boiler requires 24/7 attention; unless you plan on hiring your own night watchman; you would need a modern, natural gas fired package boiler. And the economics then don't work out.

Do you have any pictures you can share? And course, I would like to know about any such location I can check out in person.

Could someone please move this one to the Technological History forum. Many thanks in advance.

GOOD STORY.................Like to hear about the obscure subjects, they have character and color of the real world....A/T.