4. Becoming the meatpacking capital of the United States
In 1840 the city of Cincinnati led the nation in the production of processed and packed pork. Hogs were driven to the city from Ohio and Indiana, and shipped by barges and steamboats from Kentucky. In Cincinnati, pork processing created byproducts used in the manufacture of soaps, candles, leather goods, and fertilizers. In the absence of refrigeration, hogs were slaughtered and processed in the cold months, with much of the meat cured by salting and smoking. It was then shipped down the Ohio and Mississippi, or across Ohio using the canals built by the state.
Chicago took over the role of the nation’s leading meatpacker during the American Civil War. The railroads moved processed meat at a faster speed than canals and steamboats. Contracts to provide salted beef and pork to the Union Armies, and access to animals from the west, created a boom in the meatpacking industry in Chicago. Insulated railcars cooled with ice, developed shortly after the Civil War, allowed beef butchered and shipped to consumers fresh. Cattle formerly delivered to eastern customers on the hoof for local processing were supplanted by slaughtered animals, ready for additional processing by butchers and food suppliers.