The Demolition of the Bogdon and Gross Plant, Walkerton

March 25, 2021

Over the last few weeks we have been walking over the site of the old Bogdon and Gross furniture factory, which is being demolished to make way for another sub-division.

Originally built in the late 1890's by the Knechtel Furniture Co., It operated until 1934, closing during the great depression.

Purchased by Bogdon and Gross in 1938. They operated a furniture manufacturing operation until 2017 when it closed and has sat empty since.

A fire in 2020 caused some damage and a permit was issued for the demolition.

I am posting photos taken (usually just with a cell phone) showing the events and the changing landscape.

Old photo of plant from the internet archives

Satellite image from google earth before anything happened

2021 02 20 before destruction

2021 02 24 still no changes

2021 03 11 Work has started

Fencing has been put up to keep people out.

Keep an eye on that rail car to right of building.

it is sort of an anchor point

2021 03 13

2021 03 15

The rail car is still there! Along with the chimney and the two elevator shafts.

2021 03 19

2021 03 20

2021 03 23

2021 03 25

2021 03 28

It starting to snow!

driveway at south end of property

The piles keep getting bigger as they sort material

2021 03 30

Building a new strong road on south side of house. Using old bricks as fill

Likely in preparation for large trucks to take away the rubble

2021 04 05

the new road is looking ready for trucks

Something is missing, the one elevator shaft concrete shell is gone. There is blue steel frame is all that remains

2021 04 06

cleaning up brick and concrete, putting it into a crusher (upper photo) with the resulting pile of small bits.

2021 04 09 The Chimney comes down!

Had hoped that they would leave the old chimney, as was done in Paisley, but that did not appear to be the case.

take the last look

Above, the plan appeared to be to use four cables attached to the blue excavator at the extreme left of the frame, and simply pull the bricks out of the bottom. The cables going through the holes at the base of the chimney.

Did not quite work. Machine pulled a lot, the chimney did not yield. Brought over the large machine with a jack hammer, broke some of the brick away, back to pulling on the cables, and... one, then second and finally 3rd and 4th cables snapped. Score: Chimney one, workers zero.

We moved from here to the west side for better view, and not into the sun. I could see they were not going to give up.

So with different angle, pull from the side and hope they could slice through the bricks

It started to work!

you can see the bricks breaking into dust.

There she goes!! The bricks gave way. Only a few seconds left for the old girl.

And she is down!

We had to leave the site for a little while, getting hungry, but came back with a real camera (not the cellphone) and a longer lens for a few closer shots.

That is all there is of the main part of the chimney, just a pile of bricks and mortar.

The base is still there

closer view of the base

a tighter view of the chain used, as well you can see the frayed cable

And while here, I got a better view of the frame of the one elevator shaft, stripped of it's shell

And just for comparison, I walked around to the north side for a better shot of the other elevator shaft, with the base of the chimney in the background.