Monday, March 27, 2023 – THE OLD NEIGHBORHOOD WHERE DAIRIES WERE NUMEROUS

By admin

FROM THE ARCHIVES

MONDAY, MARCH 27, 2023

ISSUE  949

Back When Western Queens had the Borden’s Milk Plant

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“DOLLARS FOR DAFFODILS”

UPDATE:
OUR FIRST DONATIONS HAVE ARRIVED 

THANK YOU TO RACHEL MAINES AND GLORIA, MARK HERMAN, CAROLINE CAVALLI, MR. & MRS. RICHARD MEYER,  NANCY BROWN, ARLENE &STEVE BESSENOFF, MARIE EWALD & DAVID DANZIG, BARRY & JUDY SCHNEIDER,  & MICHELLE ROY, ARON EISENPRESIS FOR THEIR DONATIONS.
WE ARE WAITING TO ADD YOUR NAME TO OUR DONOR LIST

We need your help this spring to help us restore and enhance our garden. 
Our goal is $2000.00 for a complete restoration of soil, drainage, plantings and fencing.
We will update donations daily.  We will list our donors.

Join us in making our garden thrive again.

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TO MAKE YOUR DONATION: https://rihs.us/donation/
TO MAKE YOUR DONATION BY CHECK:  R.I.H.S., 531 MAIN STREET, #1704. NY NY 10044

Tonight my friend Pat was telling me of her youthful escapades in the Borden Playground as a teenager. Sure enough plant is gone, but images of it remain along with some photos.  I can imagine teenagers propelling themselves to the sky on the swings!

The Borden’s Condensed Milk Co. pasteurizing plant at 35-10 Steinway St., summer 1936.

Gail Borden Jr. founded what became the Borden’s Condensed Milk Co. on Dec. 31, 1856. The company prospered during the Civil War, selling condensed milk to the Union armies. It pioneered milk bottles in 1885 and evaporated milk in 1892.

In June 1913, Borden announced it was building a four-story pasteurizing plant at 55 Steinway Ave. (off Pierce Street, now 35th Avenue), for $30,000. G. Howard Chamberlain of Yonkers was the architect. Like Borden’s Manhattan office and Brooklyn plant, the structure was heated with coal burners.

The new plant employed hundreds from the area. In 1917, a huge strike took place when workers demanded a raise from 30 to 35 cents a day. The building was renumbered 35-10 Steinway Ave. when the street name system was changed.

Elsie the Cow became the company spokescow in 1937. In the 1950s and ’60s Borden went on a buying spree, purchasing Wylers, Drakes Cakes, Wise snack foods, Kava coffee and Cracker Jack, to name only a few of the most recognizable.

When the price of whole milk dropped in 1992, the company did not adjust the cost of its product, causing a major market share loss that it could not recover. Borden’s looked for someone to buy it.

The plant was last in the telephone book in 1973. Eventually, the coal-burning, asbestos-laced building was torn down. A merger made Borden part of Hexion Speciality Chemicals, which shut it down and assigned its trademarks to another company.

Borden’s Milk Company 1940

Playground-Steinway Street & 35th Avenue ,NYC MUNICIPAL ARCHIVES
1941

Vintage RARE Borden’s Golden Crest Quart Brown Milk Glass Bottle Elsie The Cow

Borden’s Factory: Female workers at paraffining machines.

Borden’s Factory: Filling and Sealing Machine

A Borden’s milk delivery van with bodywork in the shape of a milk bottle, New York, 30th January 1935. (Photo by FPG/Hulton Archive/Getty Images)

MONDAY PHOTO OF THE DAY

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WEEKEND PHOTO OF THE DAYS

BLUE DRAGON BY GUSTAV KREITZ
AT ENTRANCE TO SOUTPOINT PARK
GLORIA HERMAN GOT IT RIGHT

Text by Judith Berdy
Thanks to Bobbie Slonevsky for her dedication to Blackwell’s Almanac and the RIHS
Thanks to Deborah Dorff for maintaining our website
Edited by Melanie Colter and Deborah Dorff

All image are copyrighted (c) Roosevelt Island Historical Society unless otherwise indicated

 
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
NYC MUNICIPAL ARCHIVES

PHOTOS COURTESY OF JUDITH BERDY

THIS PUBLICATION FUNDED BY DISCRETIONARY FUNDS FROM CITY COUNCIL MEMBER JULIE MENIN & ROOSEVELT ISLAND OPERATING CORPORATION PUBLIC PURPOSE FUNDS.

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