The pork processing industry began in urban centers such as Cincinnati before the Civil War, also known as “Porkopolis.” In the era before mechanical refrigeration, Cincinnati’s pork processing industry took place in the winter. This chromolithograph from the 1870s illustrates four scenes in a packing house: “Killing, Cutting, Rendering, and Salting.” (Image from Library of Congress)
Frances Trollope, an Englishwoman, described her impressions of Cincinnati’s pork processing industry in her 1832 Domestic Manners of Americans.
“It seems hardly fair to quarrel with a place because its staple commodity is not pretty, but I am sure I should have liked Cincinnati much better if the people had not dealt so very largely in hogs. The immense quantity of business done in this line would hardly be believed by those who had not witnessed it. I never saw a newspaper without remarking such advertisements as the following :
“Wanted immediately, 4,000 fat hogs.”
“For sale, 2,000 barrels of prime pork.”
But the annoyance came nearer than this ; if I determined upon a walk up Main-street, the chances were five hundred to one against my reaching the shady side without brushing by a snout fresh dipping from the kennel ; when we had screwed our courage to the enterprise of mounting a certain noble-looking sugar-loaf hill, that promised pure air and a fine view, we found the brook we had to cross, at its foot, red with the stream from a pig slaughter-house ; while our noses, instead of meeting ” the thyme that loves the green hill’s breast,” were greeted by odours that I will not describe, and which I heartily hope my readers cannot imagine ; our feet, that on leaving the city had expected to press the flowery sod, literally got entangled in pigs’-tails and jawbones ; and thus the prettiest walk in the neighbourhood was interdicted forever.” p. 85