This anonymous cluster of buildings, one of which is obviously a grain elevator, has an incredibly important role in the history of America in the early Twentieth Century. Known variously as the George P. Plant Milling Company as well as the Gingham Girl Flour Mills, and apparently later the Corneli Seed Company by 1950, it now sits vacant. But at one point, its designs printed on its flour sacks served as fabric for millions of women’s and girl’s dresses for generations. You can read about it here. And yes, it was right here in St. Louis.
From the article:
Suddenly, feed companies were being encouraged to use the latest dress print bags and feed supply stores were turned into fabric stores, to the disdain of one feed salesman interviewed in 1948 who said, “Years ago, they used to ask for all sorts of feeds, special brands you know. Now they come over and ask me if I have an egg mash in a flowered percale. It ain’t natural.”
Lol