The Twentieth Century dawned with Mallinckrodt expanding rapidly. While originally based along North Second Street, it had now reached North Broadway, taking over two long buildings that had once served as power houses for streetcars.

The company could now boast over 1,000 products. My favorite are the buildings labeled “cocaine” and “opium.”

Edward Jr. had taken over the company, and the outbreak of World War II presented Mallinckrodt with one of its greatest challenges.

As Germany and the Allies raced to complete an atomic bomb, the United States was confronted with a major problem: no uranium. The Belgian government had shipped some of the richest uranium ore in the world out of its colony in the Congo, but processing it proved a daunting task.

Enter Edward Mallinckrodt Jr. His company’s mass production of ether proved to be just what the Allies had ordered. Through a process using the ether, Mallinckrodt could rapidly process the ore into uranium that was fissile material.

Yes, the material for the atomic bomb was processed right here in St. Louis. There are still buildings on North Broadway that are radioactive, and I’ve seen sewer maps from MSD that have manholes labeled as radioactive and too dangerous for employees to enter.

And older St. Louisans, including me, can all remember the haunting buildings off in the distance along Highway 94 in St. Charles County where radioactive dirt and other materials had to be buried in a giant protective dome several decades ago. It will be safe in a couple hundred thousand years–don’t worry!

Like most St. Louis homegrown companies, Mallinckrodt was swallowed up by some faceless multinational corporation and the family has nothing to do with it. Mallinckrodt settles with federal regulators every couple of years for a couple hundred millions of dollars and moves along. I hear they still make methadone.