LeRoy Pennysaver & News

LE ROY PENNYSAVER & NEWS - OCTOBER 11, 2020 by Lynne Belluscio We continue to sort through hundreds of photographs from the Keeney collection which includes many family photos as well as photos taken on many of the farms and seed mills across the United States. I was surprised when I discovered a photo of the Keeney seed plant in Bozeman, Montana and had to send off an email to my grandson who lives in Bozeman. He is studying to be a civil engineer at Montana State University. He emailed me back to say that he was pretty sure the building was still in Bozeman, so I did a little more research and sent a note off to my son who lives in California. He did a little more searching and sent me a link to a couple of articles about the seed industry in Bozeman and the application for the building’s inclusion on the National Register of Historic Places. The N.B. Keeney & Son Company originated in LeRoy during the Civil War. Their business primarily centered around agricultural commodities such as beans, peas, cotton and cattle. Nicholas’ son, Calvin became interested in developing stringless beans which we call snap beans. Between 1884 and 1911, Calvin introduced nineteen varieties of beans which ultimately were distributed by the W. Atlee Burpee Company. Although they grew peas and beans for canning companies, their main interest was in growing seed for farmers. They were one of the biggest seed producing companies in the United States. But in 1911, a blight hit most of the fields in the north east – in NewYork, Wisconsin, and Michigan. And it was discovered that the blight was carried in the seed from one year to the next. The large seed companies, Jerome Rice Seed Company of Detroit, Everett Clark, Landreth Seed Company and Nicholas Keeney & Son of LeRoy, looked for land in the west that would provide better growing conditions. One by one they moved their facilities to Bozeman in Gallatin County Montana. Tests conducted by the Jerome B. Rice Seed Company proved that the land was ideal for growing peas and beans. By 1912, 17,000 acres of land were planted to peas and beans and it produced 75% of the nation’s crop. Keeney started moving production to Gallatin in 1913. The Bozeman Canning Company went into production and was aided by the government demand for canned goods during World War I. In a 1922 article in the “Grain and Farm Service” magazine, it explains that Keeney had decided to move his seed production plant in Cheboygan, Michigan: “The Keeney Seed Co. is discontinuing business here (in Cheboygan) due to exorbitant taxes being paid on its buildings. Two warehouses will be dismantled, one going to Bozeman, Mont and one to LeRoy, NY.” I quickly searched through the Keeney photos and found two photos of the buildings in Cheboygan, but with no explanation. I suspect that the buildings weren’t moved, only the machinery and equipment. Interestingly, the Bozeman building in the 1925 photograph was placed on the National Register of Historic Places in October 1987 and is listed as the Gallatin Seed Company Building. The Gallatin Seed Company closed in 1962, and at some point, it was converted into an apartment complex. The narrative of the National Landmark nomination explains how the seed was processed. The seed was delivered to the first floor and then taken to the third floor where fanning mills blew away any debris. The seed was dropped through a chute to the second floor where it was manually sorted to remove deformed or off-color seeds. Then it was treated with chemicals to prevent disease and dyed with a color to discourage human consumption. The seeds were dropped to the first floor to be put into burlap bags or 1200 to 1500 lb. boxes. In 1928, the Keeney Seed Company joined together with two other competitors, Everett Clark Seed Company and John Allen Seed Company and formed the Associated Seed Growers Inc., known as Asgrow. It was based in New Haven, Connecticut. (Today it is owed by Bayer and is part of the Monsanto conglomerate which is based in DesMoines, Iowa.) Calvin Keeney, who had no children interested in succeeding him, turned his company over to his employees in 1923. He said that he wanted to give the company to the men who had helped him build it up. Calvin died in 1930. He is buried in Machpleah Cemetery and this year we planted Keeney yellow pencil pod beans in the urn next to his graves stone. His home on West Main Street, where his daughter Ruth Keeney lived, is just east of the Save-A-Lot store. Keeney Road is named for the Keeney family and the original pioneer Keeney homestead was located on the south side of Route 5, near the Keeney Road intersection. A historic marker indicated the site of the Keeney homestead but was removed when Walmart was interested in building a store on the site. The DOT has refused permission to put the sign back up. The plant disease that necessitated the move to Bozeman, eventually pervaded the fields in Gallatin, and the seed companies were forced to move again, further west. Asgrow moved out of Gallatin in 1948. The canning factory that processed the peas and beans went bankrupt in 1961 and the Gallatin Seed Company closed in 1962. Cheboygan, Bozeman, LeRoy