Stella Cheese Factory

Sitting up the hill from the No. 3 shaft stand an impressive collection of sandstone and brick – a series of buildings we like to call the complex. At first glance it appeared to be one large building made up of a hodgepodge of hastily constructed additions. Upon closer examination it was clear that this was a series of separate buildings built very close together. The sandstone construction suggests that these buildings were built early in the mine’s life (at least before the concrete 1910 structure from yesterday). But what purpose they served was unclear – a closer look was in order.

For so long have we been dwelling in the realm of industry and infrastructure here at Baltic that we have failed to appreciate a more humanized angle. For all we know these sandstone walls and concrete foundations could have been built by giants, aliens, or Gods – anything but the brittle and mortal man that we have come to know. But these epic structures were indeed built by men, and from time to time during our travels we are sometimes reminded of that simple but often overlooked fact. At Baltic it would be the discovery of remains from a simple house that would provide our much needed human perspective for the day.

When we had first stumbled across the vast complex of ruins we weren’t sure what we had discovered – but had assumed it was connected with the Baltic Mine in some manner due to its location. (check out our first exploration of the ruins HERE) It sure appeared to come from the mine – faced with a patchwork of sandstone and topped by a steel smokestack. But its layout and sheer size was something entirely different. This wasn’t a mere hoist building or dry house that we had discovered – it seemed more like a factory. It turns out it was.

After leaving the cavernous room on the south end of the complex, we moved through a small doorway into a smaller single-story room. The room was lined by series of window and door openings and was rather well lit considering it damp and dingy appearance. Most notable, however, was the set of four large concrete tubs laid out in two rows in the center of the room. Our first thought was that these tubs were the cheese vats themselves, and that milk was curdled within them. But the room’s exposed brick and sandstone walls – along with its low roof and dirt floors didn’t seem to be a good environment for food production. These vats must have been used for something else.

Making our way up the stairs from the lower level upwards we find ourselves walking up into the bright sunshine of day – as the room we entered was missing its roof. Just like the rooms below, this one also featured a collection of concrete tubs. But unlike the lower vat rooms these tubs were not laid out along rows but instead were pushed up against the walls of the room.

Heading west out of the collection of vat rooms we had been exploring we pass under a gabled wall of sandstone which looks to have once been a mine building. Passing through the doorway we immediately noticed a change in building materials – and found ourselves in a very familiar environment.

As with any smokestack, the Stella Cheese Factory’s stack was required to draw combustion gases up and out of the building. In the case of mine buildings, this combustion was used heat a boiler in the production of steam to feed the mine’s various steam engines. While the Stella plant would not of required any steam for mechanical use (its machinery would have been powered by electricity) it would however require steam to heat the cheese vats along with the building itself. Somewhere within the massive complex must have been a boiler room where these steam would have been produced. Since the boilers would have to be placed near the smokestack there are two possibilities for its location – marked on the map above. Since our exploration of the room to the east of the stack turned up nothing, we now turned to the room on its west. A room protected by a large steel fire door.

Moving down the hallway past the stairs down to the basement we entered yet another room in the vast ruins we call the Stella Cheese Factory. This one featured a series a set of windows on its south wall and a series of openings along its west, one of which looked to be a doorway. Most interesting of all was a brick structure set along its north wall which provided a clue to this rooms purpose.

Now that our exploration of the Stella Cheese Factory is complete, its time to take a step back and look at all that we have discovered. After exploring nearly a dozen rooms of these vast ruins I feel I can make an educated guess on just how the building was once laid out and how it might have looked in its youth. Luckily a great deal of the structure still stands, making the task a tad bit easier. But some details are scantly evident on the ground, and I had to make some leaps of faith here and there. My artistic interpretation is shown above.

Before leaving the Stella Cheese Factory behind for good, there’s still one last mystery that I feel the need to explore. It has been said that when Stella moved into Baltic it made the decision to take advantage of the already existing infrastructure that the mine had left behind. This makes perfect sense considering the period of the history in which the plant was born. It was 1933 and the Depression had taken hold of the Copper Country resulting in the closure of several mines including the Baltic itself. Stella arrived to Baltic to find a collection of recently vacated industrial buildings in an economy that called for thrift – moving in to these old buildings was no doubt an easy decision.