I really need your help finding photos or images of Spencer Packing Co. reefers. Here's what I know and what I have done.
Spencer Packing Co. was founded in 1952 in Spencer, Iowa. They went public in the 1960's as Spencer Foods, was closed on Oct 31, 1977. Later was bought by Land O' Lakes until they closed in 1984. In 1959, they were shipping 75 to 100 reefers a week and were the third largest US beef plant. They bought from a 150 radius of Spencer and shipped most of their dressed beef to Chicago by reefer. In the late '50's and early '60's they had a large fleet of URTX reefers with their name on it. The only color picture I have seen of one is an HO model by Walthers.
I have written to the Spencer Library, The Spencer Chamber of Commerce, and the Clay County Historical Society. I received the black & white photo of the packing plant from the library. The Chamber has not responded yet and the historical society said they have a color slide of the car and will send it to me.
I have Googled just about every combination I can think of with no luck so far. I got excited when I found a web site with pictures of old URTX reefers on it, but not the one I'm looking for. I found a few old stories about Spencer Pack on the Spencer Daily reporter newspaper's web site, but no pictures so far.
I have written Walthers to see if they would either make an O gauge car or share a picture or artwork to help me get one made, but haven't heard back from them yet.
I'm thinking I will contact Kalmbach to see if they have any images in their library of this car.
Mill City, you have found a lot of awesome pictures before, can you "pull another rabbit out of the hat?" There has to be pictures somewhere, what am I doing wrong?
Art
