Jamesport landmark elevator demolished

JAMESPORT, MO — A Jamesport landmark has been torn down. The former Farmers Produce Elevator, out of service for the past several years since the Reed family sold their interests about a decade ago, has been demolished due to safety concerns. Hoffman and Reed at Trenton had owned the business while it was used for storage before selling the property to David Landes of Jamesport. The history of the building goes back 70 years when W.L. Reed and his son, Charles Reed, built the elevator just north of the railroad to expand their business. The elevator had been added onto several different times to accommodate the business. According to the Jamesport Centennial, printed in 1972, Reed traded a farm in Kansas to H.R. Currin for the Farmers Produce Company in Jamesport and took possession on June 7, 1932. At that time they handled eggs, cream and poultry. In the first years of their operation, they would buy 75 to 80 ten-gallon cans of cream on Saturdays and 100 cases of eggs. Later the grain business developed. In 1940 a grain elevator was built north of the railroad depot. In 1942 the business also starting buying and processing seeds of all kinds. The company purchased the old ice plant and creamery which was located in the old Farmers Tile Elevator that was idle at that time. They added onto it and made it into a modern plant. The produce shipped out of Jamesport tallied from 150 to 200 rail cars of grain per year during good crop years. During the 1940s, Saturday night entertainment in Jamesport included movies shown on the north side of the elevator building with the audience seated in chairs they brought, while others sat in their vehicles to watch.