A mighty swath of Akron’s industrial past is tumbling to the ground.
Wreckers are steadily chipping away at a seven-story behemoth at the old Goodyear Tire & Rubber Co. complex. As of Monday, about 75% of the 600,000-square-foot plant had been demolished.
Known as the mixing center, the brick-and-steel factory at 1080 River St. was actually a conglomerate of buildings erected more than a century ago across the tracks from Plant 1.
According to 100-year-old files discovered by University of Akron archivists John Ball and Mark Bloom in Goodyear’s company records:
- Building 31, the cement house, was a three-story, L-shaped structure completed in 1915. It measured 279 feet long by 59 feet wide and originally housed such departments as asbestos packing, balloon fabric spreading, fabric curing, and cement mixing and shipping. Its total cost was $112,700 (nearly $3.5 million today).
- Building 32, constructed as five stories in 1916 but expanded to seven by 1920, measured 379 feet long by 79 feet wide and originally housed the calendar room, crude rubber storage, nonskid bands, electrical department and dispatch room. Its total cost was $509,043 (over $10.5 million today).
- Building 33, constructed as five stories in 1916 but expanded to seven in 1920, measured 239 feet long by 159 feet wide and originally housed a tin shop, vacuum dryers, unloading scales and drying room. Its total cost was $563,690 (over $11.7 million today).