Rath Packing Company, Sycamore Street between Elm & Eighteenth Streets, Waterloo, Black Hawk County, IA

Significance: Between 1891 and 1985, the Rath Packing Company grew from a small local business into the ninth largest meat packing company in the United States. By 1950, the Waterloo plant was the largest single-unit packing house in the world. The buildings in the complex were designed by Hans Peter Henschien of Chicago, the nation's foremost packinghouse architect during the first half of the twentieth century. The Rath plant exemplifies the vertical killing and processing technology that dominated the meat packing industry during this period.
Survey number: HAER IA-41