New Orleans Republican. [volume] (New Orleans, La) 1867-1878, 1875-11-14
How the Cincinnati Hog Is Taken In and
Done For,

BY the improved processes of slaughter
ing, within the brief space of two and a
half minutes a log Hoses his place in the
world as portion of the vitalized creation
and becomes SO much bacon, 80 many spare
ribs and such quantity of lard. AS the
process involves the personality of the hog
to some extent, we will begin with him in
his living, breathing form. He ia contained
in an immense pen on the ground floor Of
the building. and there are good many of
him, say five or six hundred at time The
porcine grunters having had their doom
duly sealed, spoken their "iast words, and
tearfully handed around an ong their aiing
and spared companions a few locks OF
bristles and mementOee, are driven up a
gangway to the slaughter pen, where an
able bodied colored gentleman claps q
chain around their hind legs, one at a
time, and the pressure of steam
lever jerks the struggling and loudly
squesling pig into the air. He is now sus-
pended on q horizontal bar about thirty
feet long. The chain by which he ia sus-
pended slides along the bar and before he
fairly comprehends the situation another
man, CORY to his very armpts, pluuges a
knife into his throat, and taps the lite cur
rent He squeals and kicks about half
second, and before the vital spark has
fed" has beside him former comrade of
the pen, who has met with the same misfor.
tune. and, with him, 10 on the way to meet
his Gadarene anct stOrs. There ia a constant
line Of stuck hogs passing down this ele-
waited bar, and when they get to the end Of
it they are dead, and are pumped into an
enormous tank Of boiling water. The great
personal pride of pig sticker is to have
hog after he introduces his knife into his
jngnlar. There was q sub" on deck yester-
day afternoon, and the pigs squealed good
deal, go much, in fact that his assistants
were disposed to complain.
The hogs take their post-mortem warm
bath, into which they are plunged from the
iron rod, eight and ten at time, and. by
means of a revolving iron skid operated BY
steam at one of the tank, are thrown out
singly upon long. wooden table, on which
they are scraped by twelve or fifteen men.
They start in rough, shaggy and dirty at
one end of the table, and reach the other
end as clean and white as may be. At the
far end of the table one man cuts off the
head, another fops the blooaless trunk
over to gang below, who gut him. hang
him up and cool him OFT with stream Of
water. The beheadng process is new here,
we believe, and comes from acephxlous
Chicago. 1t is claimed, that by cutting off
the head the hog is more speedily cooled,
and that the lard, tongue and head pieces
are got at day il advance of the old
method. The hams are also faced" and
still warm, instead of waiting for it to cool
as formerly, and the innovation is said 10
be very advantageous. When the heads |
have been cut of, the entrails ard fatty
substance taken out and the hams dressed, |
the cleaned hogs are hung op runways be- |
tween the joist of the drying room and run |
into that department to cool. Nearly all |
the houses on the avenue will hang about |
$500 hogs on floor, In this room, when |
tire hogs are sufficiently cool, they are cut
up into all the various forms Of pork
hams, shoulders, middles, ETC. and the |
men who do the cutting use their knives
and saws with the skill and precision of |
ANTAGONISTS, cleaning bone when it is to
be thrown away SO perfectly that hungry |
dog would pass it by in disgust. Since the !
adoption Of the new method of taking of |
The heads and facing" the hams
n the kiIlingroom, the cutters work
very fast and to much better ad-
vantage To cut up thousand hogs
a nov considered only a fair days
work for one man, and in the busy season
sven more than that amount of work is ex-
acted All of the houses are supplied with
hugh iron watts extending from the killing
r1om to the floor below, in which the fatty
portions Of the hog are boiled or steamed |
INTO lard An Improvement known as
'CaldwtlPs Manhead," has recently been
made to these watts. 1t is a manhead in the |
centre Of the bottom of the tank. instead of |
at the side as in the old tanks, and its |
utility is that when the cooking process is |
it is opened and the "chowder"
Or "slush, as the reiuss of the lard ia called,
drops out at once. The old tanks had to |
,ool SO rs to allow man to go into them |
and shovel out the "chO wder," and that gen |
orally required two or three hours. When |
the lard is dome" it is pumped into an ele- |
waited galvanized receiver called .'rig- |
Tag" some thirty by twelve feet square,
and traversed by cutters aggregating in |
length nearly 400 feet. The lard having |
hsssed through these cutters, passes |
through 6. long pipe to another receiver,
from which it is drawn into the tierces in |
which it inds it's way to market. The bris-
ties go TO the brush factory or the mattress
maker; the brains become "head-cheese," |
feet are sold to the restaurant as Irish |
quail" and the blood flows into @ big
wooden vessel directly under the killer 9
by steam pipes until it cong =, ls
into q sort of ielly and ia then readily a Id