Gloversville Continental Mills

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After the Fire: What Remains of Gloversville Continental Mills A Field of Bricks The bricks were everywhere. Not stacked, not standing. Just scattered across the ground like something vast had simply let go. What used to be Mill No. 3 of the former Gloversville-Continental Mills now spread out before me like a field of rubble, stretching from Beaver Street all the way back to the Cayadutta Creek bank. Thousands of bricks, the same ones that had held this building upright through more than a century of American manufacturing history, lay in random heaps with nowhere left to go. In one corner, pressed against a sealed-off wall, sat what remained of steel beams, HVAC machinery, and other miscellaneous load-bearing beams and the remains of 40 historical knitting machines. The fire had taken everything soft about them. What was left were twisted red-brown skeletons of rust and charred metal, piled on top of each other like they had tried to hold on and failed. Standing there in the ...
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Abandoned "Supermarket' Warehouse

Heading into the Supermarché!





This abandoned warehouse takes a special place in my life. It is the very first abandoned building I explored. The very first. The number one. The cherry popper. Yadda yadda. It all began on a cold early morning, jumping into my car, picking up my friend in Queens and taking the three-hour journey north. We arrived early ahead of the meeting time and chilled for what seemed like an eternity as the car became colder by the minute. My friend and I met the local connect who knew this city well and was showing us around for the entire day. Our connect led us to the property as we parked our cars on the grass median and walked our way to the active rail line and walked behind the building. The rail line was also involved in a feature movie that for some reason I forgot to commit to memory. Entering the building, we headed straight to the roof. We were going to take in the roof views first and make our way down.






Untitled movie tracks. I forgot the movie!





Fishing around on the roof. Sea bass anyone?















Inside contained about eleven floors. All the floors from the second onto the last floor before the roof contained the same pillared landscape synonymous with early factories if you've been enough factories as I have been. It was pitch black on some floors the further away you were from the windows. We were warned to look out for gaping freight elevator shafts. Dark and ominous entrances one step too far and you would be meeting the ground floor pretty quickly.


























This warehouse also contained a unique structure within the second floor. It housed actual train lines right inside the building. A very unique and one not to be emulated anytime soon in the future. The tracks entered from the west and continued on east to the other side of the building. This 90-year-old warehouse stored many supermarket items many of us are accustomed to on our supermarket shelves. One story goes that about 3,000 pounds of butter once vanished in storage here during a government relief effort. Paula Deen that you?







On the left, the railroad spur enters the second floor.





Looking down from the roof.





The railroad dock where goods were unloaded and loaded onto trains.





The other side of the dock.





Seven years ago this eleven story behemoth survived a fire a modern warehouse building would probably never have withstood. A fire started at the top of the floor and burned all the way to the loading dock on the bottom floor due to an illegal scrapping of pipework inside the building. This behemoth was built with concrete, steel and cork installation for its cold and dry storage operation. It seemed fire was only a flesh wound. There is evidence of that fire when I explored years ago but the building stands strong today. Shaming this generation of builders for the next ten years when it reaches 100 years if no redevelopment or demolition in the next decade misses this storage facility.





Dock gates on the ground floor.





As per the usual, this property has changed numerous hands and still has not seen any changes as of 2017. A truly exciting first expedition I ever made.




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