The front wall of Stephens Meat Products in San Jose, California. This building no longer exists.

There was a time in our history in which a cut of meat, or links of sausage didn’t come from a chain supermarket. Meat wasn’t transported pre-cut, across the country, via refrigerated trains. There was a local butcher. He knew you personally, and likely had an order made especially for you, every week.

Stephens Meat Products is now a parking lot next to San Jose’s central train station. Those who happened to pass by when the building existed, and who were not regular customers of Stephens, would immediately be struck by the neon sign above the parapet and a 1950s-era sign depicting an illuminated pig (one which was animated, mind you).

The building was constructed in 1948, but the business itself dates as far back as the Depression Era. During World War II, meat was hard to come by, but Stephen Pizzo was able to find an uncle with a beef ranch in the hills. When times began to change, and the packaged meat industry was dawning, Pizzo was visionary enough to purchase the first vacuum-pack lunch meat wrapper West of the Missouri. “They said he was crazy,” said Bob Morrison, Pizzo’s son-in-law.

Eventually, Pizzo’s meat products company was fighting an uphill battle. The big guys were controlling every aspect of the meat processing industry — vertical integration is what it’s generally referred as — and Stephen’s couldn’t compete with rancher cooperatives out East, who were controlling every stage of the production. These companies became the Oscar Mayers, Armour, and Swifts of today.

Morrison, who took over the business from his father-in-law, focused on quality to keep afloat — and it worked for years. He scoffs at the sausage made by the “big guys.”

“Beef Broth,” he said in a disgusted manner, “That’s what plumps ’em. I shudder to think where that broth comes from. We don’t need that. And our franks out-plump ’em all,” pausing for a moment. Then he picked up a package of chorizo sausage from his ‘corporate’ competitor, “Go ahead. Read the ingredients,” pointing out the list, which included salivary glands, lymph nodes, and tongue trimmings. “It doesn’t excite me seeing that on a sausage label.”

By the turn of the century, though, Stephen’s Meat Products was closing down. After 63 years of providing links and dogs to ballparks, cafeterias, and supermarkets the company just couldn’t compete. In its final years, it focused on its strong suit — something the conglomerates had difficulty matching in quality — sausage.

“In the meat business, sausage making is the top of the line,” Morrison explains. “Anybody can kill, but making sausage come out the same every time? It’s an art.”

Consider this a manifesto of sorts — an encouragement to go beyond the societal definition of private property and pave your own way. You should do this because these places are disappearing. You should do it because through your stories, and your experiences, you could perhaps inspire us to appreciate history for its lessons. Do not let old laws prevent you from telling incredible new stories. Do what you believe is right, rather than what the establishment says is right. There is still much to discover in this world. It all may seem to become less mysterious by the day; in reality, each day brings a new thing to analyze and a past to appreciate.

I wear shoes with padded soles to these places of the past; this keeps me from being heard while walking. Touring an abandoned place is a lot like walking through a post-apocalyptic no-man’s land; but with it comes both the guilt and exhiliration of potentially being caught for a crime.

When we see these places from the outside, they often don’t leave us with any lasting impression. Passing by them may incite idle curiosity for a few fleeting seconds, but it’s generally in passing. When one is inside, though, the experience changes. There are moments in which I’ve heard my own heart beating; seen flapping gulls in a framed-glass six story foyer that once housed radioactive ship components; an escalator that was once the world’s tallest and sits covered in mold, rust, and bird droppings. In a digital age, where everyone has a camera and every person with a cell phone is a photographer, these places serve as ideal snapshot fodder — and as a result an entire sub-culture of explorers have built a veritable institution online.

Beyond their raw photographic, draw though — beyond the interplay of light and rust, peeling paint, and the odor of asbestos and death is something that tells more about our culture than any critic or pundit could. Top secret manuals strewn about in military bases closed by the Base Realignment Committee; a multi-million dollar mansion built by a copper baron; the pervasive smell of benzyne, diesel fuel, and who-knows-what-else hundreds of feet underground in a Titan 1 missile silo. These experiences are incredibly formative; in an odd way they are the modern, post-industrial equivalent of Muir’s cathedrals.

My first conversion experience was not in a pew; it happened while I was alone. I was about to enter one of Oakland’s grandest historic structures — the Key System building. Pulling up a retractable ladder to a second story window, I nonchalantly climbed into the dark hole as bus passengers across the street looked at me in shock. The ladder disappeared from the bus passengers’ view along with me as I cautiously strolled across the precarious platform, which had a commanding view of the lobby below. Hand-carved Beaux Arts plaster had toppled from the ceiling; water dripped; a lone desk from the 40s sat in the middle of it all, rusting in its wake. But the conversion came higher — six stories up. I climbed the wrought iron staircase, encountering artifacts from various raves dating to the 80s. Though the building was an empty shell, one still had a sense of its magnificance. It was first built as a bank building and the architect spared no expense.

As I went higher, the rooms became emptier. Characteristic orange sodium vapor light flooded in through the broken windows. A building’s beauty is often best brought out when it’s empty. All too often we walk through active buildings and take little note of the care that is taken into its construction. At night, and while empty, is a building’s moment of glory. If a building’s best moment is when it is empty, its worst moment is reaching the final set of stairs. It is a moment of loss; a moment when one realizes there is nothing left to discover and this brief escape — like all escapes — will have its end.

I emerged to the roof and saw high-rises all around me. To the north was the Tribune building. I stood there to take it all in, understanding history through experience; knowing what a place once was, in the middle of a growing city that’s so alive, yet still carries the dead weight of the past on its shoulders. I stood there for what seemed like minutes (likely hours) in meditative silence. There on the top story of a 1911 building, a new belief was formed, and since then have discovered things about the past that few have been privileged to see.

Yes, I am a trespasser, and I have likely encroached on one of America’s dearest of ideas — that of private property. But through that minor transgression, I have been in the captain’s room of a 1950s cruise ship and have seen the silo of a 4-megaton nuclear warhead; photographed the abandoned mansion of a billionaire, and walked the halls of a World War II secret interrogation facility. It’s good to know there is still much to discover in this world, and taking pictures of these places is my conceit of ensuring that they’re never forgotten.

One of my resolutions for 2008 was to update this site and make it a bit more user-friendly.? Granted, I’m only about 1/3 of the way there, but as you’ll notice, I’ve added a few tweaks.

If you find an article especially interesting or appealing, you now have the option of sharing it via a suite of various social bookmarking sites.? You can also easily subscribe to the RSS.? If you’re a new visitor, you may notice there’s a little widget at top that encourages you to subscribe.? Don’t despair if it annoys you; I promise it will only appear 2-3 times before it disappears.

Launch two will come soon; in addition to a new look and feel, I’ll soon be offering the ability for you to contribute to Bearings.? What this means to you is that you get added value to your site through an inbound link, I get a great article to distribute, and you get exposure through a great geography blog (I don’t pretend that it’s the “best” per se, but I can say that quite a few Bearings readers will find your submission interesting, valuable, and intriguing). I’ll be accepting photo submissions too!

So now that the housecleaning summary is done, here comes the fun part:

In the Coming Weeks…

• Follow me through the abandoned decks and hull of a ghost ship. Telstar Logistics has inspired me to do the additional research necessary to turn this into a decent story with photos (three-part series).
• Learn about the religious significance of hot springs in America. You won’t believe the cool sources I found; you’ll also get a health dose of images from these defunct hot spring resorts! (three-part series).
• Special grab bag surprise. I can’t tell you what this story is going to be about, but I can guarantee that it will be a doozy — with photos (one-part entry).

Happy Belated Holidays from the Bearings Editor, and I wish the best 2008 you could possibly imagine. If you have any suggestions, questions, or requests please feel more than free to contact me.