E is for Elevator an A to Z Series about Agriculture

It wasn’t too long ago that I was talking with someone and they started describing something they saw and didn’t know the right words to use. They wanted me to understand, but it was sort of like they were speaking a different language. They were talking about a town I hadn’t been too but they knew it had something to do with farms so we both thought we would focus on it and figure it out.

The “it” was a really big building. It was right there on the river. You know the big building. It’s really white. I’d never been to that town and yet I had been to every town and seen “it.” The “it” being a grain elevator — the storage facility for corn, soybeans, wheat and rice.

My first chance to be in the world of grain elevators was while I was in college in Oklahoma. I got used to the elevator on the horizon. Enid, Oklahoma was the Wheat Capital of the US so the elevators there were hulking masses. And in the photo on the left, you can see grain bins in the foreground.