WRITTEN HISTORICAL AND DESCRIPTIVE DATA

FIELD RECORDS

HAER MO-118HAER MO-118

PRATT & WHITNEY PLANT(Bannister Federal Complex)(Kansas City Plant)1500 & 2000 East Bannister RoadKansas CityJackson CountyMissouri

HISTORIC AMERICAN ENGINEERING RECORDMIDWEST REGIONAL OFFICE

National Park ServiceU.S. Department of the Interior

601 Riverfront DriveOmaha, NE 68102

HISTORICAL AMERICAN ENGINEERING RECORD

PRATT & WHITNEY PLANT (Bannister Federal Complex) (Kansas City Plant)

HAER No. MO-118 Location: 1500 – 2000 East Bannister Road, Kansas City, Jackson County, Missouri Quad: Grandview, Jackson County, Missouri (1996) UTM: 15/363450/4313011; 15/363392/4313448; 15/364437/4313622; 15/364337/4313172 (Coordinate edited Jan 9, 2014) Date(s) of Construction: 1942 - 1943 through 1961; 1964 - ca. 1990 Present Owner: U.S. Department of Energy, National Nuclear Security Administration, and the General Services Administration. Present Use: The U. S. Department of Energy, the National Nuclear Security Administration, and the General Services Administration (GSA) occupy a large section while Honeywell Industries leases a large portion on the complex as the managing contractor to the National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA). Significance: Designed by the famed industrial architect Albert Kahn in 1942 and completed in July 1943 after his death (December 1942), the original Pratt & Whitney Aircraft plant comprises a collection of buildings specifically designed to assist in U.S. wartime efforts during World War II. Constructed in less than 9 months, the approximately 3 million square foot Main Manufacturing Plant (Building 1) demonstrated the utility and economy of Kahn’s “Warspeed” concept and concrete arches. Kahn’s firm also designed several other buildings within the complex. Report prepared by: Cydney Millstein, architectural historian Architectural & Historical Research, L.L.C. Kansas City, Missouri Mary Ann Warfield, cultural historian Kansas City, Missouri Date: April 9, 2012

PRATT & WHITNEY PLANT (Bannister Federal Complex) (Kansas City Plant) HAER No. MO-118 (page 2) PART I. HISTORICAL INFORMATION When the United States realized that its entrance into World War II was inevitable, the government encouraged manufacturing corporations to build up their physical plants to assist in the wartime effort, in whatever way possible. Corporations appeared to be reluctant to finance their own expansions to produce military equipment, such as aircraft parts, and were concerned about overcapacity. Consequently, the government partially or fully paid for these expansions by offering an accelerated tax amortization to companies certified by the War or Navy Departments. The Defense Plant Corporation, created in August 1940, loaned money to build these much needed factories while “retaining title to the facilities.”1 One of the biggest proponents of this corporate expansion was Frederick Brent Rentschler, developer of the Pratt & Whitney line of Wasp aircraft engines, who believed that a partnership with the automotive industry would lend the best contribution to aircraft production. Rentschler felt that the auto industry could retrofit their factories for the assemblage of airplanes by taking over the production of the engines and duplicate manufacturing procedures of the aircraft makers in order to increase the output of needed war machinery.2 Subsequently, this arrangement occurred in many existing automotive plants across the United States, not only for the production of needed aircraft and engine parts, but also, for the production of ammunition, tanks, submarines and other equipment necessary to win a war.3 A number of new plants constructed during World War II for the sole purpose of producing military grade aircraft engines. Albert Kahn designed the majority of these facilities, including the following: Wright Aeronautical Corporation’s plants in Caldwell, Woodridge, and Paterson, New Jersey and Lockland, Ohio; Fairchild Engine and Airplane Company, Long Island, New York; Buick Motor Division, Melrose Park, Illinois; Chrysler Corporation Dodge Division, Chicago; United Aircraft Corporation, one each in Stratford and Hartford, Connecticut; Curtiss-Wright Corporation, Louisville; General Motors Corporation, Tonawanda, New York and United Aircraft Corporation’s Pratt & Whitney Plant, Kansas City, Missouri. 4

1 R. Christopher Goodwin and Associates, Inc., “Historic Context for Department of Defense Facilities World War II Permanent Construction.” Online, http://aec.army.mil/usaec/cultural/ww2_pc.pdf Chapter VI, 1. The report states that “of all the methods used to stimulate industrial construction, the Government-Owned, Contractor Operated (GOCO) facility has the most relevance to this study.” The Pratt & Whitney Plant Complex is one of these federally sponsored enterprises. 2 United Technologies, “Dependable Engines Since 1925,” Pratt & Whitney. July 1990, 3-7. Copy, NNSA Archives, Kansas City, Missouri. 3 Existing plants owned by the Ford Corporation, General Motors, Buick, Chrysler and a few other now- defunct auto company facilities, as well as commercial aircraft manufacturers including United Air Corporation, Curtiss Wright, and Glenn L. Martin were, in fact, retrofitted to produce military equipment.

4 James Buford, former archivist at Albert Kahn Associates, Inc., provided a list of the plants.

PRATT & WHITNEY PLANT (Bannister Federal Complex) (Kansas City Plant) HAER No. MO-118 (page 3) Kahn has been noted as the “most powerful influence in the development of the late 1930s industrial building” and that the “organization of his office and the buildings he designed became the standard by which the majority of World War II industrial complexes were built.”5 However, to date, there are no World War II aircraft assembly plants listed in the National Register of Historic Places.6 Although a burgeoning business in aircraft and engine manufacturing already existed from growth of an increasing passenger transport clientele, it became evident to the War Production Board in April 1942 that military aircraft production had to quickly increase. The “Warspeed” construction method devised by Albert Kahn and his firm led to Kahn’s success as the leading architect of wartime industrial design, as masterfully demonstrated in the construction of the Pratt & Whitney Corporation of Missouri. The “Warspeed” design techniques devised by Albert Kahn and his team of architects and engineers grew out of the need to quickly and efficiently construct manufacturing plants for the production of war machinery. As Roger Matuz explains, “‘Speed and more speed,’ became the motto of the firm to design the factories that manufactured the supplies needed for the war effort.”7 The Kahn team, with Long-Turner Construction Company, general contractors of Kansas City and New York, respectively, further developed “Warspeed” construction.8 What the two firms did very successfully was to design form work first, then conceive the structural system around it.9 This method was based on construction guidelines that challenged the ingenuity of the building industry during the crisis of World War II. “First, critical materials had to be eliminated [steel was needed for building tanks, aircraft and ships]; second, speed of the construction was of the essence; third, buildings had to be built at minimum cost.”10 As an outcome of Kahn’s new scheme for the Kansas City plant, the development of the concrete arch slab roof was a direct result of material-saving measures as dictated by the War Production Board.

5 “Kahn,”Goodwin and Associates,p. 183. Online http://aec.army.mil/usaec/cultural/ww2_pc.pdf

6 Edson Beall, Control Unit Manager, NRHP, has confirmed this fact.

7 Roger Matuz, Albert Kahn: Builder of Detroit (Detroit: Wayne State University Press, 2002), 84.

8 Long-Turner was a combination of the Long Construction Company of Kansas City and the Turner Construction Company of New York, Philadelphia and Boston.

9 “Warspeed System of Construction in Concrete,” Architectural Record, n.d., 52. Archives, Kahn Associates archives Detroit, Michigan. Copies of journal articles archived at the Kahn office often did not include a complete citation.

10 “Wartime Construction of Factory Buildings: Building Types,” Architectural Record 92 (December 1942): n. p. Albert Kahn and his firm was chosen to design the Pratt & Whitney Plant complex in 1942 utilizing the “Warspeed” construction method used in his earlier projects, including the expansion of Pratt & Whitney’s factory in West Hartford, Connecticut. In 1939 Pratt & Whitney moved from East Hartford to West Harford, Connecticut. Also, Kanh’s work with Mahony-Troast Construction Company on Willow Run (among others) utilized Warspeed methods.

PRATT & WHITNEY PLANT (Bannister Federal Complex) (Kansas City Plant) HAER No. MO-118 (page 4) The “Warspeed” method of constructing an industrial building was, perhaps, Kahn’s greatest contribution to the United States during World War II. This system saved time and materials, both of which were tantamount to the war effort. With minimal use of steel, a fast curing concrete product and the use of reusable concrete forms, the Kansas City Plant (totaling nearly 3 million square feet), was operational in less than six months. Construction and Initial Operation of the Pratt & Whitney Aircraft Corporation in Missouri The Pratt & Whitney Aircraft Corporation, a subsidiary of United Aircraft Corporation, West Hartford, Connecticut, decided to build a new plant that could substantially increase manufacturing of the powerful Wasp engine series. On April 22, 1942, Rear Admiral E. M. Pace of the Bureau of Aeronautics held a conference at the request of Captain Paul E. Pihl, of the production and engineering branch of the Bureau, to discuss this effort. They considered Chicago, St. Paul and Kansas City as possible production locations. The last site examined was just outside the city limits of Kansas City, Missouri.11 On April 29, 1942, it was agreed that the site of an old racetrack in an unincorporated town known as Dodson, Missouri, would be the location for the new Pratt & Whitney Aircraft Corporation of Missouri. The location appeared to have all the necessary facilities; water, electricity, transportation, labor force and housing. In addition, the site featured 300 acres of flat land in close proximity to a trolley line, adjacent to the right-of-way of the Missouri Pacific Railroad, and good road facilities.12 Excavation work began on July 6, 1942. At that time, the Long-Turner Construction Company had numerous difficulties in beginning construction. When the construction schedule was set, bulldozers and other types of heavy earth-moving equipment were needed for the North African Campaign.13 In addition, only one tractor was available to do a job that required dozens. Missouri mud, alone, caused construction delays that were uncommon to other war factory projects.14 At the onset of the construction of the Pratt & Whitney complex, there was a severe shortage of both lumber and steel. Kahn had to adjust his design to utilize concrete without the steel rods normally used as reinforcement. He turned to the load-bearing capacity of the arch, which did not need reinforcing rods, but instead used wire mesh. Kahn stepped away from the truss-style roof system, which had been the standard in his designs for both automobile and aircraft plants up to this time. Because of his

11 “The First Seven Days,” The Wasp Nest 1 (February 1943): 1. Pratt & Whitney published The Wasp Nest in-house for their employees from 1943-1945. The newsletter was mainly social in scope. 12 Ibid, 5-7.

13 The North African Campaign was fought between the allied forces and the axis powers to protect the British Commonwealth from German invasion. The United States lent military assistance in North Africa in May 1942, the same time that Kansas City’s Pratt & Whitney Plant was developed. 14 Arthur Edson, “War Plant Tale of Difficulties,” The Herald, 24 May 1944. Microfilm, Archives, Albert Kahn Associated Architects and Engineers, Inc., Detroit, Michigan.

PRATT & WHITNEY PLANT (Bannister Federal Complex) (Kansas City Plant) HAER No. MO-118 (page 5) innovation in roof design, the Pratt & Whitney Plant exemplifies Kahn’s ability to quickly redesign a project to accommodate for unforeseen circumstances such as material shortages, which were so prevalent during the years of World War II.15 By adopting the arch as a standard design for the Pratt & Whitney Plant, movable forms for setting concrete were required.16 Kahn designed the roof as a series of load bearing arches, each 40’ wide, made of 3” concrete poured around wire mesh and constructed by employing movable concrete forms and the application of concrete with a quick cure time. As designed, the arches rest on top of concrete girders supported by columns rising from the floor. Additional support for the arches was achieved with concrete cross-sections set at frequent intervals.17 Kahn’s ‘Warspeed’ construction method for the Kansas City Pratt & Whitney Plant called for the use of one-fifth the amount of steel normally required for the construction of a manufacturing plant. This assembly line procedure would prove to be highly effective as it permitted the pouring of 200,000 square feet of roof area each workweek once construction was underway.18 Thus, the Manufacturing Plant was hailed as a “real monument to the genius of Kahn, who died when it was under construction.”19 Efficiency in the use of wood was also exceptional. Each 80-foot form accounted for a 40-foot section of roof, 1,570’ long. The movable concrete forms made of wood were used nineteen times before having to be rebuilt.20 The Main Manufacturing Plant, which included administrative offices at the front of the facility, was compared to a flattened skyscraper spread out over two floors. The mobile forms were used to expedite the construction time.21 While arched roofs were vastly successful in the Manufacturing Plant, the system was not appropriate for other buildings in the complex. The thirty-two test cells also designed by Kahn as part of the Main Manufacturing Plant, required a slip form type of wall building. Forms were raised in four-foot steps by screw jacks as the concrete walls were built up. The Double Wasp engines were placed inside the test

15 Tracy Wood, “Concrete Arch Roof for Kansas City Factory,” Civil Engineering 13 (August 1943): 363-364. 16 Ibid.

17 “Pratt and Whitney, ”The Kansas City Star 4 July 1943, n. p. Microfilm, Special Collections, Missouri Valley Room, Kansas City Public Library. 18 “Aircraft Engines: Pratt &Whitney Aircraft Corporation, Kansas City, Missouri,” Factory Management and Maintenance 104 (April 1945): B-62-65. 19 Ibid.

20 Ibid. See also: “Pratt & Whitney Aircraft Plant Construction,” The Kansas City Times 6 July 1942, n. p. Microfilm, Special Collections, Missouri Valley Room, Kansas City Public Library. The heavy wood members that were discarded became the trusses for the separate garage building, while other sections were used elsewhere. The much-used pieces were later sold for scrap.

21 Ibid.

PRATT & WHITNEY PLANT (Bannister Federal Complex) (Kansas City Plant) HAER No. MO-118 (page 6) cell cylinders and run at varying speeds. In order to successfully test the engines, there were two types of horizontal cylinders: 16’ and 24’in diameter. The cells were designed to muffle the noise from the roar of the engines as they were tested. Openings in the test cells were stuffed with rock wool for additional soundproofing.22 The irregularly shaped Main Manufacturing Plant represents one of the largest integrated projects in the war construction program, literally below one roof. This building was the work place of thousands of men and women before the close of the war in 1945. Although the Pratt & Whitney Plant Complex was not completed until July 3, 1943, the plant was operational within four months of the groundbreaking ceremony held a year earlier on July 4, 1942. Over 3,000 people attended. In the beginning days of Pratt & Whitney, efforts to find a skilled work force was problematic, since an all-male work force was unavailable due to their involvement in the war. This left farmers, housewives, and single women in the employment pool, a largely unskilled labor force that required extensive training in the use of intricate tools for the production of high-performing engines for Pratt & Whitney.23 As construction continued on the Main Manufacturing Plant, newly hired Pratt & Whitney employees were trained at 2735 Main Street, an old Packard factory and dealership (now demolished). At this location, United Aircraft Corporation installed a working engine factory in a former automobile facility. After some modification to the three-story building, it became a fully operational and efficient factory. Items produced in the training center included full size airplane engines, parts for the engines and the tools used to produce the final product. All were manufactured by the new employees to aid in the training process prior to entering the Main Manufacturing building.24 The first employees to complete training were men who were to hold key positions within management of the plant. Training was a three-shift operation with 1,000 employees per shift. After four to five weeks of training, previously unskilled workers became machine operators, inspectors, and assembly line workers.25

22 “Larger Diameter Test Cells,” Construction Methods 26 (October 1944): 79, 154, 156, 158. 23 “Pratt and Whitney,” The Kansas City Star, 20 December 1942, Microfilm, Kansas City Public Library, Kansas City, Missouri. The Pratt & Whitney employees were from every walk-of-life: graduates fresh from high school in their first job, farmers supplementing their income or simply as a way to serve their country, as well as men who did not qualify for active duty. Although Pratt & Whitney was not the only industry to find women entering the work force in roles traditionally filled by men, it was very new to the farm belt of the Midwest. 24 Ibid. The first 200 employees were shipped to the Hartford, Connecticut, plant for training on how to be foremen and train the rest of the workers. See also: Wasp Nest (February 1942), 11.

25 Ibid.

PRATT & WHITNEY PLANT (Bannister Federal Complex) (Kansas City Plant) HAER No. MO-118 (page 7) The classroom settings were miniature versions of the Pratt & Whitney complex. Modules in the training facility included the following: a machine shop with more than 100 machines for making engine parts; an inspection department; an assembly line with the capacity to assemble seven motors at one time; a heat-treating department that tested for proper temper of the finished engines; and a motor testing room without motors where skills in the use of testing instruments were operated by compressed air instead of the engine itself.26 By February 18, 1943, the plant was fully operational, cranking out the famous Double Wasp engine.27 Every aspect of manufacturing was in place. Inventory was on site, production and assemblage lines were operational, as was the heating and cooling, electricity and lighting for the entire complex. Washrooms, cafeteria, health room, and employee lounges were available for breaks. Personnel and administrative offices were fully staffed. There was an on-site fire department (Kahn designed the building), with security guards on duty. The Kansas City Public Services Company, under a contract with the government, provided transportation by bus and train for the newly hired employees. New rail tracks laid from the Dodson Line were extended to the plant for greater accessibility for employees living outside the Kansas City area. In addition, the roadway, which reached to the end of the Country Club Line at Troost Avenue, was widened from the city limits to Bannister Road with a branch leading to the plant. For those employees who drove to work in their own automobiles, large parking lots were provided. State and county highway departments received federal funding for all transportation-related improvements.28 By the time United Aircraft Corporation of Missouri began producing Pratt & Whitney engines in 1943, the company had progressed in design and engineering to build the most advanced engines that the company had ever produced: As much as 3,400 hp was taken from the C [model] engines and due to the powerful heads, the high power was achieved with an actual reduction in cooling drag. Moreover, the engines promptly went into battle action, both in Europe and in the Pacific. In the crisis of the Battle of the Bulge, it was the Republic P-47 Thunderbolts, powered with the Missouri-built, water-injection-equipped R-2800-Cs [Double Wasp] that scrambled down on von Rundstedt’s forces the moment the weather broke after five days of ground action, and gave McAuliffe’s and Patton’s men the aerial support they so badly wanted to turn the tide.29

26 Ibid.

27 United Aircraft Division, Pratt & Whitney Aircraft Division, The Pratt and Whitney Aircraft Story 74 (1950): 138. 28 “Pratt and Whitney,” The Kansas City Star, 4 July 1943, n. p.

29 The Pratt and Whitney Aircraft Story, 139-141.

PRATT & WHITNEY PLANT (Bannister Federal Complex) (Kansas City Plant) HAER No. MO-118 (page 8) In 1944 Rear-Admiral Ramsey, Chief of the Navy‘s Bureau of Aeronautics, applauded the employees at the Pratt & Whitney Plant in Kansas City, saying that: [W]e knew, however, that we had in America four priceless resources. . . ingenuity, raw material, productive capacity and Americans who are independent, intelligent, resourceful and aggressive . . . capable of undertaking any task, no matter how alien to the work they had done in times of peace. Pratt & Whitney and the Bureau of Aeronautics knew how many engines we would want and how many thousands of farmers, packing house workers, salesmen, housewives and others unfamiliar with precision tool work would be required, who must be trained to man such a plant and meet production schedules…We needed light and power and heat and transportation for the workers—in a region largely agricultural we had to find trained mechanics to set up a training school to transform these sturdy Missouri Valley men and women into accomplished machine tool operators.30 Brigadier-General Perrin, Army Air Force who attended a conference in Kansas City in 1944, stated: Every month Pratt & Whitney powered planes are flying millions of miles—across oceans and continents, over the Himalayas, in the cold of Russia and over the steamy jungles of the South Pacific . . . and having met this good old name of Pratt & Whitney all over the world, it seems natural to find it tucked away in the Missouri Valley, if you can really tuck away a plant covering three million square feet of floor space. Someday, and it can’t come any too soon, we will start installing those new R-2800-C engines, made here in Kansas City, in the Thunderbolts and when that day comes the Thunderbolt, good as it is, will become a brand new air plane.31 At the height of productivity there were over 21,000 employees working at the Pratt & Whitney complex. The company was one of the largest employers in the Kansas City metropolitan area during the war. Over the three-year period of operation 7,815 R-2800 Series D engines, each containing over 14,000 parts, had been delivered to the U. S. Navy by the time the plant closed on V-J Day, September 2, 1945.32 The men and women of Kansas City, Missouri, who trained hard and worked harder to produce one of the best aircraft engines used to win World War II, went home to their pre-war lives.

30 “Engine Plant Grows Almost Over Night,” Aviation 43 (June 1944): 190. 31 Ibid.

32 Irving Brinton Holley, Jr., Buying Aircraft: Materiel Procurement for the Army Air Forces (Washington, D.C.: Office of the Chief of Military History Department of the Army, 1964), 580. This number may actually be higher as the Training Center also produced over 100 engines. See also: Maurice Smith, “A Brief History of Manufacturing,” Honeywell Federal Manufacturing & Technology, n.d.

PRATT & WHITNEY PLANT (Bannister Federal Complex) (Kansas City Plant) HAER No. MO-118 (page 9) A Brief Overview of the Development of the Pratt & Whitney Corporation As stated above, Pratt & Whitney’s aircraft history began with Frederick Brent Rentschler, an Army captain who oversaw the production of aircraft engines for the U. S. Army during World War I. After the war, Rentschler worked for the Wright Aeronautical Corporation, but quit in June 1924 over a disagreement with the general research and development practices of the Wright Board of Directors.33 Rentschler was convinced that the future of aviation depended on lightweight, powerful engines with a higher level of reliability. His experience during WWI also convinced him that an air-cooled engine could perform better than the heavier liquid cooled engines, which had been the standard in aviation.34 In 1925 Rentschler moved to Hartford, Connecticut, looking for work with the Pratt & Whitney Corporation with the intention of selling his expertise in aviation engine production. He quickly struck a deal with Pratt & Whitney to start a new division using the Pratt & Whitney Aircraft Company name to implement his ideas and designs for reliable and lightweight aircraft engines. It was of great fortune to Rentschler that Pratt & Whitney was able to supply one of their buildings that had been in use as tobacco warehouse. The old warehouse became the new company’s initial factory. It was in this facility that the first Wasp, a 425 horsepower radial engine weighing in at only 650 pounds, came off the assembly line on Christmas Eve of 1925. The Pratt & Whitney Aircraft Company was off to a great start with Rentschler as its chief executive officer. The aircraft industry was a growing field in the mid to late 1920s. Technology in aviation was quickly changing as the various aviation companies experimented in search of the perfect engine. Passenger flights were creating new revenue while airmail had formed a solid income stream. In 1928, Rentschler began talking mergers with various companies within the industry in order to combine their resources under a single management company that could design and produce all the equipment needed for new transport planes. What followed was a merger between Pratt & Whitney (engine production), Boeing Airplane Company and Chance Vought Aircraft Corporation (both companies built airframes); and the Hamilton Aircraft Company (propeller manufacturer). This late 1928 merger resulted in the formation of the United Aircraft and Transport Corporation.35

33 United Technologies, “Dependable Engines Since 1925,” Pratt & Whitney (July 1990): 3-7. Pratt and Whitney was founded in 1860 by Francis Pratt and Amos Whitney in East Hartford, Connecticut. At its founding, Pratt & Whitney manufactured guns and gun-making machinery for the Civil War starting in 1861. 34 Pratt & Whitney, Online. “Challenging the World by Changing Expectations,” Accessed May 12, 2010. http://pw.utc/About+Us/History 35 The Pratt and Whitney Aircraft Story, 72-73.

PRATT & WHITNEY PLANT (Bannister Federal Complex) (Kansas City Plant) HAER No. MO-118 (page 10) At this same time, passenger flights were becoming a profitable business and another company was formed out of the 1928 merger giving birth to United Air Lines. Boeing Airplane Company began building a new transport to carry twelve passengers. The planes had solid mahogany paneling, soundproofed cabin walls, a lavatory and included a crew with a stewardess. The Pratt & Whitney Wasp and Hornet engines provided the power.36 As United Aircraft and Transport Corporation grew, Rentschler established a fundamental rule that would prove to be advantageous to private industry, as well as the military. Through his earlier military experience in World War I, Rentschler insisted that 50 percent of the engine should be subcontracted. Rentschler felt that if the U.S. should ever go to war again, several companies (thereby creating other sources of supply) could accomplish the increase in production. Thus, Pratt & Whitney Aircraft would expand operations sufficiently to keep up with higher production demands. He reasoned that the ability of many companies to provide managerial and plant facilities was better than forcing one company to expand its entire organization. The second advantage was realized during peacetime, with the workload spread among many establishments while allowing the hub company to remain small.37

By 1930 the Wasp and Hornet engines powered 90 percent of the nation’s commercial transports and virtually all of the Navy’s military aircraft, as well as a large portion of the Army Air Corps planes. To handle the load of production Pratt & Whitney Aircraft built a new $2 million plant in East Hartford, Connecticut, which was also the location of their laboratory for research and development. Designed by Albert Kahn, Associated Architects and Engineers, Incorporated, the new plant had 400,000 square feet of floor space.38

In 1934 the government passed antitrust laws that forbid airframe or engine manufacturers from having interest in airlines. As a result, United Aircraft and Transport Company folded and became United Aircraft Corporation (United Technologies Corporation as of May 1975), while United Airlines established its own company. By 1936 the R-1830 C Twin Wasp was in production. Later, the R-2000 Twin Wasp and the R-2180 were designed and developed for both a Twin Wasp and Hornet, yet only the Twin Wasp was manufactured. Research and development would eventually lead the Pratt & Whitney Corporation to the R-2800 Double Wasp, a two-row, 18-cylinder, air-cooled radial aircraft engine. It was America’s first 18-cylinder radial engine design. The Double Wasp was first introduced in 1939 at which time it was capable of

36 Ibid., 73-74. The Hornet R-1690 was a 9-cylinder air-cooled, radial engine manufactured by Pratt & Whitney from 1926 until 1942.

37 Ibid., 98-99.

38 Ibid., 101. The East Hartford plant, designed by Kahn, was conventionally planned and was not related to Warspeed construction developed more than ten years later.

PRATT & WHITNEY PLANT (Bannister Federal Complex) (Kansas City Plant) HAER No. MO-118 (page 11) producing 2,000 hp. By the close of World War II, the design of the Double Wasp transitioned to producing 3,400 hp.39 Manufacturing of the Double Wasp engine began in the East Hartford, Connecticut, plant. As the United States participation in World War II became inevitable, Rentschler began planning ways that Pratt & Whitney Aircraft could “meet World War II.”40 Rentschler believed that a partnership with the automotive industry would be the best contribution to aircraft production. In this arrangement, the auto industry would retrofit their factories for the assemblage of airplanes by taking over the production of the engines and duplicate manufacturing procedures of the aircraft makers.41 Pratt & Whitney representatives arranged a meeting with the Ford Plant in Detroit, designed by Kahn. They successfully convinced the Ford organization to become a Pratt & Whitney licensee. Ford then called on Rentschler to arrange a team from Ford to observe the manufacturing of the R-2800 Double Wasp. Edsel Ford was part of the team. Subsequently, Ford built a separate Pratt & Whitney plant, the River Rouge Ford plant in Dearborn, Michigan. Twenty-two months later Ford was producing 400, R-2800s a month.42 In the process of joining the aircraft manufacturers in the task of producing efficient aircraft for the war effort, the automobile industry introduced Albert Kahn Associated Architects and Engineers to the war effort. Kahn had been designing factories for Henry Ford since 1909 beginning with the Highland Park, Michigan, Ford Plant for the production of the Ford Model-T.43 With the success between Pratt & Whitney and the Ford Company, similar programs were set into motion. Buick built the R-1830 Twin Wasp and the advanced R-2000 Twin Wasp; Nash-Kelvinator, the Double Wasp; Chevrolet, the Twin Wasp and later the Double Wasp “C” model; and Continental Motor and Jacobs Aircraft, the single-row Wasps and Wasp Juniors. However, the enormous war production load of aircraft engines remained on the shoulders of the established manufacturers.44 The contribution of Pratt & Whitney’s division of United Aircraft Corporation to the war effort, at both Hartford and its extension plant in Kansas City, was one of massive importance not only to the nation but the entire world. Pratt & Whitney was the “...single top producer of American aircraft engines during World War II, manufacturing 122,302 of its Wasp family of radials at its flagship plant in [West] Hartford, Connecticut.” When added to all of Pratt & Whitney licensees, the total number of Wasp family engines

39 Ibid.

40 Ibid., 128.

41 Ibid., 130.

42 Ibid., 132. The plant at River Rouge reverted back to manufacturing automobiles after the war.

43 Ralph J. Christian, “Highland Park Ford Plant, Chicago, Illinois,” National Register of Historic Places, Inventory-Nomination, May 1977.

44 Ibid.

PRATT & WHITNEY PLANT (Bannister Federal Complex) (Kansas City Plant) HAER No. MO-118 (page 12) produced during World War II was 355,985.45 According to corporate records, Pratt & Whitney stated that “three of the nation’s five key fighter aircraft in the decisive years of the war were powered by the Double-Wasp-the P-47 for the Army and the Navy’s F4U-4 and the F6F.”46 The Need For Warspeed Construction The urgent need for equipment during World War II was tantamount to a successful military campaign in the European theater as well as in the Pacific. It is well-known that the technology of American airpower was a deciding factor in the outcome of World War II. It could be said that Albert Kahn and his Detroit firm’s ability to quickly construct the industrial facilities that were first needed to produce the planes, tanks, and artillery, as well as industries that supported them, was just as important. Warspeed pertains to a method of construction rather than an architectural style. Research reiterates the fact that Warspeed was developed and may have been solely used by Kahn’s firm. Warspeed was a form of concrete construction that was quickly erected at a great savings in labor and materials. The following quote was in a clipping of an article from Architectural Record, ca. 1943, that was found in the Kahn archives. It gives a description of an unnamed Warspeed project to utilize the moving forms: Once the 20 by 38 ft. column spacing was decided upon as ideal for the manufacturing process, a system of form work was scientifically developed—form work which was drawn over previously laid rails by tractors and which could be used over and over again to form each succeeding unit of construction. The formwork then was capable of accounting for the structure of a particular unit, and the architects took great care that their factory would be so designed that this unit could be repeated again and again. There were no changes in dimensions once the unit was established. Beams were slightly tapered so that the formwork could be easily stripped. The columns were set in for the beams so that they would be out of the way of the advancing formwork. This system of construction worked out so successfully that 1,500,000 sq. ft. of roof area was constructed at the almost unbelievable rate of 220,000 sq. ft each week. The concrete roof slab is mopped with hot pitch, fiberglass insulation is laid on and a 3-ply built up composition roofing is applied.47

45 Bill Yenne, The American Aircraft Factory in World War II (St. Paul: Zenith Press, 2006), 173. This number agrees with statistics found in Irving Brinton Holley, Jr., Buying Aircraft: Materiel Procurement for the Army Air Forces, 580. 46 The Pratt & Whitney Aircraft Story, 140 (see n. 26). 47 “ ‘Warspeed’ System of Construction in Concrete,” Architectural Record, ca. 1942-43, 52. Clipping, Archives, Kahn Associates, Inc. At the time this article appeared in Architectural Record, the location for the plant was not given. Articles reviewing construction during World War II were not allowed to disclose the locations for reasons of national security.

PRATT & WHITNEY PLANT (Bannister Federal Complex) (Kansas City Plant) HAER No. MO-118 (page 13) In 1942 Albert Kahn gave a speech for a building types study developed for a program for national defense during wartime, made shortly after the United States entered the war. General in description, Kahn, too, did not mention any specific location, saying, It is questionable whether the enormity of the building program for national defense is generally appreciated. Never in history has so staggering a program been undertaken, nor... as much accomplished. For manufacturing buildings there has been developed certain types…generally accepted as the best…the one-story structure of incombustible materials, with enormous uninterrupted floor spaces under one roof, with a minimum of columns.48 National censorship applied to the majority of Kahn’s commissions during the war years. However, Kahn was able to state the basic principles that he and his firm espoused with regard to designing manufacturing facilities that were affiliated with national defense, as follows: Must be practicable in view of today’s labor and material markets; Must permit ultra-rapid construction if the plant is to serve its purpose; Must provide for safety of plant and process if attacked; Must provide for the safety of workers under air attack particularly; Must, as a factory building, meet the requirements of the industry it serves.49 Elements of Warspeed construction were incorporated into the expansion of the Glenn L. Martin Aircraft Company Plant, Baltimore, Maryland. On February 5, 1939, the Martin Aircraft Company contacted Kahn to ask if he could furnish plans for a 440,000 square foot building to be completed by May 1, 1939. While Kahn consented to complete the large building in 84 days, the firm actually completed it in just 81 days.50 This was the beginning of a pattern that set the pace for a program of war-impelled plant construction, including the Pratt & Whitney plant in Kansas City, Missouri. From a review of available data, it is more than likely that there were three projects simultaneously designed by Kahn and his firm using Warspeed construction: these were the Ford Bomber Plant, known as Willow Run, outside of Ypsilanti, Michigan, which manufactured the B-24 Liberator Bomber; the Chrysler Corporation, Chicago, responsible for the Wright Cyclone Radial aircraft engines and the Pratt & Whitney Plant in Kansas City. When the designs were drawn for the Pratt & Whitney Plant in Kansas

48 “War Requirements Accelerate Progress in Design,” Architectural Record 91 (June 1942): 66. At the end of Kahn’s quote, the article stated that the magazine was required by the Government to censor certain information that could give away the location and the products manufactured within Kahn’s buildings related to national defense.

49 Ibid., 69.

50 “Producer of Production Lines,” Architectural Record 91 (June 1942): 39.

PRATT & WHITNEY PLANT (Bannister Federal Complex) (Kansas City Plant) HAER No. MO-118 (page 14) City, early in 1942, the formwork changed considerably (see above).51 With the completion of each plant, Kahn reduced the amount of reinforcing steel and set another record for speed in concrete construction.52 During World War II alone, over 60 million square feet of war production facilities scattered across the world were designed by the Kahn firm.53 Biography of Albert Kahn (1869-1942) Albert Kahn was born in Rhaunen, Germany, on March 21, 1869. Kahn with his family moved to Detroit, Michigan, at the age of eleven. He was the son “. . .of an impoverished small-town Rabbi who peddled fruit for a living on Detroit’s streets.” Kahn developed an early interest in architecture. Kahn’s first job was that of an errand boy for an architect’s office, where he was given free lessons in a drawing school operated by architect Julius Melchers. Later Melchers found a job for Kahn at the architectural firm of George D. Mason. With Melchers, Kahn spent fourteen years of study and hard work.54 Kahn earned a traveling scholarship from the magazine American Architect and Building News when he was 21 years old. With these funds, he was able to travel to Europe for two years of study. While in Italy, he had the good fortune to meet and travel with famed architect Henry Bacon, responsible for the design of the Lincoln Memorial.55 When he returned to Detroit, he set up an office with two other architects, George Nettleton and Alexander Trowbridge. Shortly thereafter, Kahn took his brothers, Louis, Felix, and Moritz, into the firm.56 The firm became Nettleton, Kahn, and Trowbridge in 1896. In 1897, the name changed to Nettleton and Kahn. Then in 1900, after Nettleton’s death, Kahn, again, worked with Mason for two years.57 From 1902-1918, after Mason left, the firm became Albert Kahn, Architect, Ernest Wilby, Associate.58

51 “War Requirements Accelerate Progress in Design,” Architectural Record 91 (June 1942): 54.

52 Leslie R. Pastor, “West Tech: A Product of the Control Paradigm,” Online article, 2009 June 10. http://peswiki.com/index.php/Site:LRPWestern_Technology_&_Soviet_Economic_Development Contains a review of “Western Technology and Soviet Economic Development. a study,” written by Anthony C. Sutton, no date given. 53 “Albert Kahn Associates Built Russian Defenses,” Michigan Society of Architects (March 30, 1943): 191. 54 Ibid.

55 R. Christopher Goodwin and Associates, “Historic Context for Department of Defense Facilities,” 212. 56 Ibid. Nettleton died in December 1900 and Trowbridge became head of the School of Architecture at Cornell in 1897.

57 Charles K. Hyde, “Assembly-Line Architecture: Albert Kahn and the Evolution of the U.S. Auto Factory, 1905-1940, IA (The Journal of the Society for Industrial Archeology) 22 (1996): 6.

58 Grant Hildebrand, Designing for Industry: The Architecture of Albert Kahn (Cambridge: MIT Press, 1974), 25. Wilby was a graduate of Wesley College, Harrogate, England. From 1923-1943, Wilby was a professor at the University of Michigan in the department of architecture and urban planning.

PRATT & WHITNEY PLANT (Bannister Federal Complex) (Kansas City Plant) HAER No. MO-118 (page 15) As Grant Hildebrand observes in his writings of Albert Kahn, nothing in Kahn's early career suggested that he would eventually design buildings that were to become some of the icons of the Modem Era.59 His rise was rapid. Furthermore, Kahn became “the most powerful influence in the development of the late 1930s industrial building.”60 Kahn, a genius of design, is best known for his industrial architecture of the 20th century. Kahn was Packard’s architect for thirty-nine years, Ford’s for thirty-four, Chrysler’s for seventeen, and for General Motors’ for 150 major plans. He produced $2 billion worth of industrial building in forty years. With his work, he was recognized as “the fastest and most prolific builder of modern industrial plants in the world.”61 For his “outstanding contribution to the war effort,” the American Institute of Architects (AIA) presented Kahn the Institute’s Special Medal on June 24, 1942, the first such award in the eighty-five year history of the institute.62 With regard to the award, Time magazine named Kahn, “father of modern factory design. . .the world’s No. 1 Industrial Architect.”63 Possibly the most succinct accolade about Kahn came from the Royal Institute of British Architects, Kahn “. . . laid down his life in the service of the United Nations just as truly as anyone who died in the field.”64 Kahn’s Early Industrial Innovations In 1903 Kahn was commissioned by the Packard Motor Car Company to design his first automotive factory. The first nine buildings designed by Kahn were of conventional mill-type construction and built between 1903-1905. The first seven were designed in 1903. In 1905 Packard asked Kahn to design an expansion at the plant resulting in Plant Number 10. It was then that Kahn broke from the traditional mill construction. Using steel-reinforced concrete frame with steel sash, he introduced a new form of

59

Ibid. 60 R. Christopher Goodwin and Associates, “Historic Context for Department of Defense Facilities”, 212.

61 “Albert Kahn, Architect, Dies,” The Detroit News, 8 December 1942. The Pratt & Whitney Plant was Kahn’s last military project before his passing. 62 “Address of Mr. Albert Kahn,” Michigan Society of Architects Weekly Bulletin 16 (July 14, 1942): 1, 5. The AIA stated that Kahn was an “exponent of organized efficiency, of disciplined energy, of broad visioned planning…a master of concrete and of steel, master of space and of time, he stands today at the forefront of our profession in meeting the colossal demands of a government in its hour of need.” When World War II broke out, Kahn was already 70 years old.

63 “Industry’s Architect,” Time (June 29, 1942): 40. See also: “Albert Kahn, 73, Noted Factory Designer, Dies,” New York Herald Tribune, 9 December 1942. 64 Letter to Louis Kahn from the Royal Institute of British Architects, 2 February 1943. Files, Kahn Associated Architects, Detroit, Michigan.

PRATT & WHITNEY PLANT (Bannister Federal Complex) (Kansas City Plant) HAER No. MO-118 (page 16) industrial design that was both beautiful and utilitarian.65 Although multi-storied, the Packard plant was the beginning of Kahn’s designs leading to the “all under one roof” type of factory design in Detroit. Albert, with his brother Julius, designed Plant No. 10 of reinforced concrete. While modest in size, 60’ x 322’, with columns on 32’ 3” centers, this plant was innovative through the use of the Kahn system of reinforced concrete, a patented system that had been developed by Julius. The system became known as the Kahn Trussed Bar.66 Noting the Packard building, art historian Sir Nikolaus Pevsner referred to Albert Kahn as “the most important specialist in concrete factory design.”67 The Packard Company Building No.10 was an important departure in both design and engineering of the American factory building, utilizing reinforced concrete that was both functional and beautiful. Following the completion of the Packard complex, new clients sought Kahn due to his reputation as a designer of efficient and cost effective factories. Two of these early plants proved to be “significant precursors of the industrial factory of the late 1930s and World War II periods.”68 One of these landmark designs was the George N. Pierce Plant (1906; Buffalo), where the Pierce Great Arrow Automobile was manufactured. Here, Kahn created a complex of eight buildings, mostly single-story and constructed of reinforced concrete frame, that were planned according to the industrial flow chart developed for production, so that the position of each of the building was determined by the factory’s needs. “The plan of this industrial complex became the model for factory design during the next several decades.”69 Kahn’s other influential early work, his 1918 single-story, steel-framed glass factory design for Ford’s River Rouge, site pronounced the end of the multi-storied factory design as seen at his Packard Plant (and at the administrative building at the Pierce Plant). This large complex was cited in the Goodwin study for the Department of Defense as a turning point that “marked a major industrial client’s

65 Hildebrand, Designing for Industry: The Architecture of Albert Kahn, 28-31.The extensive 3.5 million square foot plant still stands, albeit in decay, sited on forty acres along East Grand Boulevard, Detroit, MI. See also: Richard A. Wright, “Once Teeming with Auto Plants, Detroit Now Home to Only a Few Nameplates,” Detroit News 16 January 2000, Online, accessed July 13, 2011, http://apps.detnews.com/apps/history/index.php?id=16#ixzz0mRMyeHd8 66 Hildebrand, Designing for Industry: The Architecture of Albert Kahn, 29. The same year, Julius formed the Trussed Concrete Steel Company to manufacture these reinforcing bars.

67 Nikolaus Pevsner, A History of Building Types (Princeton, New Jersey: University Press, 1976), 287-288. See also George Nelson, Industrial Architecture of Albert Kahn, Inc. (New York: Architectural Book Publishing Company, Inc., 1939). Nelson erroneously states that the building was constructed in 1903. While the Packard Plant began in 1903, it was with Building No. 10, that Kahn’s first use (and the nation’s first use) of this type of reinforced concrete was utilized. 68 R. Christopher Goodwin and Associates, Inc., “Historic Context for Department of Defense Facilities World War II Permanent Construction,” 213. 69 Ibid.

PRATT & WHITNEY PLANT (Bannister Federal Complex) (Kansas City Plant) HAER No. MO-118 (page 17) commitment to single story construction, but also Kahn’s commitment to steel frame construction.”70 Thereafter, other manufacturers such as the 1919 Buick Motor Car Company, followed suit. As a result, Kahn had created a “distinctive building style of single-story, steel-framed designs encased in glass curtain walls and topped by glass roof monitors.71 This new industrial architecture of steel-and-glass buildings, long and rectangular in form, did not lend themselves to urban settings. Prior to 1917, the multi-storied plants occupied parcels of thirty to fifty acres. These new one-story monolithic industrial factories required at least 500 acres. As a consequence of these land requirements, industrial historian Charles Hyde maintains that Kahn contributed to the decline of older industrial cities as these new factories moved into the suburban or rural areas where land was much cheaper and construction much easier than in the congested cities.72 The one-story facilities needed space to store raw materials, components and finished products. In addition, the new industrial plant had space to set aside for employee parking lots. From 1936 to 1939, leading up to World War II, Kahn’s office prepared plans for an array of industrial plants for civilian production of which 30 commissions were mainly nonautomotive clients, including the Glenn L. Martin Aircraft Plant (1929, 1937 and 1939), Middle River, Maryland, which is discussed in further detail below. After 1937, Kahn’s practice centered on defense work, primarily aircraft plants, leading into World War II.73 While Kahn’s automobile factory work is extensive, he designed Army airfields, naval bases, cantonments and other military buildings during World War I. Other projects included the naval bases at Midway Island, Honolulu, Alaska, Puerto Rico, and Jacksonville.74 Kahn’s Russian Venture In 1928 the Soviet Government, after combing the U.S. for a man who could furnish the building brains for Russia's industrialization, offered the job to Kahn. Twenty-five Kahn engineers and architects went to Moscow. They had to start from scratch.75

70 Ibid. It is interesting to note that Kahn designed a Ford Plant for Henry Ford in Kansas City in 1910. Located at Tenth and Winchester Road, the three-story concrete and glass plant was the first branch assembly plant for the company outside of Detroit, assembling Model Ts. Unfortunately, this plant has been severely modified and no longer retains its historic integrity. See Justine Christianson, “Rosie the Riveter National Historical Park, Rosie the Riveter Memorial.” HAER No. CA-326-H, 2004, Chapter 2, 13.

71 Hyde, “Assembly-Line Architecture: Albert Kahn and the Evolution of the U. S. Auto Factory, 1905-1940,” 17.

72 Ibid, 17-19.

73 Ibid.

74 “War Requirements Accelerate Progress in Design,” Architectural Record (June 1942): 66. 75 “Art: Industry’s Architect,” Time 29 June 1942. Online Accessed June 20, 2011, http://www.time.com/time/printout/0,8816,795936,00.html

PRATT & WHITNEY PLANT (Bannister Federal Complex) (Kansas City Plant) HAER No. MO-118 (page 18) In 1928, Kahn was awarded a commission by the Soviet government to build a $40 million tractor plant in Chelyabinsk for the Amtorg Trading Corporation which served as the Russian international commerce liaison along with an outline of a program for an additional $2 billion worth of buildings. About a dozen of these factories were done in Detroit, the rest were handled in a special office with 1,500 draftsmen in Moscow.76 The Russians were highly impressed with the team of architects and engineers that Kahn sent with his brother Moritz. The Soviet authorities gave Kahn and his firm full charge of the huge industrial building program of their first Five-Year Plan. Kahn’s company completed 521 factories in less than three years, covering a span of twenty-five Soviet cities. They also trained 4,000 Soviet engineers to continue with the job of building Russia’s factories.77 As an agricultural nation, Russia did not have an industrialized infrastructure. From the beginning, the partnership between Moscow and Detroit was not an easy one. The first two years under contract to the Soviet Union, the U. S. team prepared the plans for the first building while still in Detroit. In addition, the language difference was only one of many trials. The firm spent six months compiling a Russian – English technical dictionary prior to Kahn’s team leaving for Moscow. As an article in 1942 stated, “...flexibility, speed and competence” for which Kahn’s company was known, was severely tested over the life of the Russian contract. 78 Measurements had to translate into “...meters, stresses were figured in kilograms per square centimeter, and moments were in kilogram meters.” 79 Russia had no factories at this time so there was no construction equipment, not even a wheelbarrow. In all of Russia, there was one blueprint machine but no draft boards or pencils. In 1938 Architectural Forum reported, “...machinery had to be selected and ordered, process layouts had to be prepared, and the very tools needed to build the plants had to be ordered here and shipped over there.”80 With all the difficulties that the Kahn team was up against, their success was exceptional. The Kahn team completed the first project, a foundry building, in only six months from start to finish. In order to handle the workload, the representatives in Kahn’s Moscow office, with Moritz Kahn at the helm, worked day and night for more than three years as they designed by day and taught future Soviet architects and engineers by night.81 The Soviet work was unique with construction sites located in desolate and difficult to reach locations from heavily forested areas to deserts. Without the

76 Leslie R. Pastor, “West Tech: A Product of the Control Paradigm,” Online article, 2009 June 10. Contains a review of Western Technology and Soviet Economic Development. 77 Ibid.

78 “Art: Industry’s Architect,” Time (June 29, 1942): n. p. 79 “Albert Kahn Associates Built Russian Defenses,” Michigan Society of Architects (March 30, 1943): 191.

80 “Albert Kahn,” Architectural Forum (August 1938): 90.

81 Ibid.

PRATT & WHITNEY PLANT (Bannister Federal Complex) (Kansas City Plant) HAER No. MO-118 (page 19) infrastructure of good roads, the terrain often made work slow and tedious. Kahn and his Detroit team had to quickly adapt plans and construction methods while remaining within cost directives, working within time constraints and conflicts arising from language barriers, weather, shortages of material and an unskilled labor force. The Union of Soviet Socialist Republic held Albert Kahn in high esteem. The small “American group of architects and engineers was . . . augmented by thousands of semi-trained and untrained Russian men and women, [who] formed the largest architectural and engineering organization the world has ever seen.”82 The condolences on Albert Kahn’s death to his wife in December 1942 in a telegram from Moscow are as follows: SOVIET ENGINEERS BUILDERS ARCHITECTS SEND YOU THEIR SINCERE SYMPATHY IN CONNECTION WITH THE DEATH OF YOUR HUSBAND, ALBERT KAHN, WHO RENDERED US GREAT SERVICE IN DESIGNING A NUMBER OF LARGE PLANTS AND HELPED US TO ASSIMILATE THE AMERICAN EXPERIENCE IN THE SPHERE OF BUILDING INDUSTRY. SOVIET ENGINEERS AND ARCHITECTS WILL ALWAYS WARMLY REMEMBER THE NAME OF THE TALENTED AMERICAN ENGINEER AND ARCHITECT, ALBERT KAHN. SIGNED BY V.A.VESNIN, ARCHIECT ACADEMCIAN [sic]. 83 The success of Albert Kahn Associated Architects and Engineers in Russia was a result of Kahn’s highly developed sense of organization, which proved to be invaluable in completing the 521 factories that were commissioned by the Soviet Union by March 1932. The experience in Russia gave the firm the knowledge of their own strengths as a formidable design firm who could adapt to grueling pressures that tested every department within the operation. The trials and lessons of the Soviet Union prepared Kahn’s firm for the long and fast-paced road of building for the defense of the nation during World War II. Kahn applied his vast experiences in the Soviet Union to the industrial mobilization in the United States during this global conflict. Kahn’s Industrial Design: From the Truss to the Concrete Arch To understand how Albert Kahn developed the concrete arch as seen in the Pratt & Whitney Plant Complex, it is vital to examine some of his earlier works that led to his Warspeed projects. While Kahn was in Russia in 1932, automobile production dropped to 1.4 million units from a high of 5.4 million in 1929. U. S. industrial construction was at a standstill. Kahn feared that the market for his talents had disappeared. However, by 1933, the auto industry began to surge and new facilities were needed to replace old dilapidated and outdated factories built two to three decades earlier. Specifically,

82 Ibid.

83 Ibid.

PRATT & WHITNEY PLANT (Bannister Federal Complex) (Kansas City Plant) HAER No. MO-118 (page 20) the multi-storied factories were obsolete and could not accommodate the assembly line process that had evolved in the automobile industry and was so applicable to the manufacturing of airplanes.84 Several factories described in Grant Hildebrand’s book Designing for Industry and other sources exemplify major design elements used by Kahn. Most changes in design principles are found in the roof and column spacing, which pre-date the arch roof of the Pratt & Whitney Plant. These ongoing changes were not only the result of the type of work produced at the various factory locations but also, by the onset of World War II, the shortage of steel and other building materials. Kahn’s principles for his factory designs eschewed historicism for functionality and practicality. Exteriors were devoid of ornamentation.

The 1935 Chevrolet Commercial Body Plant in Indianapolis is a typical early New Deal era design by the firm.85 The bays are spanned by Warren trusses on “...40-foot center columns with doubly tapered top chords above which a superstructure, resting at central and outside panel points, supports monitor sash and the upper roof level.”86 Pratt trusses with an 80-foot span on 20-foot centers are located in the crane bays and support a slightly modified roof monitor system.87 The De Soto Press Shop, a division of Chrysler Corporation located in Detroit, was designed in April 1936. It was designed just seven months after the Chevrolet Body Plant using a similar plan. However, the difference at the De Soto Press Shop is found in the improved truss-monitor scheme that used a truss that supports the roof with fewer pounds of steel. This design also made possible monitor lighting with fewer additive steel members.88 The 1937 Chrysler Half-Ton Truck Plant in Detroit is noted for being Kahn’s most frequently cited building. Grant Hildebrand states that, “The key to the design lies in the roof structure of the large loft space. Bent beams at 20-foot intervals generally follow the profile of those in the Ford Engineering Laboratory of fifteen years before.”89 Yet, the actual structure is completely different. Hildebrand continues, “Trusses at 60-foot intervals carry the beams, which are suspended from the top chord and transfer the load to columns every 40’; thus each bay is 40’ by 60’ or half again the typical bay size of the Chevy and De Soto plants but the same poundage of steel used per square foot. . . . The structural cage utilizes a minimal amount of material, and the cantilevering principle that makes this possible is exploited to provide light admission with a minimum of additional material.”90

84 Hildebrand, Designing for Industry: The Architecture of Albert Kahn, 152-155. 85 Ibid., 157.

86 Ibid., 157-58.

87 Ibid.

88 Ibid., 165.

89 Ibid., 173.

90 Ibid.

PRATT & WHITNEY PLANT (Bannister Federal Complex) (Kansas City Plant) HAER No. MO-118 (page 21) In 1937, Kahn designed an addition to the Glenn Martin Assembly Building (Plant No. 1), Middle River, Maryland. Kahn’s firm held an in-house design competition for alternative designs that could accommodate for the 300-foot wingspan of an airplane. Hildebrand reports that “The lightest design, in pounds of steel per square foot of roof supported, was chosen—a scheme of simple span, parallel chord Pratt trusses, 300 feet in length, 30 feet in depth placed at 50-foot intervals.” It was the first building with a flat span as great as 300’.91

Upper and lower chords of the 300-foot trusses consist of pairs of built up 20-inch deep channels spread 18 inches apart, back-to-back. A 30-inch wide closing plate is riveted across the bottom of the lower chord and the top of the upper. . . .the main trusses suggested the use of monitors running parallel with them, admitting light through the flanks of the trusses. . . . Accordingly, the 50-foot Warren secondary trusses, equal to the primary structure of most factories, support a roof surface that occurs alternately at the top and near the bottom of the main trusses.92

In February 1939, Kahn was asked by Glenn-Martin to design another addition, a contiguous manufacturing unit of 440,000 square feet. The deadline for completion, May 1, 1939, put the Kahn team to the ultimate test. The design called for an enclosed space approximately 300’ x 450’ with no interior columns. At the time, the “300-foot trusses supporting the roof are the longest flat-span trusses ever used in a building.”93 The trusses were fabricated using civil engineering principles. In June 1940, the Chrysler Corporation was directed by the Council of National Defense to plan for the production of military tanks. In September 1940, Kahn delivered plans even before the Council was clear about how to proceed with manufacturing. This was the first time that tanks were mass-produced in the United States. Here, Kahn turned from the truss scheme of the Glenn Martin plant to the ubiquitous Pratt truss, often used in bridge design, and employed the butterfly monitor for maximum light. Hildebrand describes the salient points of the plant’s design as follows: …the Pratt trusses are not pointed and each bears on its own set of columns, rather than on a perpendicular truss system. Clear heights to the bottom of trusses are 29 feet and 39 feet. …part of the truss zone is glazed and a part is opaque. As a result natural light quality is exceptionally good…The scheme is of the general manufacturing loft space type but with clear spans and heights that are larger than usual and an exceptionally clean plan-process relationship.94

91 Ibid. While common for bridge spans to surpass 300’ in length, at the time the Glenn-Martin plant in Middle River was built, it was the longest flat span building that was surpassed only by the arch principal that crossed a 300’ 8” span at Broad Street Rail Station in Philadelphia. 92 Ibid., 184.

93 George Nelson, Industrial Architecture of Albert Kahn, Inc., 35.

94 Ibid., 198-203.

PRATT & WHITNEY PLANT (Bannister Federal Complex) (Kansas City Plant) HAER No. MO-118 (page 22) The Curtiss-Wright Corporation Assembly Plant (1941), built in Buffalo, is a mirror image of the Pierce Plant that Kahn had designed for the same location back in 1906 (see above). As described by Hildebrand: The broad, one story, monitor-lit manufacturing building is contiguous to the higher assembly building, whose monitors run perpendicular to those of the manufacturing building. …The one innovation in planning principles: a tunnel corridor system runs under the entire plant leading to toilet rooms, cafeteria, security rooms, storage and stock rooms, delivery rooms, and other services not directly a part of the production process. … the plant derives from the work for Glenn-Martin but with reduced spans.95 These steel-framed factories that featured large truss supported roofs were modified depending on the needs of the client. Once the U.S. entered World War II, with an increase in shortages of materials and the need for reduced construction time, Kahn first turned to the concrete flat roof, as seen, for instance, in the Curtiss-Wright Aeronautical Corporation Plant (1941; outside of Patterson, New Jersey) and then less than a year later, devised a more refined remedy, that of the concrete arch. With Kansas City’s Pratt & Whitney Plant and the Chrysler Corporation Dodge Chicago Plant, Kahn “reverted to reinforced concrete for the building frame and roof with an innovative multiple-arch concrete slab system.”96 The strength gained through the arching permitted further reduction in the amount of structural steel. While the Chrysler Plant was investigating design solutions, including that of structural steel, the Pratt & Whitney Plant had already adopted the arch design arguably months before Chrysler approved the revolutionary method of construction.97 The Pratt & Whitney Plant was fully operational six months before the Chrysler Plant. The Organization of Albert Kahn’s Firm Kahn felt that the formula for success was in the coordination of experienced experts. His firm typically employed 150 men and women. However, during the war years, there were as many as 600 employees within the organization. Among the employees are architectural designers and draftsmen, specification writers, estimators and expediters, field superintendents, mechanical, electric and ventilation engineers and office workers. Three elements—organization, teamwork and business management—were key to

95 Ibid., 206.

96 Hyde, “Assembly-Line Architecture: Albert Kahn and the Evolution of the U.S. Auto Factory, 1905-1940,” 20. 97 “Weekly Bulletin,” Michigan Society of Architects 17 (March 30, 1943): 179. See also W. Hawkins Ferry, The Legacy of Albert Kahn (Detroit: Wayne State University Press), 26. While Ferry mentions the Pratt & Whitney Plant and the Dodge Chicago Plant in reference to the arch thin slab concrete construction, he states that another plant, that of the Wright Aeronautical Corporation Plant No. 7 in Wood Ridge, New Jersey, also used that form of construction. However, upon examination of this one-story unit, it is obvious that the roof is flat and presumably incorporated trusses in the design.

PRATT & WHITNEY PLANT (Bannister Federal Complex) (Kansas City Plant) HAER No. MO-118 (page 23) Kahn’s philosophy. Instead of working in successive stages the Kahn firm worked simultaneously. Under normal conditions, the group would typically turn out plans in a week to ten days. Under “Warspeed” the plans were produced overnight. In addition, standardization of materials and simplicity of construction also played a part in “Warspeed” construction.98 During this period, Kahn’s organization developed two divisions with six major departments. At the top of the organizational flow chart was the Administrator, next the Assistant Administrator and then Project Administrators. The company had two main branches: Technical Division and Executive Division. The Technical Division had three branches: Architectural Department, Structural Department and Mechanical Department. As the chart lengthened, the Architectural Department consisted of a Chief Architect, Chief Designer, job captains, followed by detailers and checking. At the bottom of the Architectural Department was Specifications, headed by the Chief of Specification with assistants and typists. The Chief Designer oversaw assistants and detailers. The Structural Department handled Steel Design and Concrete Design, and oversaw job captains, drafting, checking and specifications people. The final department under the Technical Division was the Mechanical Department, a five- department, four-tier chain includes Sanitary Engineering who oversaw job captains, drafting and checking. Heating engineering oversaw job captains, drafting and checking. Ventilating/Air Conditioning included; job captains, drafting and checking. Process engineering also had job captains, drafting and checking. The Electrical Engineering branch included job captains, drafting and checking. In addition, there were two specifications departments under the Mechanical Department, while the Estimating Department included a chief estimator with assistants and stenographers. The Executive Division oversaw the construction coordinator followed by the department chief, obtaining tenders, awarding contracts, expediting construction, checking contract accounts and issuing certificates. The chief superintendent oversaw the assistant superintendent followed by the resident clerks of work. In addition to the Executive Division were Office management, chief accountant, accountants, stenographers, filing drawings, correspondences and mailing.99 Kahn’s company was regularly plagued by material shortages and substitutions. Kahn stressed the need for a national building code to permit substantial savings in construction material: I feel strongly that a National Building Code should be adopted. It would substantially help us in our effort to conserve critical materials, and, at the same time, meet the obligations of the vast war-building program that lies ahead. The attempt to set up a National Building Code sponsored by Herbert Hoover when he was Secretary of Commerce and continued until the days of the depression, was based upon the principle that maximum allowances be permitted skilled designers and not maximum allowances

98 “Producer of Production Lines,” Architectural Record 91 (June 1942): 40. 99 Ibid., 41.

PRATT & WHITNEY PLANT (Bannister Federal Complex) (Kansas City Plant) HAER No. MO-118 (page 24) as established in most cities to guard against the unskilled. Those who are highly competent would be encouraged to use their skill to the utmost in planning entirely safe buildings utilizing a minimum of material.100 Twenty years prior to his death in 1942, Kahn called in the key men in his organization, gave each one an interest in the company, and began training them to continue on after his death. Kahn carried on the process until two years before his death when the incorporation of the firm changed the name to Albert Kahn, Associated Architects and Engineers, Inc.101 Albert Kahn and his brother Louis signed a foreword of a book that they presented to the new associates of the firm, saying: It is with great pride that we present in this booklet the men who direct the work of the organization of Albert Kahn Associated Architects and Engineers, Inc. Several years ago, the 25 men whose pictures appear on these pages were asked to become partners in the firm. To them can be attributed much of the strength of the entire organization and its ability to execute important architectural and engineering assignments. The partnership will assure the permanency of the organization, which will carry on even after the retirement of the present administration.102 The Death of a Master Architect The strain of so much war work took a toll on Kahn’s health. On December 8, 1942, prior to the completion of the Kansas City Pratt & Whitney Plant, Kahn died of a bronchial ailment at the age of 73. During his lifetime Kahn received numerous honors in the United States and abroad. In 1933 the University of Michigan honored Kahn with an honorary L.L.D. Degree. In 1942 he received an honorary Doctor of Fine Arts Degree from Syracuse University.103 In addition to the honorary degrees, Kahn also received a number of professional awards. In 1937 Kahn was awarded a gold medal at the International Exposition of Arts and Sciences and was made a Chevalier of the Legion of Honor in Paris, France. In 1942 the American Institute of Architects bestowed him with two recognitions. One was an award at their annual meeting; the second was a medal for his distinguished war service. In addition the Franklin Institute awarded him, posthumously, the Frank P. Brown Medal in recognition of his contributions and outstanding achievements in the development of Industrial Architecture. Kahn died before his final project, that of the Pratt & Whitney Aircraft Plant of Missouri, was completed.104

100 Ibid.

101 Ibid.

102 “Obituary: Albert Kahn Architect 1869-1942,” Architectural Record 93 (January 1943): 14. 103 Ferry, The Legacy of Albert Kahn, 26.

104 Ibid.

PRATT & WHITNEY PLANT (Bannister Federal Complex) (Kansas City Plant) HAER No. MO-118 (page 25) Close friend and fellow architect, Paul Cret, wrote a tribute to Albert Kahn after his death: It was my good fortune to enjoy Albert Kahn’s friendship for twenty years and our conversations revealed his constant preoccupation with design. Each new work in his office was an occasion for experimenting with new materials, or with new ways to use old ones. In a span of fifty-years . . . there are changes in tendencies, which reflect some of the influences to which he was subjected. The work of certain modern Germans, such a Ludwig Holtman or Peter Behrens, have left their trace on some periods, while others can be seen the orientation given to American architecture by McKim, Mead, and White. In his recent work, under the pressure of time, and with fitting recognition that war projects are not the place for experiments, he gave up architectural “embellishments” and retained only the play of contrasting masses, the patterns created solids and voids, and his sensitive general lines. But among all his war construction, this is enough to mark the work of his office with the stamp of a master’s hand.105 Grant Hildebrand, who today remains the foremost scholar on Kahn’s contribution to American industrial architecture, recently remarked: I remain convinced -- am more than ever convinced -- of Kahn's importance historically, but the world must now look to you to tell his story.106 Pratt & Whitney Complex: Post World War II, October 1945 through June 1948 The Pratt & Whitney Aircraft Plant of Missouri became known as Plancor 1213 in the War Asset Administration logs. The Defense Plant Corporation owned the complex. In addition the Reconstruction Finance Corporation, created under the laws of the United States acting through the War Assets Administration (under and pursuant to Reorganization Plan No. 1 of 1947 (Fed. Reg. 4534) and the powers and authority contained in the provisions of the Surplus Act of 1944 (58 § 705) as amended), was also instrumental in managing war production plants that closed in 1945.107

105 Paul Cret, “Albert Kahn,” Michigan Society of Architects (March 30, 1943): 25.

106 Grant Hildebrand. E-mail to Cydney Millstein, September 26, 2011. Hildebrand is Professor Emeritus at the University of Washington.

107 Pratt & Whitney Files, Archives. National Archives Records Administration (NARA), Kansas City, Missouri.

PRATT & WHITNEY PLANT (Bannister Federal Complex) (Kansas City Plant) HAER No. MO-118 (page 26) For roughly three years the Pratt & Whitney Plant Complex, that had produced jet engines full time, sat largely vacant. On August 12, 1946, a memorandum of the Reconstruction Finance Corporation, a division of the Office of Defense Plants, outlined the plant assets, owned by the government. The outline covers the main manufacturing plant, out buildings, test cells and the administration offices. The memorandum also listed the possibility for Multiple Tenancy, Building Classification, Cost Data, Rental Rates and Lessor’s Cost of Operations. Several small Kansas City firms, as well as the Internal Revenue Service (IRS), leased office space during the years between 1945 and 1948. On December 20, 1945, a memorandum was sent from the War Assets Administration authorizing the sale of surplus equipment. Beginning March 26, 1946, equipment was offered to the public. The sale consisted of machine tools, hoists, drills milling machines and planers amongst a list of over 5,000 various types of tools from Plancor 1213.108 In December 1947, the War Assets Administration held a meeting with the Department of the Navy to determine the ownership of Plancor 1213. As a result, the plant was turned over to the Department of the Navy. A Quit Claim Deed was filed between the War Department and the U.S. Navy resulting in the transfer of the mothballed Pratt & Whitney plant to the Navy Department on December 31, 1947, under Public Law 364, as set forth by the 80th Congress. Thereafter, the plant was known as the Naval Industrial Reserve Plant of Kansas City, Missouri.109 When the first nuclear bombs were dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki in 1945, warfare changed forever. In addition, the Soviet Union had turned from ally to enemy during the years shortly following World War II when they took control over Eastern Europe. The introduction to nuclear weapons and the hostilities developing between the Soviets and their former World War II allies gave rise to the era of the Cold War. During the presidential administrations of Harry S Truman (1945-1953) and Dwight Eisenhower (1953-1961), federally funded research and development of both nuclear and non-nuclear weapons increased.110 The Pratt & Whitney Complex factored greatly into the research and development of military products used to secure and protect the U.S. during this period, beginning with the Westinghouse Corporation when they leased the complex for the development of the jet engine.

108 Pratt & Whitney Files, Archives. Memorandum File No. 2 “Sale of Personal Property at Plancor 1213.” NARA, Kansas City, Missouri. 109 Pratt & Whitney Files, Archives, Box 215, HM1995, MO-11 Pl1213. NARA, Kansas City, Missouri. 110

U.S. Army, “The Truman and Eisenhower Years: 1945-1961,” Thematic Study and Guidelines: Identification and Evaluation of U.S. Army Cold War Era Military-Industrial Historic Properties (Aberdeen, MD: U. S. Army Environmental Center, 1984), 16.

PRATT & WHITNEY PLANT (Bannister Federal Complex) (Kansas City Plant) HAER No. MO-118 (page 27) Pratt & Whiney Complex: Retrofitted for the Atomic Age At the end of World War II, President Truman established the Atomic Energy Commission (AEC). When Russia blockaded West Berlin in 1948 and detonated their first atomic device in 1949, Truman ordered the AEC to expedite the development of thermonuclear weapons. This was the beginning of the Cold War years and the beginning of a new era for the Kansas City Plant, which then was under the control of the Department of the Navy. In November 1948, the Department of the Navy hired Westinghouse Corporation for the manufacturing of aircraft engines.111 In January 1949, the Westinghouse Aircraft Gas Turbine (AGT) plant leased the former Pratt & Whitney Plant and hired 5,000 employees. Over the next year, Westinghouse AGT converted a portion of the Main Manufacturing Plant for a new use. By January 1, 1950, Westinghouse was producing an average of 150, J34s a month. The J34 was used in trainers and many of the Navy’s Lockheed Neptune P-2s reconnaissance planes. In September 1951, just eighteen months after the plant began production Westinghouse completed its 3,000th J34 and tooled up to manufacture the J40 engine.112 Concurrently, the AEC selected the former Pratt & Whitney Plant as a manufacturing facility for non-nuclear electrical and mechanical components for nuclear weapons. Subsequently, Westinghouse sub-leased a portion of the Main Manufacturing Plant to AEC, with Bendix Corporation as their operational contractor. By April 1949 the Bendix was in full operation. The initial installation of Bendix remained a secret and for years the area residents believed that the plant only manufactured washing machines.113 Between 1951 and 1959, the federal government and the U.S. Navy focused on missiles and deterrence. During this timeframe, Westinghouse AGT was in competition with General Electric, yet, the Westinghouse management staff was reluctant to invest in new technology. Additionally, a reduction of orders for the J34 and the J40 hurt Westinghouse by causing a steady decline in business for the Kansas City plant.114 On March 22, 1960, Westinghouse AGT announced their plan to discontinue the Aircraft Gas Turbine engine division. By December 1960, Westinghouse closed their entire operation at the Kansas City Plant.115 However, its parent company, the Bendix Corporation continued to lease the buildings at the complex through the next twenty years, yet the specifics of their production remains unclear. Although

111 In August 1948, the Navy decided that Westinghouse Aircraft, Philadelphia, should increase the production of their J34 Gas Turbine engine. 112 Smith, “A Brief History of Manufacturing,” 2. 113 Honeywell Federal Manufacturing and Technologies, Kansas City Plant: 60 Years, 1949-2009 (Kansas City: Honeywell Federal Manufacturing and Technologies, LLC, 2009), 37.

114 Smith, “A Brief History of Manufacturing,” 2.

115 Ibid.

PRATT & WHITNEY PLANT (Bannister Federal Complex) (Kansas City Plant) HAER No. MO-118 (page 28) the jet engine production closed down in 1960, Bendix remained the operating contractor for the Atomic Energy Commission, Energy Research and Development Agency, Department of Energy and more recently, the National Nuclear Security Administration. In 1983, Bendix merged with Allied Corporation. Also during the 1980s, a Robotics Team began developing robotics to implement factory automation across the plant. Over the years, as new production processes were installed and production specifications tightened, areas of the plant were renovated. Eventually, all wood block flooring was replaced. The heavy furniture of the war years was replaced by modular furniture and sound-absorbing carpeting. In 1993 the DOE designated the Kansas City Plant as the consolidated site for the production of non-nuclear components. In 1994 Allied Corporation changed to Allied Signal. In turn, Allied Signal acquired the Honeywell Industry. The Honeywell name was adopted and in 1999 the name changed to Honeywell Manufacturing and Technologies, LLC., at which time consolidated companies celebrated their fiftieth year in operation.116 For over sixty-years Bendix and its successors have managed the facilities in Kansas City for the DOE. Today, the Kansas City Plant “involves procuring and manufacturing non-nuclear components. . .and is applying its manufacturing capabilities and unique factories to solving non-weapon related manufacturing challenges for the National Nuclear Security Administration’s national laboratories, Department of Defense, and other Federal agencies. Most recently, the Kansas City Plant has positioned itself to benefit the Department of Homeland Security and other government agencies with combating terrorism.”117 In 2006, the NNSA envisioned the transformation of the Kansas City Plant, from “a cold war-vintage infrastructure to a more cost effective and correctly sized 21st century responsive infrastructure that exemplifies good stewardship of taxpayer resources while maintaining the nuclear deterrent.”118 A new Kansas City plant is in the planning stages and will be located at Botts Road and Highway 150. The new location is approximately eight miles south of the Kansas City Plant.119

The following timeline is a guide to the series of events regarding the Pratt & Whitney Plant beginning in 1939 when Germany invaded Poland and inevitable entry of the U. S. into World War II; through 2006, when the decision was made by NNSA to plan and build a modern facility.120

116 Kansas City Plant: 60 Years, 1949-2009, 90-99. 117 Ibid., 122.

118 Ibid., 116.

119 Ibid., 114-118. 120 Table compiled from the overall research data listed in the bibliography.

PRATT & WHITNEY PLANT (Bannister Federal Complex) (Kansas City Plant) HAER No. MO-118 (page 29)

September 1, 1939 World War II began when Germany invaded Poland, with subsequent declarations of war on Germany by France, the countries of the British Empire and Commonwealths.

November 1939 U. S. Neutrality Act passed, however, the French and British were allowed to purchase arms from U.S. manufacturers for cash only.

December 8, 1941 United States declared war on Japan following the attack on Pearl Harbor.

December 11, 1941 Germany and Italy declared war on the United States, and the U. S. reciprocated with a declaration of war against Germany and Italy.

January 16, 1942

The War Production Board (WPB) established by Executive Order 9025. This board was formed to oversee all industrial production related to military needs while managing the rationing of supplies and raw materials needed specifically for military use. At this time, steel, as well as other metals including fabrics other such raw materials, and wood, were rationed in order to reserve supplies that were needed for the production of aircraft, tanks, ammunitions and other implements of war.

April 22, 1942 The Navy and United Aircraft Corporation, under Brent Rentschler, discussed plans for a new location to construct a manufacturing plant for the production of the Pratt & Whitney Wasp engines needed for the war effort.

April 29, 1942 A 397-acre site outside of Kansas City, Missouri, was chosen at Bannister and Holmes Road for the United Aircraft Corp of Missouri for manufacturing Pratt & Whitney Wasp series engines.

July 1, 1942 The Defense Plant Corporation took possession of the construction site at a total cost of $139,798.58. Fourteen parcels of land were purchased.

July 2, 1942 Contract let to Turner Construction, New York and Long Construction, Kansas City, Missouri. Work completed as the Long-Turner Construction Company while building the new Pratt & Whitney Complex.

July 4, 1942 Groundbreaking ceremony was held at the construction site; approximately 3,000 people attended.

July 6, 1942 Excavation work commenced.

December 1942 Albert Kahn died on December 8, 1942. The Pratt & Whitney Corporation of Missouri was his last project.

January 1943

Building No. 3: Personnel Building, designed by Albert Kahn, was completed.

Building No. 4: Truck Garage, designed by Albert Kahn, was completed.

Building No. 5: West Boiler House, designed by Albert Kahn, was completed.

Building No. 15: Polymer Building, designed by Albert Kahn, was completed.

Building No. 16: Kinematics Building, designed by Albert Kahn, was completed.

Building No. 71: West Basin completed.

Building No. 87: Test Cells (32), designed by Albert Kahn, were completed.

February 3, 1943 Pratt & Whitney engine plant was fully operational.

November 1943 The construction of the Pratt & Whitney complex was completed.

PRATT & WHITNEY PLANT (Bannister Federal Complex) (Kansas City Plant) HAER No. MO-118 (page 30)

1944

The addition of a First Aid room, designed by Kahn Associates, was completed. A sound system, also by Kahn’s firm, was installed.

Building No. 54: High Power Lab, designed by Albert Kahn Associated Architects and Engineers, was completed.

1945

Building No. 14: Four Experimental Test Cells, designed by Albert Kahn Associated Architects and Engineers, was completed.

Building No. 46: Unfinished Test Cells, designed by Albert Kahn Associated Architects and Engineers, under construction. These cells were never finished, most likely due to the war’s end in September 1945.

September 2, 1945

“V-J Day” Government closed the Navy’s Kansas City Plant which had delivered 7,934 R-2800 Series “C” Double Wasp engines totaling 21,506,167 hp to the U.S. Navy. 21,000 employees were sent home.

October 1945 thru June 1948

Although the complex remained largely vacant during this period, the War Asset Administration managed the tenancy of several business entities, both governmental and non-governmental, that occupied warehouse space within the complex.

1947 The Refinance Corporation (RFC) transferred the property to the Federal Government and placed responsibility for the property with the War Assets Administration (WAA).

1947 The Internal Revenue Service leased Bldg 41, a one-story warehouse for record storage. (Part of the Main Manufacturing building).

December 31, 1947 The WAA transferred the KCP to the Department of the Navy and renamed the plant the Naval Weapons Industrial Reserve Plant (NWIRP).

June 1948 Westinghouse leased the Main Manufacturing Plant for their J34 airplane engine production and one year later sublet a portion to the Bendix Corporation, which was under contract to the Atomic Energy Commission (AEC).

April 1949 Bendix and Westinghouse occupied the former Pratt & Whitney Plant.

1950 Building No. 42: Materials Handling Building, attrib. to Albert Kahn Associated Architects and Engineers, was completed.

1952 Building No. 59: Waste Management Building was constructed. Architect and builder unknown.

1953 Building No. 76: Explosives Storage Bunker was constructed. Architect and builder unknown.

1956 Building No. 50: Fuels Components Laboratory Building, architect and builder unknown, was completed.

1957 Building No. 13: Manufacturing Support Building, Wilson and Company, Architects of Salina, contractor unknown, was completed. Building No. 68: Storage Shed for Bendix Corporation, architect unknown.

March 22, 1960 Westinghouse AGT announced their plan to discontinue the Aircraft Gas Turbine

PRATT & WHITNEY PLANT (Bannister Federal Complex) (Kansas City Plant) HAER No. MO-118 (page 31)

engine division. By December 1960, Westinghouse closed their entire operation at the Kansas City Plant.

Post December 1960

The Bendix Corporation continued to lease the buildings at the complex through the next twenty years.

1961 Building No. 48: East Power House was completed, Alfred Benberg, Architect.

1970s Picnic Area Shelter was constructed for the use of Bendix employees. Architect and builder unknown.

1972

Building No. 73: Solid Waste Handling Building, A. C. Kirkwood, Engineers, constructed for Bendix Corporation was completed. Building No. 75: Supervisory Control, A. C. Kirkwood, Engineers, constructed for Bendix Corporation was completed.

1973 Building No. 74: A. C. Kirkwood, Engineers, constructed for Bendix Corporation was completed.

1975 Building No. 64: Shelter, architect/builder unknown, attributed to Bendix Corporation.

1979 Building No. 89: Fire Protection Pump was installed by the U. S. Department of Energy (DOE).

1980

Building No. 65: Chemical Storage Acid Shelter was constructed by the Bendix Corporation. In addition, it was during the 1980s a robotics team began developing robotics to implement automation across the plant.

1983 In 1983, Bendix Corporation merged with Allied Corporation, which then became lead agency running the facility.

1984 Building No. 90: Mold, Heating and Cooling, constructed for Allied Corporation. Architect and builder unknown.

1985

Building No. 25: Truck Scale and Booth was constructed by Allied Corporation. Architect / Builder unknown. Building No. 91: Plating was constructed by Allied Corporation. Architect / Builder unknown. Building No. 93: Northeast Guard Post was constructed by Allied Corporation as designed by the architectural firm of Horner Blessing and Associates. DMF Wastewater Treatment Unit was constructed. Architect / Builder unknown.

1987 Building No. 94: Northwest Guard Post was built. Architect / Builder unknown. Building No. 96: Special Process was constructed. Architect / Builder unknown.

1988

Building No. 62: Waste Acid Shelter constructed by Allied Corporation, architect or engineer is unknown. Building No. 97: Groundwater Monitoring Equipment was installed. Engineer / Builder unknown. Building No. 98: Industrial Wastewater Pretreatment was installed by TMSI Engineers, Los Angles, California.

PRATT & WHITNEY PLANT (Bannister Federal Complex) (Kansas City Plant) HAER No. MO-118 (page 32)

A Utility Bridge was added to the facility. Engineer / Builder unknown.

ca. 1990 Building No. 95: Another Shelter was built for the storage of solid waste material. Engineer / Builder unknown.

1991

Buildings No. 26, 27, 29: All three buildings were constructed by Allied Corporation as waste management storage facilities. No architect or engineer was involved. It appears that Allied Corporation constructed these buildings to store various waste materials, both chemical and non-chemical, based in liquid and solid form.

1993 The Department of Energy designated the Kansas City Plant as the consolidated site for the production of non-nuclear components.

1994-1995 Allied Corporation changed its name to Allied Signal and soon after, acquired Honeywell Industries. The plant continued to operate under Allied Signal for the next four years.

1998 Building No. 49: Allied Corporation constructed the East Cooling Tower to provide chilled water for the compressors.

1999 The Honeywell name was adopted and the name changed to Honeywell Federal Manufacturing and Technologies, LLC. Honeywell continued to manage the facility for the NNSA.

2006

NNSA began planning the transformation of the facility from a ‘vintage Cold War era’ plant to a modern 21st century infrastructure while remaining a nuclear deterrent and an important part of U. S. defense against terrorism. A new facility is in the planning stage, is to be constructed approximately eight miles south of the current Kansas City Plant.

Setting Located in a light industrial, commercial and residential area, the Pratt & Whitney Plant is partially obscured on the south by a floodwall constructed in 1994. Several large surface parking lots are located on the south and north sides of the Main Manufacturing Plant (Building No. 1). Access roads around the plant include Santa Fe Trail and Liberty Drive on the north, Freedom Street on the west, Constitution Drive, Wayne Avenue and E. 95th Terrace on the south. Garfield Avenue, which runs parallel to the historic Missouri Pacific Railroad tracks, is located to the east. Maintained grassy areas compose portions of the perimeter, while the confluence of Indian Creek and Blue River skirt the south and east. Further to the east is a large warehouse, the former Federal Supply and Records Building, Region 6 (1954-1955; Anning-Johnson Architects, Chicago). Internal transportation patterns and paths are highly restricted in the NNSA section (fencing and guard gates secure areas), while the GSA portion of the plant is more accessible. Located approximately twelve miles from downtown Kansas City, the surrounding area of the Pratt & Whitney Plant Complex does not contain any National Register-listed properties or other properties that have been inventoried.

PRATT & WHITNEY PLANT (Bannister Federal Complex) (Kansas City Plant) HAER No. MO-118 (page 33) PART II. PROJECT INFORMATION

The Pratt &Whitney (P&W), also known as the Bannister Federal Complex, is undergoing mitigation due to the relocation to a new facility for the Department of Energy (DOE) and National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA). The Honeywell Corporation is the managing firm for the facility. The DOE/NNSA is the property landholding agency occupying approximately half of the entire facility Pratt &Whitney complex. Only those resources controlled by the DOE/NNSA are a part of this documentation. The General Services Administration (GSA) occupies approximately one third of this complex while the remaining portion of the complex is leased to various federal agencies. In circa 2005, NNSA hired the engineering firm of Burns & McDonnell, of Kansas City, Missouri, to implement the relocation of the facility. Cydney Millstein, of Architectural & Historical Research, L.L.C., with Mary Ann Warfield, historian, authored and compiled the HAER documentation report. Richard Welnowski completed all large-format, archival black and white photographic documentation of the facility. The NNSA, Kansas City, Missouri, and the Albert Kahn Company of Detroit, Michigan, the successor firm to Albert Kahn and Associated Architects and Engineers, supplied historic plans and drawings. Due to the sensitive nature as a working research facility for the DOE/NNSA, both crucial to the national security of the United States, research was limited. The majority of resources used in this study date between 1940 through 1961, the year in which the preceding agencies of DOE/NNSA occupied the facility. Access to information after 1961, as well as interior photographic documentation, was highly restricted. Efforts to contact the archives of Pratt &Whitney located in West Hartford, Connecticut, for information regarding the Pratt & Whitney engines that were produced at this facility during World War II was unsuccessful. It is P & W policy not to divulge this information outside of what is already available to the public. Historic publications published by Pratt & Whitney as an employee bulletin dating from 1943-1948 are located at the NNSA facility along with a 60-year history of the plant, published in 2009. This publication outlines the predecessor’s to the Honeywell Industry, which was beneficial in producing the timeline. Although research of the manufacturing details of this facility remains restricted, the amount of accessible historic data provides an excellent historical context of the facility’s contribution to the national defense measures of the United States. Architectural and engineering information was readily available from the DOE/NNSA in the form of architectural drawings and plans. The most beneficial source of data concerning the details of the complex’s construction came from the company archives of the Albert Kahn Company, Detroit, MI. Included in the corporate archives is the span of Albert Kahn’s work, from c. 1907, through Kahn’s death in 1943. In addition to plans and drawings, notebooks of published articles, photographs and personal letters were also found in this collection. In addition, the Albert Kahn Collection located at the Bentley Historical Society at the University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, Michigan, contained the Kahn plans for farm tractor plants built in Russia during the 1930s. During the course of research, several phone interviews were conducted which included Dr. Grant Hildebrand, a Kahn Scholar and author of Designing for Industry: The Architecture of Albert Kahn, and Dr. Charles Hyde, Wayne State University.

o

N

~.

W~E

S 150

Fe

et

300

iiiiI

--

His

toric

Com

ple

x B

ound

ary

__

Con

trib

utin

g

rJ#]

'] N

on-C

ontr

ibut

ing

:I1 >­ tTl

:::0

Z

o ~ y 0

0

~

l---

----

----

----

----

---i

l~

Pra

tt &

Whi

tney

Com

plex

(B

anni

ster

Fed

era

l Com

plex

) P

ropo

sed

His

toric

Com

plex

15

00 &

200

0 E

ast

Ban

iste

r R

oad

Jack

son

Cou

nty.

MO

~ w ~

'-'

PRATT & WHITNEY PLANT (Bannister Federal Complex) (Kansas City Plant) HAER No. MO-118 (page 35)

Racetrack, 95th Street and Bannister Road, Kansas City Missouri.

Site of the future Pratt & Whitney Plant Archival Photograph Date: c. 1923 Source: National Nuclear Security Administration, Kansas City Plant, Kansas City, Missouri.

PRATT & WHITNEY PLANT (Bannister Federal Complex) (Kansas City Plant) HAER No. MO-118

(page 36)

Plot Plan Aircraft Engine Plant for United Aircraft Corporation of Missouri Albert Kahn Associated Architects & Engineers, Inc. Date: September 21, 1943 Source: Archives, National Nuclear Security Administration, Kansas City, Missouri

PRATT & WHITNEY PLANT (Bannister Federal Complex) (Kansas City Plant) HAER No. MO-118

(page 37)

Site Layout of AEC Facilities Bendix Corporation, Kansas City Division Drawing Number 8643 Date: November 11, 1965 Source: Archives, National Nuclear Security Administration, Kansas City, Missouri

PRATT & WHITNEY PLANT (Bannister Federal Complex) (Kansas City Plant) HAER No. MO-118

(page 38)

Chrysler Corporation Dodge Chicago Plant Chicago, Illinois Albert Kahn Associated Architects and Engineers Date: 1943 Source: Albert Kahn Associates, Inc., Detroit, Michigan

PRATT & WHITNEY PLANT (Bannister Federal Complex) (Kansas City Plant) HAER No. MO-118

(page 39)

PART III: BIBLIOGRAPHY “Air Recovery by Gas Absorption Cuts Equipment Weight and Costs.” Heating, Piping & Air Conditioning (May 1943). “Aircraft Engines: Pratt & Whitney Corporation, Kansas City, Missouri.” Factory Management and Maintenance 13 (April 1945). “Albert Kahn Associates Built Russian Defenses.” Michigan Society of Architects. 30 March 1943. “Architects Place in War Effort Is Theme of Institutes’ Meet Here.” The Detroit Free Press. 21 June 1942. Architectural & Historical Research, LLC. “The Kansas City Plant: Bannister Federal Complex,” Section 106 study. Available at Missouri State Historic Preservation Office Jefferson City, Missouri. May 26, 2010. “Assembly Line Method Saves Steel in Erecting Pratt & Whitney Plant.” The Kansas City Star. 20 December 1942. “Assembly Line Plan of Plant Construction.” The Constructor (February 1943). “Big Warehouse Here to Save U.S. Money, GSA Chief Says.” The Kansas City Star 5 May 1954. Borg, Robert F. C.E. "New Methods in Building Construction.” NYU Quadrangle. November 1942. Breihan, John R. “Historical and Architectural Resources of Middle River, Maryland.” Multiple Property Submission. National Register of Historic Places. U.S. Department of the Interior, National Park Service. n.d. Bucci, Federico. Albert Kahn. New York: Princeton Architectural Press, 2002. “Build For Permanence.” Mill and Factory (May 1942). “Building Profession Salutes Plant 7 Speed.” Michigan Society of Architects 30 March 1943. (Originally from War Speed Record, published by Mahoney-Troast employees at Plant Seven). “Cargo Plane Factory Completed in South by Curtiss-Wright.” Construction (February 1943). Choporis, P. N. (Kahn Assoc.) “Steam, Compressed Air and Refrigeration for a Large Plant.” Power Plant Engineering (May 1945).

PRATT & WHITNEY PLANT (Bannister Federal Complex) (Kansas City Plant) HAER No. MO-118

(page 40)

Christian, Ralph J. “Highland Park Ford Plant.” National Register of Historic Places Nomination. U.S. Department of the Interior, National Park Service. May 1977. Edson, Arthur. “Ingenuity Builds New Motor Plant.” Troy (New York) Records. 25 May 1944. _______. “This War Plant Story Unusual.” Miami (OKLA) News-Record. 25 May 1944. _______. “Plant Built But Answers Not All Found.” Richmond (Virg.) News Leader. 25 May 1944. “Eighteen New Engine Test Houses At Pratt & Whitney Aircraft.” Hartford Connecticut Courier. 7 July 1944. “Engine Plant Grows Almost Over Night.” Aviation 43 (June 1944). “Engine Plant Wins Through.” Grand Rapids Press 25 May 1944. “Events and Comments.” The Architect and Building News (November 13, 1942). “Fast Construction For Fast Production.” Architectural Record 97 (February 1945). Ferry, W. Hawkins. The Legacy of Albert Kahn. Detroit: Wayne State University Press, 1987. Hedgepeth, Marty. “Ford Motor Plant: Louisville Kentucky.” National Register of Historic Places Nomination. U.S. Department of the Interior, National Park Service. 17 December 1982. Hildebrand, Grant. Designing for Industry: The Architecture of Albert Kahn. Cambridge: MIT Press, 1974. Holley, Irving Brinton, Jr. Buying Aircraft: Materiel Procurement for the Army Air Forces. Washington, D.C.: Office of the Chief of Military History, Department of the Army, 1964. Hyde, Charles K. “Assembly-Line Architecture: Albert Kahn and the Evolution of the U.S. Auto Factory, 1905-1940.” IA: The Journal of the Society for Industrial Archeology 22 (1996). “Industrial Buildings of Albert Kahn.” The Architectural Forum 69 (August 1938). Kahn, Albert. Archives. Albert Kahn and Associates, Detroit, Michigan. Kahn, Albert. “Immense Expansion of War Industries At Fast Tempo.” Lighting and Lamps (February 1942).

PRATT & WHITNEY PLANT (Bannister Federal Complex) (Kansas City Plant) HAER No. MO-118

(page 41)

Kahn, Albert, Architects, Inc. Stalingrad Tractor Plant, Stalingrad U.S.S.R. Plans for Amtorg Trading Corporation, Sheet Number 7. June 1929. Bentley Archives, University of Michigan, Ann Arbor. Kahn, Albert and Associates. “Factory Construction.” Architectural Forum October 1942). Kahn, Albert Associated Architects & Engineers, Inc. Aircraft Engine Plant for United Air Corporation of Missouri. Job No. 1927. Various dates. Archives. Albert Kahn Associates, Dedtroit, Michigan. “Kansas City Plant of UAC Rising Fast.” Stratford Connecticut Courier. 20 December 1942. Kaufmann, R. H. and N. A. Kieb. “Electrical Distribution System of the Pratt & Whitney Plant.” Power Plant Engineering (May 1945). _______. “Modern Electric Power Distribution Ideas As Applied In A Large War Plant.” Technical Paper published by AIEE of New York, New York. January 1945. “Larger Diameter Test Cells.” Construction Methods 26 (October 1944). Matuz, Roger. Albert Kahn: Builder of Detroit. Detroit: Wayne State University Press, 2002. Nelson, George. Industrial Architecture of Albert Kahn, Inc. New York: Architectural Book Publishing Company, 1939. “New Colgate-Palmolive Plant Kansas City Unit.” Soap and Sanitary Chemicals (November 1951). “New Plant Is Dedicated to Precision.” Western Machinery and Steel World 31 (March 10, 1940). “New Plant Promotes Precision.” Steel 106 (February 1940). Nimmons, George C., FAIA. “Industrial Buildings.” American Architect 129 (January 1925). “Pardon Issued by Lincoln in Vast Storehouse Here.” The Kansas City Star. 17 February 1956. “Plant Built Against Odds.” Michigan Herald Press. 24 May 1944. “Pratt and Whitney.” The Kansas City Star. 4 July 1943. “Pratt & Whitney Aircraft Plant,” The Kansas City Star. 24 May 1942. “Pratt & Whitney Aircraft Plant Construction.” The Kansas City Times. 6 July 1942.

PRATT & WHITNEY PLANT (Bannister Federal Complex) (Kansas City Plant) HAER No. MO-118

(page 42)

“Pratt & Whitney Aircraft Plant Contractors,” The Kansas City Star. 2 July 1942. “Pratt and Whitney Aircraft Plant: Groundbreaking Ceremony” The Kansas City Star. 3 July 1943. “Pratt & Whitney Aircraft Plant: Management.” The Kansas City Times. 13 August 1942. “Pratt & Whitney Aircraft Plant: Training Center for Workers.” The Kansas City Times. 20 December 1942. “Pratt and Whitney’s Kansas City Engine Plant: Built Despite Seemingly Endless Problems." The New York World Telegram. 24 May 1944. “Producer of Production Lines.” Architectural Record (June 1942). “Progress in Industrial Building Design.” The Iron Age 142 (July 28, 1938). R. Christopher Goodwin and Associates, Inc. “Historic Context for Department of Defense Facilities World War II Permanent Construction.” U.S. Army Corp of Engineers, Baltimore District. Delivery Order 21. May 1997. Reed, Peter S. “Enlisting Modernism.” World War II and the American Dream. Washington: MIT Press, 1995. “Single-Story Concrete Factory: War- Inspired Innovation.” Engineering News-Record 22 (October 1942). “Smashing the Axis: The Inside Story of American Industry at War.” New York World Telegraph. 2 December 1942. Smith, Maurice. “A Brief History of Manufacturing.” NNSA, Kansas City Plant archives, Honeywell Federal Manufacturing and Technology, 2002. “Suspense Ends: $14M Project Is Expected to Provide Jobs For 5000.” Southington Connecticut News. 15 May 1942. “Tail-End War Plant Scrapes Bottom of Labor Material Barrel.” The Pontiac Michigan Press. 24 May 1944. “The Architect Working in Industry.” Architectural Record 9 (March 1941). “The Arsenal of Democracy: Albert Kahn Architect (1869-1942).” Architectural Record (January 1943).

PRATT & WHITNEY PLANT (Bannister Federal Complex) (Kansas City Plant) HAER No. MO-118

(page 43)

“The New Pratt & Whitney Plant.” Machinery 46 (February 1940). Turner, Ralph E. ed. “Buick Factory Assembles Army Aircraft Engines.” Power Plant Engineering (July 1942). “United Aircraft Corporation of Missouri.” The Kansas City Times. 23 June 1942. United Aircraft Division, Pratt & Whitney Aircraft Division, The Pratt and Whitney Aircraft Story. NP: 1950. “Victory Sash.” Michigan Society of Architects. (May 19, 1942). “War Plane Factory Design.” Construction (June 1942). “War Plant Building Tale of Difficulties.” Manchester (Connecticut) The Herald. 24 May 1944. “War Plant Construction: Series of Mobile Roof Forms Speed Aircraft Engine Factory.” Steel 28 (December 1942). “War Requirements Accelerate Progress in Design.” Architectural Record (January 1942). “War Speed Factory Construction.” Michigan Society of Architects. (March 30, 1943). “Warspeed System of Construction in Concrete.” Architectural Record, n.d. Files, Kahn Associates, Archives, Detroit. “Wartime Construction of Factory Buildings.” Architectural Record 92 (December 1942). “Weekly Bulletin.” Michigan Society of Architects 17 (March 30, 1943). “Willow Run’s War Speed Record.” Mahony-Troast Employee Newsletter, 27. (January 29, 1943). Wood, Tracy (Kahn Assoc.). “Concrete Arch Roof for Kansas City Factory.” Civil Engineering 13 (August 1943).