There are literally train tracks leading into it. Why Did the U.S. Government Amass More Than a Billion Pounds of Cheese? Like anything you grow up with and then lose subsequently access to, government cheese is parked in a prominent spot in the memories of its former consumers. And the resulting demand just pushes the price of milk up. The cheese was processed and made into 2 and 5 pound bricks and given away as food aid to the poor of America. We walk inside. In response to this dairy shortage and 30% inflation . The government was buying 1 in every 4 pounds of the country's cheddar cheese. DUFFIN: Lever 1, lower the supply - you could do what they do in Canada and say - hey, no more milk - you can only produce so much milk. Sign up for our newsletter and enter to win the second edition of our book. And the resulting demand just pushes the price of milk up. . Its existence serves as a reminder of Kansas Citys knack for innovative transportation especially as new railways for the streetcar go down all along Main Street. So the thing that the government was concerned about is what's called commercial displacement. And what percentage of economists would you say are able to milk a cow by hand? Follow us on Twitter to get the latest on the world's hidden wonders. As the room and pillar mining method is used to extract limestone throughout the Midwest, many companies are looking at ways to utilize the hundreds of millions of square feet created in this manner for everything from mushroom farming to crude oil stockpiling. Working underground is no big deal to me, Peters says in the interview. You can do something to make demand greater, or you can do something to make supply less. JIMMY CARTER: Now, although I am a farmer, I'm not in favor of guaranteeing farmers a profit. The main brewing cellar, now outfitted with seating areas, a bar and raised stage, reaches 55 feet underground. On a given day, kids scramble over its playground, neighbors walk their dogs through its green acres, and teens meet for pick-up games on its soccer fields and volleyball courts. Posted on June 16, 2022 by June 16, 2022 by Now heres a story that comes full circle. Missouri has more than 7,000 caves under its ground, though fewer than 20 are easily accessible to most people. MALONE: I'm Kenny Malone. Besides those already mentioned, other businesses include Cerner, NextPage, Hallmark Cards, Hantover, Clore Automotive, and Knapheide. You could destroy the surplus, but that looks pretty bad. Specifically, the federal government had 560 million pounds of cheese, most of it stored in vast subterranean storage facilities. Its at the same park! This is, you know, important to me. Food Caves in Missouri SubTropolis, Kansas City. He says the government was buying powdered milk, butter and cheddar cheese - only grade-A cheddar, though. MALONE: Andy is still in the dairy world. The Trump administration says today it will make an estimated $12 billion in government assistance available. ASCHEBROCK: And you insert it in through the block or the barrel or whatever. This one-of-a-kind display showcases a wide variety of hair art, historic hair pieces, and more. Since that requires capital, the dairy industry starts consolidating, says Andrea Wiley, author of Re-Imagining Milk. MALONE: Until there was no more room for you to be in this room? In 2003 the Archives opened an underground FRC facility in Lenexa, Kansas. KCUR serves the Kansas City region with breaking news and powerful storytelling. MALONE: Are you pretty annoying to eat cheese with? Heap the flour on your countertop and make a well in the center. as well as other partner offers and accept our, http://eapcontent.ap.org/jpg/2015/20150914/16/be46cf305fa20029820f6a70670013cf.jpg?contentid=be46cf305fa20029820f6a70670013cf/fmt=jpg/role=Preview/reldt=2015-09-14T16:35:59/media=Photo/recordid=a772a7d9f93f488487ec5a05e64f976a/itemid=a772a7d9f93f488487ec5a05e64f976a/objfilename=preview.jpg/authToken=eNotikEKwyAURE%2bkzNf4NQuhV4lWwUVj0Ei78PC10FnM48Gb6eNZG%2bsIO4OwRg4zFh%2fSxjFrCJMPJQC1C6eQBR8WbFemY56j%2b1jPu5Uw7tr6I4xeztTX9fJMTcb6mtfb%2f5UMZrk8b5LAkn4k8wXMhif%2b&token=1442512801_9D4E1758BD6D116C2F559647389B3542, NOW WATCH: Incredible video inside Hang Son Doong the largest cave in the world. A large portion is also owned by companies, who . Share your experiences in the comment section below. And you can drive your car right into it. Born from tragedy, the remote national park is bringing tourism and other changes. G. DEP: (Rapping) Can't buy trees with government cheese. Kraft Cheese Cave, Springfield. Park University in the Kansas City suburb of Parkville has dozens of classrooms and offices in the caves and rents out other underground space to businesses. MALONE: Who's got time for dating when you're traveling around eating cheese everywhere? So how in the world did the U.S. end up with a mountain of slowly molding cheese? It was created by digging into the Bethany Falls limestone mine and is, in places, 160 feet beneath the surface. And before that, he was a reporter for his friend T.C. As a busy mother of one crazy kid, two cats, and two geckos, they write whenever there is spare time. But the surplus was growing so fast that 30 million pounds barely made a dent. NOVAKOVIC: So you can imagine, you know, you don't just kind of roll down one of these barrels down Seventh Avenue in New York City and say, anybody want some cheese? Lamar Hunt, the late founder of the Kansas City Chiefs, is perhaps the most well-known of the cave developers. JUNOT DIAZ: Clear the government cheese from the refrigerator. And though OMalleys looks normal from the outside, the inside tells another story. UNIDENTIFIED PERSON: That's government cheese. Onandaga Cave is one of the most gorgeous underground places in Missouri. And welcome to PLANET MONEY. Have you seen these caves before? Get more stories delivered right to your email. Jimmy Carter was running for president. Kraft Foods, the multinational conglomerate that makes countless grocery products in addition to cheese, is about none of that, however. The same year, the USDA bought up $20 million worth of cheese to cut the glut. Well, we got some real crafty guys that started putting 40-pound blocks of special cheese right under the bunghole. DUFFIN: By the early 1980s, the dairy support program was costing taxpayers around $2 billion a year. ANDY NOVAKOVIC: Exactly. Uncover the finest, most undercover experiences in Kansas City. SubTropolis is a 55,000,000-square-foot (5,100,000m2), 1,100-acre (4.5km2) artificial cave in the bluffs above the Missouri River in Kansas City, Missouri, United States, that is claimed to be the world's largest underground storage facility. He spent 30 years testing and tasting cheese for the United States government. Deep in converted limestone mines, caves kept perfectly at 36 degrees Fahrenheit store stockpiles of government-owned cheese comprising the country's 1.4 billion pounds of surplus cheese. With temperatures maintained at 25F and 35F, staff have nicknamed the space the "Ice Cube." Unfortunately, your shopping bag is empty. is cottonseed oil safe for nut allergy There's a lot of history buried beneath Kansas City streets, from Prohibition-era passageways and underground caves to the oldest bar in Missouri. According to the Center for Land Use Interpretation, the space was once also a limestone mine. NOVAKOVIC: One is it's really hard to balance what you want to do socially or politically with what you can get away with economically. MALONE: Right. MALONE: Karen's doing the dance. The Missouri River town is known for its charming main drag and castle-like college, Park University. glimpse into the void but a modern-day viewing is near-impossible. Go to the shop Go to the shop. DUFFIN: It's one thing for politicians to say, we want the price of milk to go up. Dug into the Bethany Falls limestone mine, SubTropolis is, in places, 160 feet (49m) beneath the surface. DAN CALLAHAN: No, I've never thought about it. That was pretty good. NOVAKOVIC: It's really hard to balance what you want to do socially or politically with what you can get away with economically. I mean, every warehouse in Wisconsin was full. Basically the dairy industry is looking to expand its market and the United States Department of Agriculture (USDA) is looking to expand the agricultural economy and they become very intertwined., It helped that the burgeoning field of nutrition science promoted dairy products as essential for both adults and children. All our area around here - everybody had cheese. MALONE: Dan Callahan worked here in the 1970s and says one day, the U.S. government rented a ton of cave space, and a ton of cheddar cheese started to show up. Help yourself. Winner will be selected at random on 04/01/2023. MALONE: Right - very, very expensive cheese. And it took a few years, but a flood of cheese starts to come in. ASCHEBROCK: Well, I think cheese eating is better than dating sometimes. The USDA helped "cut the glut" then by purchasing $20 million worth of fresh cheese. NOVAKOVIC: Exactly. There was an incredible press conference where Agriculture Secretary John Block went before reporters and held up a giant hunk of cheese like it was a national emergency. ASCHEBROCK: Nope. A NASA employee needing an area to test sensitive navigational instruments was among the first official cave occupants. It can fit a train car. Every weekday we compile our most wondrous stories and deliver them straight to you. For example, the United States Postal Service uses the space for its collectible stamp operations, and the United States Environmental Protection Agency leases spaces within for their Region-7 Training and Logistics Center. In the 1940s, there was a real concern that we were going to have a hard time keeping up with providing the necessities of life, Novakovi says. NOVAKOVIC: Well, I think there's two basic lessons. Lawmakers worried that any blow to the nations dairy farmers could lead to drastic shortages down the line. By 1984, the U.S. storage facilities contained 1.2 billion pounds, or roughly five pounds of cheese for every American. Kenny Malone hails from Meadville, PA where the zipper was invented, where Clark Gables mother is buried and where, in 2007, a wrecking ball broke free from a construction site, rolled down North Main Street and somehow wound up inside the trunk of a Ford Taurus sitting at a red light. The air is cool and the barroom massive almost cathedral-like. MALONE: Many listeners may remember "Saturday Night Live's" Matt Foley, as played by Chris Farley, the world's worst motivational speaker. MALONE: Bob Aschebrock was one of the government's cheese graders. Offer available only in the U.S. (including Puerto Rico). Let us know. UNIDENTIFIED REPORTER: The great cheese giveaway began today in California. Decades of propping up the dairy industryby buying up surplus. Start with this beginner's guide to the neighborhood, Local public health officials fear a Kansas bill would undercut work to contain diseases, A federal lawsuit against Missouri's 'dysfunctional' SNAP call center has gotten bigger, Escape your house with this list of outdoor adventures around Kansas City, Kick off your summer with outdoor music and movies in Kansas City, Kansas City is home to a lot of offbeat and fun museums. MALONE: When we have a surplus of grain or soy or even powdered milk, we can send that stuff overseas as part of foreign aid. Through our sister company, Cold Zone, we are able to store refrigerated food, such as cheese for our tenants. The government would buy up, say, massive amounts of corn or wheat and then just throw it into a silo until we needed it for some reason. ASCHEBROCK: I'm not running down Velveeta, but I'll tell you, the government processed loaf was 10 times - 100 times better. MALONE: OK. OK. We're not here to make fun of Velveeta. Embark on a wonderful cave tour and learn all about its history. DUFFIN: You can also follow us on Twitter and Facebook - also @planetmoney. MALONE: Bob Aschebrock spent 30 years as a USDA cheese inspector. 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There are these massive columns, and it looks like something the "Lord Of The Rings" dwarves built. Love Kansas? SNOOP DOGG: You don't buy it. Sprawling beneath 31st Street (and beyond) for more than two million square feet, the nations first subterranean business park was blasted into existence by prolific businessmen Lester Dean Sr. and Lester Dean Jr. We say blasted because in 1973, the duo expanded an existing mine on the property using what else? Youve heard about the subterranean chamber beneath the land near Worlds of Fun, right? I am currently about 35 feet underground in an old converted limestone mine that is the size of 120 football fields. And the Ronald Reagan team was stuck dealing with these caves full of cheese. So just wall-to-wall, floor-to-ceiling CALLAHAN: Floor-to-ceiling - and then as you kept filling it, you just worked your way right back out. While the government-owned cheese hoards of the 1970s and 80s are largely a thing of the past, the U.S. has still never really figured out what to do with its excess dairy. The underground industrial park known as SubTroplis opened for business in 1964 in an excavated mine below Kansas City, Mo., attracting tenants with the lure of lower energy costs and cheap rents . Do you or does someone you know work at SubTropolis? MALONE: You were hired as someone to show up with a metal ASCHEBROCK: Where you do quality checks on it. It's also mostly water, so you've got to haul it around in those, like, gas tankers. You don't do that, huh? Developed by late Kansas City Chiefs owner Lamar Hunt via Hunt Midwest Real Estate Development, Inc., it has trademarked the phrase World's Largest Underground Business Complex. Want more adventures like this? DUFFIN: Hello. (Dean Russell/Here & Now) This article is more than 4 years old. And he says getting rid of caves full of grade-A government cheese was an economically tricky issue. The two larger caves were used by the Faris family as a spring house, generator room and, a schoolhouse as well. [3] The National Archives and Records Administration also leases space for a Federal Records Center. KENNY MALONE, BYLINE: The year was 1977. Metallic, sour, whey taint, weedy, onion, barny, lipase and sulfide. The Heim family owned property all over Kansas City at the turn of the century, including breweries called Rochester and Imperial, as well as the one in East Bottoms. And in order to do. The reason why the dairy industry gets such preferential treatment is its status as this uncontested food in the diet, Wiley says. And he started floating this idea. President Jimmy Carter wanted to help the dairy farmers. The way it melts for a hamburger - there is nothing better. Make sure to come up for fresh air, as well as bangers and mash. Lets just call it tunnel vision. The block earned its name due to the number of saloons found between the Kansas-Missouri state line and Genessee Street at the turn of the century. Starting around the 1950s, investors started finding ways to use the abandoned underground space. The 55,000 sq ft underground storage facility is the world's largest underground business complex. The government was demanding an unnatural amount of milk and so farmers were supplying an unnatural amount of milk. But as Kansas Citians began to rely more on buses and their own vehicles in the 1940s and 1950s, the 8th Street tunnel ceased operations. NOVAKOVIC: Yeah. Jimmy Carter's campaign promise to help farmers in 1976 not only gave us government cheese but also milk mustaches. Born and raised Kansan, Clarisa has lived in both tiny towns and cities during their time here in the Sunflower State. honolulu police department records; spiritual meaning of the name ashley; mississippi election results 2021; charlie spring and nick nelson It dates back to a time when farmers were having a tough time in the 1920s and 30s and a growing feeling that the government should help., In the early 1900s, the growing availability of refrigerated transport allowed dairy farmers to sell their product on an unprecedented scale. And to be fair, it was processed cheese kind of like a brick of Velveeta. In 1949, the Agricultural Act first gave the Commodity Credit Corporation, a government-owned agency created to stabilize farm incomes, authority to purchase dairy products. UNIDENTIFIED REPORTER #2: A state official estimated 300,000 people will get a taste of today's cheese. Try the frozen treat that inspired Arrested Development's famous banana stand. The young people do - they say, well, I can't go out with a girl or I can't go out with a guy because I'm on the road all the time. Starting in 1995, a government nonprofit has promoted a pro-dairy policy - in direct opposition to the Department of Agriculture and government nutritionists. ASCHEBROCK: And that's what you grade. SUBSCRIBE for Every Delicious Theory! But remember; the raw ingredients were grade A cheddar cheese, some of it personally certified by Bob Aschebrock. I started in 1967 with the USDA, and I was hired as a cheese grader. Follow us on social media to add even more wonder to your day. No, it doesnt have to do with the disastrous flooding experienced there in 1903 and 1951. Layer by Layer: A Mexico City Culinary Adventure, Sacred Granaries, Kasbahs and Feasts in Morocco, Monster of the Month: The Hopkinsville Goblins, Writing the Food Memoir: A Workshop With Gina Rae La Cerva, Reading the Urban Landscape With Annie Novak, How to Grow a Dye Garden With Aaron Sanders Head, Making Scents: Experimental Perfumery With Saskia Wilson-Brown, Indigenous Desserts of Turtle Island With Mariah Gladstone, University of Massachusetts Entomology Collection, The Frozen Banana Stands of Balboa Island, The Paratethys Sea Was the Largest Lake in Earths History, How Communities Are Uncovering Untold Black Histories, The Medieval Thieves Who Used Cats, Apes, and Turtles as Accomplices, THIS ARTICLE IS ADAPTED FROM THE MAY 21, 2022, EDITION OF GASTRO OBSCURAS FAVORITE THINGS NEWSLETTER. MALONE: The Trump administration announced that in order to help farmers being hurt by Trump's tariffs, the government may be making some food purchases again. And the European Union has a long, scandalous history of accumulating butter mountains, wine lakes, and milk lakesthe latter of which consisted of vast quantities of skim milk powder housed in warehouses in Germany, Belgium, and France. Kansas City, MO 64112. Each week, KCUR's Adventure! You don't do that, huh? Many tenants at . The year was 1981, and President Ronald Reagan had a cheese problem. So they created a brand-new special program to give the cheese away through food banks. ASCHEBROCK: Will eat any cheese. Yes, that is a lot of cheese. The United States Postal Service and the United States Environmental Protection Agency lease spaces within SubTropolis, the United States Postal Service for its collectible stamp operations and the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency for their Region-7 Training and Logistics Center. Just dont forget your pillar number. Its first FRC opened in 1997 beneath Lee's Summit, and another opened in 2003 under Lenexa. SubTropolis is a ginormous man-made cave in the bluffs above the Missouri River in Kansas City. Hogwarts, who? Like Atlas Obscura and get our latest and greatest stories in your Facebook feed. [4]. There is a. ASCHEBROCK: There is a bung - what they call a bunghole up on the top. Today on the show, the story of what happened when the president of the United States decided he was going to help America's farmers by buying milk, lots of milk. NOVAKOVIC: It was pretty hard to predict that it would get as bad as it got. But what Andy Novakovic knew is that it's one thing to provide stability, it is another to step into the market in a big way at maybe the wrong time because playing with price controls is playing with fire. SubTropolis is a ginormous man-made cave in the bluffs above the Missouri River in Kansas City. NOVAKOVIC: Butter was one, nonfat dry milk and cheese - and in particular, cheddar-type cheese. Nevertheless, dairy surpluses still very much exist. Missouri Valley Special Collections, Kansas City Public Library, Kansas City, Missouri. History is a mystery. DUFFIN: In the pantheon of milk-related economic disasters, there is one that rises above the rest. This little-known cave area in Kansas is the perfect opportunity to explore something that many Kansans might not have heard of before. The Cheese Grotto isn't just about cheese storageit also allows you to age cheese at home. PublishedSeptember 7, 2018 at 7:20 AM CDT. Yeah. Sign up for our email, delivered twice a week. The surplus dairy products now in storage have a market value of $3 billion. Over the years, the industry has found all sorts of ways to get rid of its excess supplysome more insidious than others. The Missouri Penitentiary in Jefferson City is rumored to be riddled with spirits. (SOUNDBITE OF TV SHOW, "SATURDAY NIGHT LIVE"). It's got its flaws. The government would buy as much milk as it took to move that price. Springfield's "cheese caves" aren't natural caves like Fantastic Caverns or Crystal Cave. It also could have tried to send it overseas as foreign aid, like we do with other surplus commodities. I can tell you what we had to reject it for - flat, bitter, yeasty, malty, old milk, fruity MALONE: That sounds lovely. ASCHEBROCK: It was 10 times better than - I hate - you know, Velveeta is OK. (SOUNDBITE OF TV SHOW, "MARTHA AND SNOOP'S POTLUCK DINNER PARTY"). If the girl's MALONE: Government cheese also shows up in tons of songs. newsletter brings you a new way to explore the Kansas City region. Copyright 2018 NPR. We are @planetmoney. SNOOP DOGG: (Rapping) And we ghetto like a [expletive] hot buttered toast in the mornin' with some government cheese. Since 1916, when James Lewis Kraft patented American cheese, the U.S. had the technology to create a cheese product that could last for years. The Rieger family went into banking and the West Bottoms distillery was paved over. On the north edge of the complex Hunt developed the Worlds of Fun and Oceans of Fun amusement park complex. I mean, it was really, really good product. Known as the Springfield Underground, this is a cheese cave of epic proportions covering a . MALONE: Today's episode was produced by Alexi Horowitz-Ghazi, Nick Fountain and Rhaina Cohen. How would you like to work underground? Andy Novakovic is a dairy economist at Cornell University. AUDIE CORNISH, BYLINE: The White House is coming to the aid of farmers hurt by its own hard-line trade policies. SubTropolis is used by around 50 businesses and organizations, for a variety of purposes. About 3.2 acres of available space are added each year as active mining continues. And then on the other side, the government tried to replace some of their artificial demand for milk with new real demand for milk. I wonder how old some of these marks are?