[Amanda] On July 2 1918, an explosion would rock a munitions plant just outside of Syracuse, New York, that had been essential to the Allies victory in World War I. The explosion would take the lives of dozens of men and nearly took out the city of Syracuse in the process. The true cause for the explosion is still a mystery and (Onondaga Historical Society, 2018) (Onondaga Historical Society, 2018; Onondaga Historical Society, 2019)quarry site, now abandoned, is considered to be a hotspot for paranormal activity. I’m Amanda Morgan, and this is New York’s Dark Side. 

[Intro Music]

[Amanda] I want to give a huge shout out to the Onondaga Historical Society and the late historian and Split Rock expert Richard Miller. The lectures that were given on Split Rock Quarry, which are available on YouTube were the major source material used for this episode. I’ll link to the channel in the show notes and the webpage for this episode.

[Amanda] I had never heard of Split Rock Quarry until doing a search for paranormal locations in New York. It’s been a bit since I’ve covered the paranormal. What I wasn’t expecting was to find this gem of history only a little more than an hour’s drive from my house. We’ll be diving deep into the history of the Quarry, and there was a lot more that I could have added, so if you interested in diving deeper into the quarry, check out the lectures on YouTube from the Onondaga Historical Society that I mentioned. Richard Miller also wrote a couple of books on Split Rock. They were limited print editions, and it looks like a few of them are out of print, but you may be able to still find them on e-bay or another source. With that, let’s dive into it. 

[Amanda] The settlement of Split Rock was established by Irish immigrants in the 1700s. The name of Split Rock Quarry stuck for a few reasons. First, French-Canadians that lived in the nearby settlement of Rockville that were working in the early quarries where the larger Split Rock Quarry would eventually become were reminded of a Split Rock that they would pass on their way from Canada. They would pass an area where the Hudson River split two hills, in Split Rock there was a gully with a bit of stream through it that split two mountains of stone. One of the two ‘mountains’ in the Quarry would be named Canada hill. Split Rock is also a quarry term, so between the two the name stuck for the quarry. Split Rock Quarry originally started out as a limestone quarry in 1796. Some of its major contributions at that time was building the original Erie Canal, as well as several other locks and canals in the state and even provided a stone for the Washington Monument. The quarry itself was active for a century before being repurposed by another company. 

[Amanda]  One interesting sidebar before going on was that the site of Split Rock Quarry had some historical significance in botany. Frederick Pursh, a German botanist would find the American Hart’s-Tongue Fern on July 20, 1807. The fern had never been recorded before and reminded him of a similar fern in Europe. The fern has long leaves that resemble a tongue shape, inspiring the name. The ‘hart’, spelt H-A-R-T is the red-stag of medieval times so- basically a tongue of a stag. To save the fern, they had tried re-locating it to other areas in the state, though it sounds like that may not have worked the best and the plant was on the endangered list for a long time. It was thought to have only been in this small area of New York, but they did find another colony in Chittenango, and more recently found large colonies of it in Minnesota so it’s been taken off the endangered list. So, there’s a little bit of history for any plant enthusiasts who listen. I’m a terrible real life gardener, I often joke that I have a black thumb. I can’t keep succulents alive, but I am proud to say that my Sim self-evolved some potatoes to magnificent quality this morning so there is that. Okay, enough sidebar. 

[Amanda] I’ve said this before, but one of the things that I have loved about doing this podcast is that as I am researching, I’ve come across other things that I need to research, and researching this episode did not disappoint. In one of the video lectures on Split Rock, Rick Miller alludes to the Fyler family. In the early days of Split Rock, the Fyler family was one of the later of the early settlers coming in the 1800s. They ran a company story which was the center of the community and Fyler quarry. He has a picture of the children of Byron Fyler in front of the General Store. Byron’s father was involved in the sudden death of his wife. So, I’m going to have to investigate that because the way it was presented seemed like a significant piece of the local history and I was able to find a book on it so of course I ordered that and now it’s on my reading list.  Expect that story sometime in the future. 

[Amanda]  Back to the quarry itself. Semet-Solvay Company was a Belgian company that made chemicals. In the 1860’s Belgian chemist Ernest Solvay developed the modern form of producing sodium carbonate, also known as soda ash, which is used today in a large number of manufacturing processes such as glass, lithium-ion batteries, food and pharmaceuticals. The two ingredients for this are salt brine and limestone. The lectures I watched on the Onondaga Historical Society’s YouTube channel went more in depth with how this worked, so if you’re interested in finding out more about that, I’ve linked them in the show notes and on the webpage for this episode, but I won’t bore everyone with the details. The whole process is far beyond me, but he did a really good job of explaining it. The Solvay’s would license two Americans, William B. Cogswell and Rowland Hazard to produce soda ash in the US, and they would partner them to start the Solvay Process Company in 1884 and they built their production plant in what is now Solvay, NY which is a bit northwest from the quarry. As time went on the company started to move things closer to the quarry. 

[Amanda]  TNT started to be produced by Split Rock Quarry in 1900. By 1907, a picric acid plant was relocated to Split Rock Quarry to help protect the process of making the chemical from competitors. They wanted it in a more isolated spot to help ensure their patents were safe. This will come back into play later in the story. Picric acid was used by France, Italy, and England in World War I. It was used in bombs and grenades. Working with Picric Acid was an extremely dangerous job, and it also sounds kind of gross. There was a Picric Acid plant in Yellowstone where 18 women had been hired to do the packing, the public called the workers the “Yellowstone girls” because working with the picric acid would turn their skin yellow. They were also known as canaries or powder girls, either way, it sounds like you could easily tell what they were doing. This was an extremely dangerous job because Picric Acid is highly explosive, there was a high amount of dust that would result from the process of packing. If anything that was iron oxide in nature touched the dust, it would explode. There was a Picric Acid plant that had a plumbing issue, and when the plumber came to fix the problem, the whole plant exploded when his wrench touched the dust on the pipe needing repair. According to Richard Miller, you could see where Split Rock Quarry was from a few miles away since there was a constantly a yellow cloud over it due to the Picric Acid production. 

[Amanda]  Also produced at Split Rock Quarry was poison gases. It’s unclear where the poison gases were stored, it wasn’t at the Split Rock site… If I wasn’t already on a couple watch lists, I probably ended up on some researching this episode. 

[Amanda]  On July 28, 1914, World War I began and because of this the Semet-Solvay Company would establish an ammunition facility in Split Rock Quarry in 1915. By 1918 about 2,500 people were working in the facility. The munitions factory at Split Rock was instrumental to the first world war, which I had no idea about. It was a bit mind blowing to me that this piece of history was only a little over an hour’s drive from my home. Most of the people working at Split Rock Quarry were either older than 50 or as young as 13-14 years old since most of the men in the area had joined the war. Several of the foremen were in their teenage years.  

[Amanda] Due to the war and to the nature of what was being produced there, Split Rock Quarry was highly protected with perimeter fences and watch towers guarded by men armed with automatic weapons to help prevent theft and sabotage. So obviously, for fun children in the area would put together dummies stuffed with things like straw and cloth. They would then head out to Split Rock Quarry and throw the mannequins on the perimeter fence near the watch towers, then yell to the guards that someone was trying to enter the compound to get the guards to react and shoot the dummies. 

[Amanda] Semet-Solvay had also employed some Pinkerton men to help protect the company secrets. I feel like I’ve come across the Pinkerton’s before, but I don’t believe I’ve done a deep dive into them, so here’s my rabbit hole for the day. A man named Alan Pinkerton immigrated to Chicago in 1842 and though he had no prior experience, he would end up having a tremendous impact in the history of law enforcement… He started out making barrels but around 1847 while searching for lumber on an island in the Fox River, he came across a group of counterfeiters and decided to do some surveillance on them. After gaining more information about them and their movements, he reported what he found to the police, becoming a local hero. There was so much publicity from the arrests that he became inundated with people calling him for help with other things. He became Chicago’s first police detective and worked as an agent for the United States Postal Service. Not long after that, in 1850 he would open the Pinkerton National Detective Agency. By the late 1850’s the company was making a name for itself through its work not only rooting out criminals but also with the private security work they were completing for the railroad companies. The Pinkerton company created a logo you may be familiar with- a large unblinking eye- and a slogan ‘We Never Sleep- which led to the nickname ‘private eye’ for detectives. In 1856, the Pinkerton Agency would hire its first female investigator, a woman name Kate Warne. She was a master at undercover work. I’m not going to deep dive into her right now, but she sounds amazing and maybe I’ll do a bonus episode on her sometime. Among one amazing feat that she did was help the Pinkerton Agency possibly thwart an assassination attempt on Abraham Lincoln. Alan Pinkerton had allegedly discovered the plot while investigating rumors that there were plans to sabotage the rail lines near Washington DC. Pinkerton had heard that there were plans to try to assassinate Lincoln on a planned train switch as part of his tour in Baltimore. Pinkerton, working with several other agents including Kate Warne acted quickly. They disguised Abraham Lincoln and posed him as the invalid brother of Kate Warne and had him secretly board an overnight train that passed through Baltimore several hours ahead of his published schedule. He arrived safely, but there was a lot of criticism that Lincoln didn’t stick to his schedule. There were also not any arrests of would-be assassins leading to some speculation that the plot was either highly exaggerated or completely made up. At this point we’ll never know. Anyway, to tie this up, Kate Warne became so valuable to the Pinkerton Agency that when she died in 1868- which sidenote, she was young, I think only 35 at that point… Alan Pinkerton had her buried in his family plot. The Pinkerton Detective Agency would have the first national database for criminals, creating the mugshot and keeping track of them with their “Rogue’s Gallery”. They have a lot of other contributions too, but I think it’s time to get back to our story. 

[Amanda] Semet-Solvay would end up buying up a lot of property around Split Rock in 1916 to build a railway to help bring the explosives out. A lot of the land around that area was owned by farmers who didn’t want explosives being shipped through their land. The city of Syracuse didn’t want Semet-Solvay to use the trolly system that was already established, obviously to prevent explosives going through the city. They would end up building a railway system in a different area. 

[Amanda] You’re probably wondering… when are we getting to the explosion?? Well we’re here, let’s do it. There actually was an explosion prior to 1918. The first explosion at Split Rock Quarry happened on February 18, 1916. Semet-Solvay company had hired an underqualified chemist to run the company sometime around December 1915. The chemist decided that he could easily double the production of TNT by just doubling the batches, except he neglected to account for the additional fuel and pressure that would be produced by doing this. Due to the increased pressure, a tank would explode, throwing five men through the brick walls of the building. Due to the weather at the time, being February, it was very difficult for first responders to try to get to the factory to try to help the men. One of the men who died was working his first night in the factory, the other man had only been there a few weeks. 

[Amanda] The explosion in 1918 occurred for a different reason, it started in part because of a fire. Fire was not uncommon at Split Rock Quarry, according to Richard Miller they happened every couple of days and the men were well prepared to deal with them. They had fire drills frequently. There were gravity water tanks on site for them to have good access to water to douse the flames. But one very important thing that the company had skimped out on was sprinklers. The building that the fire started in on July 2, 1918, per state regulations at the time should have had sprinklers due to its height. The building was truly three stories high, but the company had managed to get it classified as a one-story building. The building was very open, instead of having different floors, there were catwalks for the second and third levels of the building. The company would tell the state that the workers didn’t go up there and that was basically how they had gotten around the sprinklers. Had there been sprinklers, it’s likely that the tragedy that was about to ensue would not have happened. The production of TNT in this building meant that there were constantly explosive fumes in the building as well. So, on the night of July 2, 1918, it’s believed that what started the fire was an overheated gear in a grinding machine- though there would be prevailing rumors of other causes which we will get to in a little bit. The building was not attended at the time, but the workers quickly became of the fire and got to work trying to extinguish it with hoses around 8:30 pm. The fire would quickly spread to the structure of the building becoming out of control. To add to the problems that the workers were having trying to put this fire out, they began to have issues with the water pressure. The water pressure issues would lead to a lot of speculation later that the explosion was due to sabotage, because there were conflicts in the reporting as to when the water pressure issues started. The issues with the water pressure occurred because they had multiple hoses attached pulling from the same water source so while they didn’t lose water pressure, they lost Nossal pressure which meant that the water wasn’t shooting out as far as it had been. The men are told to then run for their lives. They valiantly fought the fire for as long as they could because there was a very real concern that it would spread to the picric acid production buildings and across the gully to Canada Hill where they had the production buildings for poison gases, and if that exploded a poison gas cloud could descend upon Syracuse. 

[Amanda[ I mentioned that the water pressure concerns lead to a lot of speculation about sabotage being the reasons for the explosion. Richard Miller goes in to a quite a bit of detail regarding that in the lecture, which to be honest I found it a bit confusing so I’m just going to tell you what I got out of it. My understanding of what he reported in the lecture is that the reporting the followings days in the press of the events were based on timestamps from daylight’s savings time. The company did not follow daylight savings time, so their records of the event have different timestamps to when things occurred. So, the 8:30 start of the fire documented by the company… was 7:30 for the press. So, to the public it looked like there was this huge delay in things when there wasn’t.

[Amanda] One of the people who had observed the explosion would later describe seeing a mushroom shaped cloud. There is a possibility that there was work being doing on radioactive material as well at the Split Rock Munitions factory as there was some early work being done on the makings for an atomic bomb. 

[Amanda] Dr Alice Hamilton had visited Split Rock Quarry, she worked for the state government. She had reported that Split Rock was incredibly safe, due to the fact that the vats were covered. There was a predominant theory early on that a spark had fallen into a vat of TNT which had caused the fire. The theory came about to give people a quick answer into what had happened to cause the tragedy. 

[Amanda] Immediately following the explosion, an inquest was called to investigate which including District Attorney Walrath, Coroner Crane, John Wilson a stenographer, and then Martin Doyle- Senior Chief Engineer, H. Duane Bruce- Senior Attorney who both worked for Semet-Solvay company. Coroner Crane was the lead on the investigation. They wanted to know what started the fire, what caused the explosion, and what caused the men’s deaths. They would end up having about 700 pages of documentation into the investigation, but they spent most of their time trying to identify what led to the fire, and that is truly still up for debate even though there are theories. At the end of the inquest, they would announce that the company should have had sprinklers. They would also conclude that there wasn’t a spark that caused the fire, but organic material had fallen into the vat. They would spend the summer trying to prove that. 

[Amanda] There were multiple other investigations into the explosion, led by the military, the government, the fire marshals, and all of these went on simultaneously.   When TNT building number one exploded, it would fly up into the air and would come down on the Picric Acid building. This would cause a second smaller explosion after the initial explosion. There was subsequently much smaller explosion as vats of the TNT blew up due to the heat of the fires. 

[Amanda]  The day following the explosion, Semet-Solvay would announce that they had been setting off explosives and that was what blew up the plant. It seemed like this was initially done intentionally, because on July 1st, the government had started taking over TNT plants, and companies began threatening to blow up their plants to protect their processes. The Semet-Solvay would later clarify that they weren’t trying to blow up their plant intentionally, they were trying to create a fire break to protect the rest of the buildings. This backfired, because it blew out towards the North, which took out all their administrative buildings and their laboratory, where all their documents were kept including their patents. When the firebreak explosion occurred, there were still men working in the area laying down hoses. The men who had been standing working on the hose all died. There was one man who had been leaning down working on the connections, and he ended up surviving. If the firebreak explosion had been ordered by the company, they never warned the workers of the impending explosion. 

[Amanda] In July of 1918, the Syracuse Journal reported that the district attorney had testimony from workers that three men had sabotaged the plan and that those three men ‘are or were’ workers for the company, so it was an inside job. In August, there was a report for the Syracuse Journal that those men may be charged with manslaughter and would get the maximum wartime sentence. The DA’s record for this does still exist at the Onondaga County courthouse but it is contaminated with asbestos. But a copy of it was sent to the United State Attorney General’s office. I’m not sure when that was but I’m interested to see if anything ever comes out of it. 

[Amanda] There was also a prevailing theory that the German’s had caused the explosion. The archives of the accounts of what happened at Split Rock that were published in the Syracuse Journal disappeared from the library. Not only the reading copy but the backup copies.  60 men officially on the record as dead due to the explosion. Initial reporting had 65 dead with 50 injured. They were able to get counts early on because they did multiple role calls. Though there would later be confusion regarding how many people were missing after the explosion which we will get to a little later. 

[Amanda] Two of the men killed were Pinkerton men, and this is a bit sad because their remains were switched for a period of time. A man named Crowley from Watertown New York was shipped home and his mother had buried him. A week later, Coroner Crane came to her door and told her that she had been given the wrong body, and the man she had buried was another Pinkerton man with the last name of Baxter. So, he needed to exhume him, and his remains returned to the morgue. It wasn’t just factory workers that were killed in the explosion. There were government workers, researchers, and at least one soldier whose name was on the roster at Split Rock, but his body was never found. Just incredibly sad.

[Amanda] Confusion ensued with how many men were missing after the explosion because people were giving fictitious names of employees trying to get into the morgue to view the bodies. The paper had interviewed men who were bringing their dates… to the morgue… to view horribly dismembered bodies. I’m sorry, but that does not sound like my idea of a good time. That’s going to be a no from me. 

[Amanda]  Over 100 men were injured or missing. There’s no record of how many of the injured died because of the explosion after the fact, either related to injuries or from inhalation of the toxic gases that resulted from the explosion.  On the railroad tracks near the plant, 8 Winchester rifles were found abandoned. The Syracuse Journal would report that there were still 8 missing men that they needed to find when the vats cooled down enough for them to search for them, however the coroner refused to take them because he had 50 bodies already. So they would end up finding their remains and putting them in duffle bags along the ledge at Split Rock. 

[Amanda]  There are reports that you can still find parts of the workers from the explosion today.  There was also one man who tried to fake his own death, and his widow was awarded damages. This man fled to California and by pure coincidence, someone who worked with him at Split Rock Quarry ran into him there while they were looking for a job and reported him. So, he ended up getting caught. It’s a small world. To this day, there are still 15 unidentified sets of remains from the Split Rock explosion. The 15 unidentified were buried in a single grave at Morningside Cemetery in Malone, New York. They had a funeral ceremony with a Rabbi, Catholic Priest, and Protestant Minister to try to cover everything for them. There’s also a memorial at the Cemetery with the names of the deceased workers. The man who faked his death was caught before the memorial was placed, so his name does not appear on the memorial in case you were wondering. 

[Amanda]  One other really sad fact is that Semet-Solvay company didn’t carry workers compensation even though it was law. The Company had to pay damages to widows, which ended up being a ridiculous amount of money. 6 dollars a week plus an additional 2 dollars a week if the widow had a child. These payments did not fall into an inflation clause either, so they just remained as they were without being adjusted as time went on. The families also had to cover their own funeral expenses for their loved ones. If a widow remarried, the payments stopped. I ran the conversion for $8 in 1918 and it equates to $166.39/week in US dollars for 2024 for a woman and child. I know that the cost of living and everything was vastly different in 1918 compared to now, but that does not seem like enough for a woman to live on and raise children. If I’m wrong someone please let me know. 

[Amanda] After the TNT factory explosion, the company continued to produce Picric Acid and other materials at Split Rock Quarry for the duration of World War I. The site then was bought by the State of New York and used as a site for the Department of Transportation until the 1980’s. While it's still in part owned by the state, the site is abandoned except for those who choose to hike, bike, or otherwise explore the area. It also seems to be a popular spot for parties, judging by the obvious signs of fire pits and abandoned beer bottles and other litter. My dad and I went to explore back in May, I’ve posted pictures from our visit on the webpage for this episode and on our social media pages. The site is said to be haunted. Unfortunately, we didn’t experience any paranormal activity, but I will say that the site is heavy with the history that happened there. The only thing still standing is the old stone crusher, which is covered from top to bottom with various graffiti. There are other signs of what once was around the site, with remnants of bricks and metal fastenings among the rocks and weeds. Some visitors to the area have reported hearing voices and footsteps, or even hearing the engine of the old stone crusher revving. There have also been reports of spirits in green or yellow hues from the chemicals that were produced here. If you choose to explore the area, or maybe conduct your own paranormal investigation, watch your step and enjoy a piece of New York History.

[Amanda] With that, I am going to close out today’s episode with a reminder to check out our website for all source material and for all the photos both historical and from my visit there a while back. You’ll also find the YouTube lectures from the Onondaga Historical Society, presented by the late Richard Miller. I think this a good plug also to check out your local historical society or history museum if you have one, and if you do, let me know what you found that surprised you. As always, please make sure you are following the show on your podcast platform of choice, and I am incredibly grateful for a rating, review, and a share to help others find our community. Wishing you all a great week ahead and I hope you stay curious!