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Rough, rowdy times at Camp Chemical
Published October 5, 2009
Built to house construction and plant workers when Dow moved to Brazoria County, Camp Chemical’s 3,000 housing units, along with a post office, grocery, drug store, beauty parlor, barber shop, variety stores, a self-service laundry, and even a jail, formed a brand new town.
Many present-day residents of the area remember Camp Chemical as the place they or someone they knew lived until better housing was available.
Travis Snedecor, who e-mailed me with a suggestion that the history of this short-lived town would make a good column, noted this was “an amazing place” built in 31 days and housed many thousands of people during its brief lifetime. It was bulldozed to the ground after a few years.
The Camp Chemical store, described as being “as big as a city block,” stocked everything from groceries, hardware and drugs to furniture, clothing and confections.
In a Facts column called “Bill o’ Fare,” longtime Dow employee Bill Colegrove said people came from all over the county to buy groceries at the Camp Chemical store, which then was the biggest in Brazoria County.
Throughout Camp Chemical’s early days, the store also provided a convenient location for construction workers to cash their checks.
Most meals for those who lived in this complex were provided by a cafeteria that seated more than 1,000 people at a time.
While the influx of jobs and residents was a boon to local businesses, some of the efforts to provide additional services were not popular with local store owners.
In an extra edition of the Velasco World newspaper on Jan. 27, 1942, the paper first told of the planned construction of Camp Chemical and of the store to be built there.
“Contrary to popular belief, and a shock to the business interests of both Velasco and Freeport, comes the announcement that stores, commissaries, a post office, a bank, and a fire department will be provided on land just west of the proposed magnesium plant,” the paper stated.
Despite the negative reception to this, Camp Chemical did become virtually a city in itself.
A huge billboard in the post office there provided a place for people to put notices when they wanted to advertise rooms or apartments for rent, or items for sale or exchange.
Bill Colegrove wrote in his book, “Episodes: Texas Dow,” that residents of at least one barracks made their own breakfast in the mornings, using a heater in lieu of a kitchen stove.
An open gas burner was lighted inside a metal box to provide heat for the barracks, Colegrove said, but the top got hot enough that the men could use it to fry eggs, heat water for coffee and even heat a can of beans.
Entertainment was part of the package for Camp Chemical residents. The facility had its own ballpark, and the cafeteria not only served meals, but also provided a place for women’s clubs to meet and for people to socialize.
Big dance bands from Houston played every Friday and Saturday night for dances, Colegrove said, adding the crowds there “were large and boisterous” as the construction workers let down their hair on weekends, and were joined by numbers of lonely soldiers.
“The policemen were few and the crowds got pretty tempestuous,” with frequent fights both inside and out, and occasional episodes of gunshots fired, Colegrove said.
He noted that “The dances were a big draw for people, even outside of Camp Chemical.” Many of them walked all the way from Velasco to attend.
Owned and operated by the Defense Plant Corporation, Camp Chemical contained 44 barracks in addition to its 3,000 “cottages,” and was the largest town in Brazoria County. During its heyday it was the only such enterprise in the world.
Officials reported construction of the facility began Feb. 21, 1942. The first meal was served in the cafeteria March 29, and the project was opened to the public April 23.
Tarver Snedecor recalls that for a time Camp Chemical boasted a population of 12,000. This was when the Brazoria County cities that now are its largest had far fewer inhabitants.
At that time, he says, Lake Jackson was “just the name of an oxbow lake out in the woods” and Pearland was “merely a crossroad going toward South Houston.”
In Dan Kessner’s book, “Memories of the Brazosport Area in the 1940s & ’50s,” Nadine Webb Ainsworth recalls that her family, including her parents, herself and two brothers, came here in 1940 from East Texas, and moved into a small, box-like residence at Camp Chemical.
“We had to use a community store,” in which many of the items to be purchased required ration stamps, as well as money, she remembered.
“We also had to share a common bath house and wash house. Also at this time, no such refinement as spraying for mosquito control was known, so we had to endure black clouds of mosquitoes.”
She said, “Anyone who has not seen mosquitoes in such quantities can never really understand the mosquito invasion from the salt grass in the area.”
Little relief was available from all the insect bites, she said.
Ainsworth also remembers frequent rains, which added to the discomforts in an area that was “mostly mud and shell,” making it difficult to keep things clean.
The camp participated in “black outs,” in which residents practiced in case World War II led to an enemy attack, a particular concern since Dow was among the industries that produced materials for the military, and was considered a prime target.
Ainsworth’s father was an air raid warden charged with enforcing the blackout rules, and she remembers he often walked the levees at night to make certain no one was turning on lights that could be used by enemy planes to target the area.
Because of the identical rows of houses along each of the shell streets in Camp Chemical, finding your way home could be a problem, even for residents.
“Many unwary individuals who thought they knew where they were spent lots of time wandering the streets looking for their destination,” she said.
Ainsworth considered her family’s stay at Camp Chemical “hard times,” which lasted until they were finally able to move to a “real house” — a bigger place with its own bathroom — on Ninth Street.
Next week: Newcomers face shock, learn to adapt.
Marie Beth Jones, a published author and freelance writer based in Angleton, is chairwoman of the Brazoria County Historical Commission.
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