Condensery building fire March 23, 1944
Monroe Historical Society photo #423

In 1942 the old Carnation Condensery plant, which had been idle since 1928, was purchased by the Pacific Fiber Flax Association and converted to a flax processing plant to make linen. The plant had only been operating three weeks when on March 23, 1944, at 1 a.m., 600 tons of flax stored in the building ignited by spontaneous combustion. By dawn, only the concrete smokestack was left. The plant was only partially insured and never rebuilt. Today the old Monroe Shopping Center occupies the site. Because of the small size of the snapshot taken by Sue Cabe Green, it was scanned at 600 ppi and is best viewed on computer.