Sioux City History and Culture by Bicycle Part 83: Sioux City's Haunted History Part 5: KD Station

The current KD Station building, formally Midland Packing Plant and Swift Packing Plant is a haunted place. Built in 1915 as a then state of the art facility it went bankrupt shortly after opening. Swift and Co. bought the facility and used it as a packing plant. In 1949 an explosion, believed to have been caused by a gas leak killed 21 people in the plant. Sometime later Swift closed and in the 1970's the building was renaked KD Station and turned into a commercial shopping center. It had many charming shops and resteraunts such as a blues and jazz bar and a costume shop.

The hauntings are believed to be from the 21 people who lost their lives in the explosion in 1949. The owner of a former martial arts studio in the building has reported many strance occurances in the building. One is there were terrace lights that required being partially unscrewed from the sockets to be turned off. One night he unscrewed the lights part way out of their sockets to shut them off. After he shut the lights off he shut and locked the 2 doors that were required to be entered through to get into the building. Something gave him the urger to turn around and go back into the building. When he did he saw all of the lights were back on. There was no one else in the building but him. Elevators have been seen operatoing on their own with out any human interaction as well as strange noises being heard.

KD Station closed in the late 1990's/early 2000's because it is unsafe and unfit for human occupancy. In 2006 it suffered a fire from arsonists. It is now due to be torn down as soon as the city finds someone to do the asbestos abatement.

Here is a chronological history of the building:
1915 Midland Packing Plant is built. Short time later goes into receivership.
1920 Swift and Company buys building and moves in.
1949 Tragic gas explosion kills 21 workers
1974 Swift and Company moves to new facility
1975 Kermit Lohry turned building into shopping boutiques and renamed building KD Station
1976 The first shops of KD Station were opened
1977 Forty one more shops opened
Late 1990's/early 2000's Fire caused by arsonists guts a majority of interior of building. City decides to let it burn to aid in the destruction of the building.

Riding my bicycle by this building I have heard noises from inside coming through the broken windows and holes in the walls. I have heard the sounds of machinery like what one would hear from a packing plant. This is in broad daylight and with no wind blowing.

Here is some more info. and photo's:
Swift Explosion