Owners of the Globe Grain Elevator Speak Out After Fire

Current and former owners of the historic Globe Elevator site share their thoughts on the future of the structure.

SUPERIOR, Wis.- Since the 1980’s the Glove Grain Elevator had been out of use, but in 1992, it was purchased by its current owner who is devistated after hearing of his building up in flames.

“I never thought it’d affect me that much, but this is really been a large part of my life for the last 30 years. I’m really gonna miss it because it… It’s really a neat place,” Gordon Oftedahl, the current owner of the burned Globe elevator said.

Gordon gave a good portion of his life to the Globe. When he purchased the forgotten building in 1992, he saw a lot of potential for the structure and its lot.

“There was a lot of wood that we could use to grind up to sell for fuel. At the time, I didn’t realize that the wood was what it was,” Gordon said.

It was 6 million board feet of White Pine, White Oak and other rare wood species that Gordon wanted to preserve.

The wood wasn’t selling at first, which is why Gordon recruited help in 2004 when he met David Hozza.

“We found out that it was very difficult to get financed because these buildings were standing right in the middle, and the more we looked at the buildings, the more we realized that if we could reclaim and recycle the wood that people might want it,” former owner Hozza said.

Once word got out about its history, business picked up. Gordon and David hired dissembling companies to help reclaim the wood, the best coming from elevator number one.

“The head house was probably better than the other two buildings. There’s still more wood here,” Gordon said.

Turning it into anything from ceiling beams to pieces of art, distributed around the Northern Mid–West including at the DECC and UMD.

“My health has gotten a little bit bad, and I haven’t been able to do what I use to do, and I had just hired some people that were in the business that are really good at tearing it down and they’re really efficient. I had just signed a contract with them Friday, a few days before.

In just three days out of Gordon’s hands, the Old Globe and years worth of collected machinery burned until it was unusable.

What was left? About 20 thousand feet of usable wood that Gordon already sold.

“A few friends of mine asked me what I was going to do with the property when I got all the wood off,” Gordon said. “I thought this would be an ideal location for a campground and a marina.”

And at the top of the elevator tower, a recreation area with a view of Lake Superior. But Gordon doesn’t think the tower will be salvageable.

“I’m very sad about a piece of history disappearing,” Hozza said.

As for what’s left of the Globe, the site won’t be cleared until Gordon settles with the insurance company.

“This not only produced great wood, but also it represented the world’s last wooden grain elevator, and it was the largest wooden grain elevator at that. Now it’s gone,” Hozza said.

As for the direct cause of the Globe’s fire, investigators are still at work to figure that out.

The owners believe the dissembling company from Green Bay underestimated the amount of metal in the tower and the iron rod nails keeping the structure together…

Which, if made contact with their equipment, would have caused the spark that supposedly started the fire.