Old Shop Comes Down

My first not-my-parent’s-garage workshop is being torn down—the old Swift Meat Packing Building/Smith & Edwards Warehouse in Ogden. 

The Swift Building: It was already old and tired in 1986 but there was a ton of cheap space, just what was needed for setting up my first big speaker workshop—well, that and being in a part of Ogden where noise was not a problem. I was sixteen, was making good money repairing and modifying V4 and V6 outboard go-fast boats and I wanted a big space to create big speakers. I had my eye on this old warehouse for years, it was part of my childhood. My grandpa Smith had purchased the lot and two building decades earlier, he needed cheap warehouse space for his military surplus buys. In the ‘70s my dad had ran a boat shop out of the ground level of the larger of the two buildings. I loved the Swift Building, it already held tons of memories for me and for $200 a month I could get a massive amount of second story manufacturing space, in a zone where testing and sound levels didn’t matter, and it was complete with electricity. First on my list of needs, after a massive cleanup, was building the eight square foot table that my Delta saw would nest. 

Loudspeakers were a passion not my job. I was building things I wanted to use, home as well as big systems for the parties and shows I was occasionally putting on. I wasn’t interested in building systems for sale, compared to go-fast boat work there was simply no money there. That said, I quickly found that you could make good money throwing parties. The first year or so I was the only organizer and DJ, then Todd (D Todd Shepherd) moved to Ogden and we became thick as thieves. With Todd I went from a party every few months to organizing an event every weekend in the summer and fall. Those stories to come, the epic ones anyway.

I shared the space with one other, Eric Alexander. I met Eric in 1983 or 1984, he had a classified ad in the paper for some paper-cone Bose tweeters and I was hip on trying them. Sharing a passion for loudspeakers, music and sound, we became friends. Eric was there for my first big party—Buckway’s Barn. He had a great sounding Realistic battery powered mixer and good sounding Hafler amp. We had many times mused of having a big space to make loudspeaker systems out of, so when I made the deal with my grandpa I of course invited Eric, there was plenty of space for both of us. I used the space until 1989, Eric maybe through 1991. Hauling MDF and ply up to the second level became too big a pain. And there my first workshop has sat, unrented, without maintenance, abandoned, and now being demolished along with the whole of Ogden’s old Swift Building complex.

I wasn’t able to dig up any photos of the shop in its day, but here are some shots my brother Dallas and my son Ian got before demolition.

Old table for table saw—thirty plus years of abandonment.

The Design Board - Notes found in the old literature, mostly horns. Again, how it looked after being abandoned for over three decades.

Scrap Floor - likely Eric’s mess :-)

Swift Building Complex, April 2020. Left Building Second Level - Sean’s First Loudspeaker System Fab Shop

Beginning of the end, April 2020. Ground Level: Ron Hirschi’s Elephant Press (1980~1990s). Second Level: Sean’s Speaker Fab Shop (1986~1991)