Before that, he was a reporter for WNYC's Only Humanpodcast. UNIDENTIFIED REPORTER #2: A state official estimated 300,000 people will get a taste of today's cheese. At Kanopolis park, near the lake of the same name, there's a short trail from a parking area that leads you through the brush into a clearing. You'll receive your first newsletter soon! (SOUNDBITE OF FREDERIC AUGER'S "SUNBURN"). His creation, SubTropolis, is the largest of the underground facilities with nearly 6 million square feet of industrial space for lease. USCIS opened its National Records Center in a cave in Lee's Summit, Missouri, in 1999. Limestone mine in the bluffs above the Missouri River in Kansas City, MO, US, Learn how and when to remove this template message, United States Environmental Protection Agency, National Archives and Records Administration, "SubTropolis | Industrial Space for Lease in Kansas City", "Bloomberg.com 2015-02-04 Welcome to Subtropolis The Business Complex Buried Under Kansas City", "Archives.gov 2018-02-26 Kansas City, MO Federal Records Center", SubTropolis Technology Center home site (Hunt Midwest), https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=SubTropolis&oldid=1140599869, Buildings and structures in Kansas City, Missouri, Articles lacking in-text citations from January 2020, Short description is different from Wikidata, Wikipedia cave articles with unreferenced coordinates, Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike License 3.0, This page was last edited on 20 February 2023, at 21:12. Every weekday we compile our most wondrous stories and deliver them straight to you. MALONE: You were hired as someone to show up with a metal ASCHEBROCK: Where you do quality checks on it. Specifically, the federal government had 560 million pounds of cheese, most of it stored in vast subterranean storage facilities. But I am in favor of giving farmers an equal break. You just have to follow us on Instagram. MALONE: The Trump administration announced that in order to help farmers being hurt by Trump's tariffs, the government may be making some food purchases again. The caves were largely abandoned after the city's building boom stopped, Hasan said. Government cheese arrived at our home in enormous uncut yellow blocks wrapped in white nondescript cardboard. It is huge. Westons downtown district was established in 1837, so theres a lot of history here. Weve written about the 8th Street Tunnel before, and who can blame us? Expand All. Long situated in a warehouse-style facility far from the major business district of Kansas . It was ready to start buying cheese. Last year, the U.S. produced nearly 12 billion pounds of cheese -- an all-time high, according to the USDA. Kenny Malone hails from Meadville, PA where the zipper was invented, where Clark Gables mother is buried and where, in 2007, a wrecking ball broke free from a construction site, rolled down North Main Street and somehow wound up inside the trunk of a Ford Taurus sitting at a red light. MALONE: So this leaves a couple of options. DUFFIN: The USDA figured out that if they paid about 39 bucks for a 40-pound block of cheese, then it would have this ripple effect. And though OMalleys looks normal from the outside, the inside tells another story. The Missouri River town is known for its charming main drag and castle-like college, Park University. MALONE: But this is America. The surplus dairy products now in storage have a market value of $3 billion. To the cheese cave. The mine naturally maintains temperatures between 65 and 70 F year-round, making it a great space for a lot of different types of businesses. That doesn't look great. Word is the tunnel sustained water damage, so time will tell if it sees the light of day. To do so, however, required a serious upfront investment. The government eventually tired of being involved in this . Kraft Cheese Cave, Springfield. There are literally train tracks leading into it. MALONE: And you can taste all of those things in a piece of cheese? It is more than a food that. When the Trump administration decided to pay subsidies to farmers hurt by trade, it reminded NPR's Planet Money podcast team about the time another president tried to help farmers. Kenny Malone has the epic tale of government cheese. DUFFIN: OK. UNIDENTIFIED REPORTER: A state official estimated 300,000 people will get a taste of today's cheese. But this was not putting even a dent in the surplus. But milk doesn't store well, so the government bought other dairy products. MALONE: One of the ways Carter proposed giving farmers an equal break was to raise the price of milk by about 6 cents per gallon, which was kind of a lot at the time. There was an incredible press conference where Agriculture Secretary John Block went before reporters and held up a giant hunk of cheese like it was a national emergency. Behold the power of cheese. That was pretty good. He says the government was buying powdered milk, butter and cheddar cheese - only grade-A cheddar, though. No, it doesnt have to do with the disastrous flooding experienced there in 1903 and 1951. The cheesy story all started in 1949, when the Agricultural Act of 1949 gave the Commodity Credit Corporation, a government-owned corporation dedicated to stabilizing farm incomes, the authority. ASCHEBROCK: I'm not running down Velveeta, but I'll tell you, the government processed loaf was 10 times - 100 times better. In addition, the Federal Government will spend $40 million to $50 million this year to transport even more dairy . Cave Tours Missouri, long known as the "Cave State," has almost 6,400 caves, and Missouri State Parks showcases four of the best for public tours. Make sure to come up for fresh air, as well as bangers and mash. Anyway, the government had its plan in place. It can fit a train car. MALONE: And then within five years, the government was spending billions of dollars filling caves with cheese that they could not get rid of fast enough. Heap the flour on your countertop and make a well in the center. All rights reserved. ASCHEBROCK: Will eat any cheese. We don't do milk quotas - no Lever 1. Weve looked and looked at ways to deal with this, but the distribution problems are incredible, a USDA official was quoted as saying. ASCHEBROCK: It was 10 times better than - I hate - you know, Velveeta is OK. SubTropolis is used by around 50 businesses and organizations, for a variety of purposes. SubTropolis is a 55,000,000-square-foot (5,100,000 m 2), 1,100-acre (4.5 km 2) artificial cave in the bluffs above the Missouri River in Kansas City, Missouri, United States, that is claimed to be the world's largest underground storage facility.Developed by late Kansas City Chiefs owner Lamar Hunt via Hunt Midwest Real Estate Development, Inc., it has trademarked the phrase World's Largest . 's homemade newspaper, Neighborhood News. The second lesson is you got to pay attention to the unintended consequences because they can come back and bite you and bite you hard. Starting in 1995, a government nonprofit has promoted a pro-dairy policy - in direct opposition to the Department of Agriculture and government nutritionists. When maple syrup supplies run low, Canada taps into its strategic reserve. Buoyed by items like Wendys dual Double Melt sandwich concept and Taco Bells steak quesadilla, the organization helped boost cheese sales by more than 30 million pounds. The complex contains almost 7 miles of illuminated, paved roads and several miles of railroad track. NOVAKOVIC: Well, I think there's two basic lessons. It was a big enough number that it sounded like one of these campaign promises that you really didn't expect they would actually fulfill. Jimmy Carter's campaign promise to help farmers in 1976 not only gave us government cheese but also milk mustaches. ASCHEBROCK: But then we had the issue of storing the stuff. And though the world may not imagine Kansas City as big in the underground scene our ever-expanding streetcar system still operates where the sun shines the limestone around these parts was shaped by glaciers and rivers and makes for good mining. Offer subject to change without notice. MALONE: This is one of those slow-moving train wrecks that you can see coming from a mile away. An eye-opening journey through the history, culture, and places of the culinary world. China props up pork prices by buying surplus for its frozen pork reserve. NOVAKOVIC: So you can imagine, you know, you don't just kind of roll down one of these barrels down Seventh Avenue in New York City and say, anybody want some cheese? They also house a massive frozen-food storage complex, a paintball business, and a US Postal Service facility that stores and distributes new stamps. So the clever folks at USDA said, what if we went down the supply chain one step NOVAKOVIC: And looked at dairy products that are storable? No purchase necessary. MALONE: Within five years, the government was storing two pounds of cheese for every single American citizen. The government tiptoed back into the cheese business in 2019 when the Trump administration said it was using the CCC program again to provide large subsidies to offset the effects of its trade. +44 (0)7540 787812 frances@constructionandbuildingphotography.com. MALONE: One part of the solution then was to gently get that milk supply down. In 2003 the Archives opened an underground FRC facility in Lenexa, Kansas. We hope so. Blackwell Motors showcases a variety of fiberglass animals, and people come from all around just to see them. Want more adventures like this? DUFFIN: But the problem, Andy says, was that a lot of this was not easy-to-give-away cheese. Hunt's extensive business dealings in Clay County contributed to the Chiefs having their NFL Training Camp at William Jewell College in Liberty, Missouri until 1991. As we unloaded the caves full of this stuff, government cheese started to show up everywhere - food banks and schools, military mess halls. The second lesson is you got to pay attention to the unintended consequences because they can come back and bite you and bite you hard. This one-of-a-kind display showcases a wide variety of hair art, historic hair pieces, and more. MALONE: And so our country has a tradition of programs to help farmers. Yeah. Government cheese, as the orange blocks of commodity cheese came to be called, wasnt exactly popular with all of its recipients. The Trump administration says today it will make an estimated $12 billion in government assistance available. Government buys more cheese. Roanoke Cave . Follow us on social media to add even more wonder to your day. This was generally the approach that we would use to support other kinds of farm industries. This little-known cave area in Kansas is the perfect opportunity to explore something that many Kansan's might not have heard of before. It was built by a German immigrant named John Georgian, who instead of relying on those trusty limestone caves weve come to know and love dug out his own brewery space beneath Weston. DAN CALLAHAN: No, I've never thought about it. MALONE: Yeah. Follow us on Twitter to get the latest on the world's hidden wonders. Well, its called SubTropolis, is owned by Hunt Midwest yes, the same Hunt family that owns the Kansas City Chiefs and is wide enough to hold 42 Arrowhead Stadiums. Theres even a train track winding through the colossal complex, and many, many exit signs. Production has increased 3% in the past year, and 29% in the last decade. KENNY MALONE, BYLINE: The year was 1977. CALLAHAN: So it'd be all the way to the ceiling. Onandaga Cave is one of the most gorgeous underground places in Missouri. The government would buy as much milk as it took to move that price. I dont even need a coat in the winter.. Turns out, cave living is naturally energy efficient. Besides those already mentioned, other businesses include Cerner, NextPage, Hallmark Cards, Hantover, Clore Automotive, and Knapheide. Jimmy Carter was running for president. In fact, it has trademarked the phrase Worlds Largest Underground Business Complex. It was developed by late Kansas City Chiefs owner Lamar Hunt via Hunt Midwest Real Estate Development, Inc. Read on to learn more about the largest underground business complex in Missouri. $20.00 per adult Kansas City Segway Tour: Art and Glide 80 Recommended Segway Tours from $69.00 per adult SEA LIFE Kansas City Aquarium Admission Ticket 66 Aquariums from $23.65 per adult Kansas City Crossroads Art District and Westside Urban Hike 17 Recommended Adventure Tours from $39.00 per adult Strawberry Hill and Downtown KCK Hike 12 (Shouting) Government cheese. Sign up for notifications from Insider! Sign up for our email, delivered twice a week.