This article is about the Chicago meatpacking company. For the decorative arts firm founded by William Morris, see Morris & Co.

Morris & Co.

Morris, Marshall, Faulkner & Co. and its successor Morris & Co. were furnishings and decorative arts manufacturers and retailers founded by the Pre-Raphaelite artist and designer William Morris...

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Morris and Company, whose president was Edward Morris

Edward Morris

Edward Morris was President of Morris & Company, one of the three main meat-packing companies in Chicago. In 1890, he married Helen Swift a member of one of the other big three meat-packing families. Their daughter Muriel became a renowned psychiatrist.As president of Morris and Company, Edward...

, was one of several meatpacking companies in Chicago

Chicago

Chicago is the largest city in the US state of Illinois. With nearly 2.7 million residents, it is the most populous city in the Midwestern United States and the third most populous in the US, after New York City and Los Angeles...

, Illinois

Illinois

Illinois is the fifth-most populous state of the United States of America, and is often noted for being a microcosm of the entire country. With Chicago in the northeast, small industrial cities and great agricultural productivity in central and northern Illinois, and natural resources like coal,...

, and in South Omaha, Nebraska

South Omaha, Nebraska

South Omaha, Nebraska is a former city and current district of Omaha, Nebraska. During its initial development phase the town's nickname was "The Magic City" because of the seemingly overnight growth due to the rapid development of the Union Stockyards. Annexed by the City of Omaha in 1915, the...

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In 1902, it agreed to merge with the other two (Armour & Company and Swift & Company

Swift & Company

Swift & Company is an American food procession company a wholly owned subsidiary of JBS S.A. , a Brazilian company that is the world's largest processor of fresh beef and pork, with more than US$30 billion in annual sales as of 2010. It is also the largest beef processor in Australia.Swift &...

) to form a giant corporation called the National Packing Company. Conceived primarily as a holding company, National Packing soon began buying up smaller meat companies, such as G. H. Hammond and Fowler.

Between 1904 and 1910, National Packing acquired 23 stockyards and slaughtering plants nationwide, which gave it control over about one-tenth of U.S. meat production. The company owned branches in over 150 cities around the world, along with a fleet of 2,600 refrigerated railcars.

Starting in 1905, the constituent companies in National Packing were targeted by Arba Seymour Van Valkenburgh

Arba Seymour Van Valkenburgh

Arba Seymour Van Valkenburgh , was an American jurist who served as a Judge of the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Eighth Circuit.-Early years:...

 under the Elkins Act

Elkins Act

The Elkins Act is a 1903 United States federal law that amended the Interstate Commerce Act of 1887. The Elkins Act authorized the Interstate Commerce Commission to impose heavy fines on railroads that offered rebates, and upon the shippers that accepted these rebates. The railroad companies were...

. Pressure from U.S. government regulators forced the dissolution of National Packing in 1912, leaving the structure of the American meat industry about the same as it had been before 1902.