Brawley Sugar Plant, California

The Brawley sugar plant in Imperial County processes beets grown in the region into sugar. Imperial County is the largest producer of sugar beets in California, and this is the largest plant in the county. The Holly Sugar company built the plant in 1947. In 1988 Holly was bought by Imperial Sugar. The Imperial Holly Corporation, as it was called, bought Spreckles in 1996, making it at the time the largest sugar processor and refiner in the country. Headquartered in Sugar Land, Texas, Imperial was named after the posh Imperial Hotel in New York, not the industrial agriculture county in California. In 2005, Imperial sold Spreckels to the Southern Beet Sugar Cooperative of Renville, Minnesota.  This plant is notable especially for the "Sea Level" marking on the silo, as much of the Imperial Valley is below sea level.