Building a model tannery

My next big project is to build a tannery for my HO model railroad.  Years ago I bought the Fine Scale Miniatures tannery kit which I later decided was too silly to serve as a tannery, and so I sold it.  I have long collected old industrial books and industry postcards to assist in my modeling efforts and it seemed clear the FSM kit bore no resemblance to any of my references or anything I could find on the Internet.  I model the 1939 era so that influences the models I build.

The tannery industry is one of the oldest industries - heck, even the cavemen wore animal skins though their tanning skills were probably crude.  In the 1800s and early 1900s almost every town of any size had their own tannery.  Now there are few tanneries left in the US.  In the late 1960's my brother-in-law worked in a tannery in Maine for a while before getting a more desirable job.  Tanneries were smelly and used lots of nasty chemicals.

The postcard above shows a tannery in Endicott New York.  There is a tank car sitting on the rail spur to the tannery.  This is a much larger tannery than I intend to build.  I am now sketching out what i intend to build to fit the area available on my layout.