Recognizing the profits of mass production, Carnegie hired engineers to streamline and mechanize the steel making process so that it ran with thousands and
thousands of unskilled workers. When Carnegie merged with Henry C. Frick's coke mining and processing company, they introduced the nation to the modern
corporation with control over all aspects of production from ore to finished product ("integrated manufacturing") and changed the face of Pittsburgh.
In short order steel mills moved into the flood plains rural river towns such as Homestead, Duquesne, Aliquippa, Monessen, and Ambridge. A large steel plant
had everything it required nearby, shoehorned into the tight space of the river flats: blast furnaces, foundries, rolling mills, and machine shops to make plant
equipment. Boilers and powerhouses next to the plants kept them operating independently. Furthermore, to make sure those factories were steadily supplied,
Carnegie Steel bought the coke mines, iron fields, and even the railroads that connected them to the mills.
By 1910, Pittsburgh produced 25 million tons of steel; more than 60 percent of the nation’s total. It was the high-water mark for Pittsburgh’s share of
national steel production. By the 1920's Pittsburgh produced one third of the national output of finished and rolled steel. It had the world's largest tube and pipe
mill, structural steel plant, rail mill, wire manufacturing plant, bridge and construction fabricating plant. Pittsburgh also led in the manufacture of electrical
machinery, railroad cars, tin plate, glass, fire brick and aluminum finishing. Forty percent of the nation's coal came from within 100 miles of Pittsburgh. The
1930's saw Pittsburgh creating the steel that would be used for skyscrapers the world over including New York's Empire State Building and the Chrysler
Building. During the 1940's it was Pittsburgh that supplied the war machinery that would conquer Germany & Japan. The "Smoky City" was the epitome of the
modern emergence of this country's ascendency to a superpower.
By 1970, Pittsburgh would have the distinction of being the third largest corporate headquarters city in the United States. With but few exceptions, all these
companies or their antecedents were founded during the period between 1870– 1910: Alcoa, Allegheny Ludlum, Blaw-Knox, Consolidation Coal, Copperweld
Steel, Crucible Steel, Dravo, Fisher Scientific, Gulf Oil, Harbison Walker, H. J. Heinz, Jones & Laughlin, Joy Manufacturing, Koppers, Mellon National Bank,
Mesta Machine, Mine Safety Appliance, National Steel, Pittsburgh Chemical, Pittsburgh National Bank, Pittsburgh Plate Glass, Pittsburgh Steel, Rockwell
International, United Engineering and Foundry, Universal Cyclops, United States Steel, Westinghouse Air Brake and Westinghouse Electric. With the exception
of the two banks, Heinz and a couple of light manufacturing companies, it was heavy industry all the way.
thousands of unskilled workers. When Carnegie merged with Henry C. Frick's coke mining and processing company, they introduced the nation to the modern
corporation with control over all aspects of production from ore to finished product ("integrated manufacturing") and changed the face of Pittsburgh.
In short order steel mills moved into the flood plains rural river towns such as Homestead, Duquesne, Aliquippa, Monessen, and Ambridge. A large steel plant
had everything it required nearby, shoehorned into the tight space of the river flats: blast furnaces, foundries, rolling mills, and machine shops to make plant
equipment. Boilers and powerhouses next to the plants kept them operating independently. Furthermore, to make sure those factories were steadily supplied,
Carnegie Steel bought the coke mines, iron fields, and even the railroads that connected them to the mills.
By 1910, Pittsburgh produced 25 million tons of steel; more than 60 percent of the nation’s total. It was the high-water mark for Pittsburgh’s share of
national steel production. By the 1920's Pittsburgh produced one third of the national output of finished and rolled steel. It had the world's largest tube and pipe
mill, structural steel plant, rail mill, wire manufacturing plant, bridge and construction fabricating plant. Pittsburgh also led in the manufacture of electrical
machinery, railroad cars, tin plate, glass, fire brick and aluminum finishing. Forty percent of the nation's coal came from within 100 miles of Pittsburgh. The
1930's saw Pittsburgh creating the steel that would be used for skyscrapers the world over including New York's Empire State Building and the Chrysler
Building. During the 1940's it was Pittsburgh that supplied the war machinery that would conquer Germany & Japan. The "Smoky City" was the epitome of the
modern emergence of this country's ascendency to a superpower.
By 1970, Pittsburgh would have the distinction of being the third largest corporate headquarters city in the United States. With but few exceptions, all these
companies or their antecedents were founded during the period between 1870– 1910: Alcoa, Allegheny Ludlum, Blaw-Knox, Consolidation Coal, Copperweld
Steel, Crucible Steel, Dravo, Fisher Scientific, Gulf Oil, Harbison Walker, H. J. Heinz, Jones & Laughlin, Joy Manufacturing, Koppers, Mellon National Bank,
Mesta Machine, Mine Safety Appliance, National Steel, Pittsburgh Chemical, Pittsburgh National Bank, Pittsburgh Plate Glass, Pittsburgh Steel, Rockwell
International, United Engineering and Foundry, Universal Cyclops, United States Steel, Westinghouse Air Brake and Westinghouse Electric. With the exception
of the two banks, Heinz and a couple of light manufacturing companies, it was heavy industry all the way.
| 1905 Homestead Steel Works |
| JONES & LAUGHLIN STEEL WORKS Early 1900 - Looking Towards Southside |
| Industrial Pittsburgh "The Real Men of Steel" |
| ABOUT THESE PHOTOS: These photos were donated to the SteelCactus Foundation by Douglas Haney. Photos restored by the SteelCactus Foundation |
Photo Antiquities Museum of Pittsburg
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| BIRTH OF A BEHEMOTH Andrew Carnegie's opening of the Edgar Thomson Works at Braddock in 1875 introduced cheap, high-volume steel to the Pittsburgh region. As a young executive of the Pennsylvania Railroad, Carnegie saw that iron train rails were wearing out too quickly, causing devastating train derailments. The railroad was ordering stronger Bessemer steel rails all the way from England, which inspired Carnegie to quit his railroad job to manufacture them in Pittsburgh. Combining all of the elements of the areas natural attributes; plentiful coal, rivers of water, cheap labor and the grit of its inhabitants, he turned the sleepy 'Burgh into a burning monster of heavy steel production that fueled a century of fortunes and industrial achievement. |
| 1892 Homestead Works 140 Inch Mill |
| 1895 Homestead Works - 90 Ton Ingot |
| 1895 Homestead Works - Pouring 90 Ton Ingot |
| Pittsburgh is more than a city," declared Herbert Casson in his popular history The Romance of Steel (1907). It was "the acme of activity," "an industrial cyclone," a region of "sweat and gold," a singular place where labor became "an untiring fury to produce." As awe-inspiring as the Grand Canyon, Pittsburgh possessed the "secret of perpetual energy which science cannot explain." Another popular image put it simply: "Pittsburgh is hell with the lid off." |