Pittsburg
• The history of Pittsburgh began with
centuries of Native American civilization in
the modern Pittsburgh region. Eventually
French and British explorers encountered
the strategic juncture where the Allegheny
and Monongahela Rivers meet to form the
Ohio. The area became a battleground
when France and Britain fought for control
in the 1750s.
Following American independence in 1783,
the village around Fort Pitt continued to
grow. The region saw the short-lived
Whiskey Rebellion, when farmers rebelled
against federal taxes on whiskey. The War
of 1812 cut off the supply of British goods,
stimulating American manufacture. By
1815, Pittsburgh was producing large
quantities of iron, brass, tin, and glass
products.
• By the 1840s, Pittsburgh had grown to one
of the largest cities west of the Allegheny
Mountains. Production of steel began in
1875. By 1911, Pittsburgh was producing
half the nation's steel. Pittsburgh was a
Republican party stronghold until 1932.
The soaring unemployment of the Great
Depression, the New Deal relief programs
and the rise of powerful labor unions in the
1930s turned the city into a liberal
stronghold of the New Deal Coalition.
• In World War II, it was the center of the
"Arsenal of Democracy", producing
munitions for the Allied war effort as
prosperity returned.
• Following World War II, Pittsburgh
launched a clean air and civic revitalization
project known as the "Renaissance." The
industrial base continued to expand
through the 1960s, but after 1970 foreign
competition led to the collapse of the steel
industry, with massive layoffs and mill
closures.
The Iron City
1800-1859
Commerce continued to be an essential part
of the economy of early Pittsburgh, but
increasingly, manufacture began to grow in
importance. Pittsburgh sat in the middle of
one of the most productive coalfields in the
country; the region was also rich in
petroleum, natural gas, lumber, and farm
goods.
Blacksmiths forged iron implements, from
horse shoes to nails. By 1800, the town, with
a population of 1,565 persons, had over 60
shops, including general stores, bakeries,
and hat and shoe shops.
The 1810s were a critical decade in
Pittsburgh's growth. In 1811, the first
steamboat was built in Pittsburgh.
Increasingly, commerce would also flow
upriver.
• ] Also, the British blockade of the American
coast increased inland trade, so that
goods flowed through Pittsburgh from all
four directions. By 1815, Pittsburgh was
producing $764K in iron; $249K in brass
and tin, and $235K in glass products.
When, on March 18, 1816, Pittsburgh was
incorporated as a city, it had already taken
on some of its defining characteristics:
commerce, manufacture, and a constant
cloud of coal dust.
Other emerging towns challenged
Pittsburgh. In 1818, the first segment of the
National Road was completed, from
Baltimore to Wheeling, bypassing
Pittsburgh. This threatened to render the
town less essential in east-west commerce.
In the coming decade, however, many
improvements were made to the
transportation infrastructure. In 1818, the
region's first river bridge, the Smithfield
Street Bridge, opened, the first step in
building the city of bridges.
In 1834, the Pennsylvania Main Line Canal
was completed. Now Pittsburgh was part of
a transportation system that included rivers,
roads, and canals.Manufacture continued to
grow. In 1835, McClurg, Wade and Co. built
the first locomotive west of the Alleghenies.
Already, Pittsburgh was capable of
manufacturing the most essential machines
of its age. By the 1840s, Pittsburgh was not
a town, but one of the largest cities west of
the mountains.
Immigration
• Between 1870 and 1920, the population of
Pittsburgh grew almost sevenfold. Many of
the new residents were immigrants who
sought employment in the factories and
mills and introduced new traditions,
languages, and cultures to the city. Ethnic
neighborhoods emerged on densely
populated hillsides and valleys.
The years 1916–1930 marked the largest
migration of African-Americans to
Pittsburgh. Jazz greats such as Duke
Ellington and Pittsburgh natives Billy
Strayhorn and Earl Hines played there. Two
of the Negro League's greatest rivals, the
Pittsburgh Crawfords and the Homestead
Grays, often competed in the Hill District.
The teams dominated the Negro National
League in the 1930s and 1940s
Andrew Carnegie
The Steel City
• Carnegie's great innovation was in the
cheap and efficient mass production of
steel rails for railroad lines. This could not
have happened without the prior invention
of Bessemer Steel. Thus Carnegie's
"innovation" was scale, not anything
technical.
• Eads Bridge across the Mississippi River,
opened in 1874 using Carnegie steel.
Eads Bridge
• In the late 1880s, Carnegie Steel was the
largest manufacturer of pig iron, steel rails,
and coke in the world, with a capacity to
produce approximately 2,000 tons of pig
iron per day. In 1888, he bought the rival
Homestead Steel Works, which included
an extensive plant served by tributary coal
and iron fields, a 425-mile (685 km) long
railway, and a line of lake steamships. A
consolidation of Carnegie's assets and
those of his associates occurred in 1892
with the launching of the Carnegie Steel
Company.
• A consolidation of Carnegie's assets and
those of his associates occurred in 1892
with the launching of the Carnegie Steel
Company.
• By 1889, the U.S. output of steel
exceeded that of Britain, and Andrew
Carnegie owned a large part of it. By
1900, the profits of Carnegie Bros. &
Company alone stood at $40,000,000 with
$25,000,000 being Carnegie's share.
• Carnegie's empire grew to include the J.
Edgar Thomson Steel Works (named for
John Edgar Thomson, Carnegie's former
boss and president of the Pennsylvania
Railroad), Pittsburgh Bessemer Steel
Works, the Lucy Furnaces, the Union Iron
Mills, the Union Mill (Wilson, Walker &
County), the Keystone Bridge Works, the
Hartman Steel Works, the Frick Coke
Company, and the Scotia ore mines.
Carnegie, through Keystone, supplied the
steel for and owned shares in the
landmark Eads Bridge project across the
Mississippi River in St. Louis, Missouri
(completed 1874). This project was an
important proof-of-concept for steel
technology which marked the opening of a
new steel market.
The Homestead Strike was a violent labor
dispute in 1892 that ended in a battle
between strikers and private security
guards. The dispute took place at Carnegie's
Homestead Steel Works between the
Amalgamated Association of Iron and Steel
Workers and the Carnegie Steel Company.
The final result was a major defeat for the
union and a setback for efforts to unionize
steelworkers.
Carnegie sold all his steel holdings in 1901;
they were merged into U.S. Steel and it was
non-union until the late 1930s
Map of Pennslyvania
• http://www.mapsofworld.com/usa/states/p
ennsylvania/
Rivers
• http://www.mapsofworld.com/usa/states/p
ennsylvania/pennsylvania-river-map.html