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The Rise and Fall of a Steel Giant

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Tour the enormous, abandoned Bethlehem Steel mill outside Allentown, PA
National Museum of Industrial History https://www.nmih.org/
Subscribe for more thedailyconversation
NMIH YouTube @natmuseumofindustrialhistory
Steelworkers' Archives https://steelworkersarchives.com/
Dr. Jill Schennum's book: As Goes Bethlehem https://amzn.to/3I2RoHY
Bethlehem Steel https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bethleh...

Chapters
0:00 Welcome to Bethlehem Steel
2:46 Adaptive reuse: mill as museum
4:03 Steelworkers' Archives project
5:45 Struggle for worker's rights
7:49 A President's influence
8:23 Improved conditions
9:05 First industrial steelmaking
9:23 The Father of US Steelmaking
10:30 Steel on an industrial scale
11:24 Charles M. Schwab
12:27 H Beams for skyscrapers
13:52 Adaptively reusing the site
14:22 Iron ingredients
15:12 Exploring the blast furnaces
16:19 The steelmaking process explained
19:08 Rebuilding the blast furnaces every 7 years
20:18 High house accident
22:16 Crane run
22:43 "Dispensary" medical clinic
23:34 Encouraging redevelopment

Inside Bethlehem Steel: History of an American Giant
Bethlehem, Pennsylvania

20 Comments

@TheDailyConversation Creator 5 months ago Pinned

Thanks for watching. If you value this kind of thoughtful, independent work and want to help me make more of it, becoming a member is the best way to support the channel: youtube.com/@thedailyconversation/join
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@johnsenior478 1 year ago

That guide is a treasure. Great tour.

@steve34043 1 year ago

I grew up in Bethlehem. Left for the NAVY in 1982 at the age of 18. Going back now, it is so quiet. I would sleep with the windows open and listen to the steel mill running 24 hours a day. I really miss that noise in the background.

@peppermoongarage 1 year ago

I currently work at a former Bethlehem Steel mill that is currently producing steel under a different company. This was very interesting to me. Thank you!

@aday1637 11 months ago

I worked for Bethlehem Steel (like my whole family) at the Sparrows Point Plant where there were over 32,000 employees at that plant at it's peak. When I got drafted, Bethlehem Steel sent me 2 week vacation checks each year while I served.

@Constantine-111 11 months ago

A nation that can't even make its own steel is subject to the will of those who can, especially in times of war.

@russjordan243 1 year ago

When I was a kid, in the early 80’s, I remember Billy Joel’s song “Allentown”. At that age and living in the south, I had no idea just what significance “closing all the factories down” had on not only the rust belt, but on the country as a whole. By the mid 90’s almost the entire steel industry in our country had shut down.

30 years later, so many young adults really have no idea what the country was like when it was truly industrialized. They’re programmed to automatically assume that manufacturing is something to farm out to Asia or wherever. You have to travel thru the rust belt, Pennsylvania, NY, Ohio, Michigan, etc.. and see the old factories for yourself to see what this country was actually capable of. It truly was the mightiest industrial powerhouse the world ever saw….and there wasn’t even a close second.

@JohnP.Martin-b1v 9 months ago

I was an engineering student in the late 70s and one of our professors arranged for a tour of the Bethlehem steel plant. The scale of the place was amazing.

@BrandonTran 1 year ago

Dr. Jill Schennum - You have a wealth of knowledge and I enjoyed your tour and stories. Thank you!

@Channel53x 11 months ago

This is a great documentary and I’m torn between being sad and mad we let this and others slip away

@jeffydahmer-ln6go 11 months ago

I was at a car show in Pennsylvania a couple of years ago and there was an Indian motorcycle on display, a 1929 or a 1931 (?).
On display with the bike was a newspaper article about its former owner. The story explained how the man who owned it rode it to work at Bethlehem Steel daily for decades. The day he retired in 1965, he came out to find the motorcycle was nowhere in sight but a limousine was waiting with his family inside.

@trashpanda314 1 year ago

Such incredible engineering, especially for its day. The scale of these old mills is staggering.

@Themyth-007 9 months ago

The lady giving the tour is amazing top notch. I’ve never been so intrigued with a history story. It was fantastic!!! Job well done. Thanks

@MikeA15206 1 year ago

Mill hunky’s kid here, fascinating to learn about what my Dad did.

@beeftest 11 months ago

what an incredible woman, so passionate. awsome video. thank you

@BS.-.- 11 months ago

"Iron rails last 4yrs, steel rails last 10 longer" i was working in a 100+yr old railroad building and we where still useing rails marked Bethlehem 1913...right up until 2019 when they took the building down.

@Eduardomd54 10 months ago

This Lady is a brilliant Historian . I enjoy the Tour. I have a piece of railroad, that was made in Bethlehem Steel. Greetings from México.

@deadphishcheesespread 1 year ago

I grew up in Bethlehem. My dad worked in Martin Tower. When I was in elementary school, it was in full swing. By the time I was in High school, it was closing down.

@conortimm733 11 months ago

I swear half the local population was employed there back when my grandparents grew up. People were either on small farms or steel workers. Huge impact on the development of the area.

@sandriagutierrez2605 1 year ago

I was a caregiver for a man in Northampton County, who worked for Steel after WW2, till his retirement. So enjoyed his stories, and experiences. Too many to write. He lived for 103 years.