Right now, if you’re quick about it, you can buy this beautiful and historic building that probably dates from the 1870s. It was the office of the Park Brothers’ Black Diamond Steel Works, later Crucible Steel.
This cheery decorative carving is in a style that was common in the 1870s; it may be by the same craftsman who did the decorations on the Springfield Public School (1871) a block away.
“Night Scene on the Monongahela River Near Pittsburgh, Pa., Showing a Portion of the Plants of the Pittsburgh Steel Co.” A striking view from a booklet published by the Pittsburgh Steel Company in 1911.
“Taylor Allerdice was accustomed to meeting all kinds of situations but here was something entirely different. So far as he knew, it had never been done before, except in the making of an occasional educational film, but this man didn’t look as though he were concerned in making just the short length educational subject.
“ ‘What kind of a picture?’ he asked.
“ ‘What we call a feature presentation, Mr. Allerdice. I have brought a company of players, including the principals and important members of the cast, cameramen and the necessary crew to handle the mechanical end, across the continent to picturize in its actual locale Herschell. S. Hall’s Saturday Evening Post story Steel Preferred. The plant at the National Tube Company seems to be the one best suited to the requirements of the story.’ ”
The entire article, “On Location in a Steel Mill,” appears in The Director for July, 1925.
