ARMCO SRRfPK^AeOMPrtEHENsrv& VITAL FORCE wffiCH FWDS EXPRESSION IN THE PRACTICAL APPUCATION OF- POLICIES BUILDED ON A PLATFORM OF CHRISTIAN PRINCIPLES IN WHICH SELFISH PURPOSE HAS NOPLACE. -2iflwiWfc_ 'PHf THE FIRST TWENTY YEARS Cornell University Library TS 340.A51 The first twenty years; a tiistory of the 3 1924 004 626 812 CORNELL UNIVERSITY LIBRARY Given to the COLLEGE OF ENGINEERING by the j-'ersoiinel office. Cornell University Library The original of tiiis book is in tine Cornell University Library. There are no known copyright restrictions in the United States on the use of the text. http://www.archive.org/details/cu31924004626812 The First Twenty Tears The IlIFirst Twenty Years A History of the Growth and Development of The American Rolling Mill Company, NIlDDLETOWN, OhIO, BEGINNING I9OI and Ending 1922 ^^^ The American Rolling Mill Company MIDDLETOWN, OHIO Copyright 1922 by The American RollinE Mill Company Contents The First Twenty Years special Frontispiece "ARAICO SPIRIT" Page IXTRODUCTION 9 CHAPTER I. Past History and Accomplishment 21 CHAPTER II. Development of Plant Operations 31 CHAPTER HI. History of the Zanesville ARMCO Plant 57 CHAPTER IV. The Advent of the Blooming and Bar Mill 63 CHAPTER V. The Blast Furnace Division 69 CHAPTER VI. Twenty Years of Progress of Galvanizing 83 CHAPTER VII. The Development of an Electrical Sheet 89 Contents — Continued CHAPTER VIII. Page Development of High Finished Sheets 97 CHAPTER IX. The Development of ARAICO Ingot Iron 105 CHAPTER X. History of the ARMCO Culvert and Flume Association. . 127 CHAPTER XI. Selling 7\RAIC0 Products 135 CHAPTER XII. The Growth of ARMCO Overseas 145 CHAPTER XHI. Research at ARAICO 155 CHAPTER XIV. Service Engineering at ARAICO 167 CHAPTER XV. The General Office Organization 171 CHAPTER XVI. The Advertising of ARAICO iSi CHAPTER XVII. Sketches at ARAICO 185 Contents — Continued CHAPTER XVIII. Page Employment at ARM CO 207 CHAPTER XIX. The Growth of ARAICO Medical Service 213 CHAPTER XX. Personal Service Work 221 CHAPTER XXL Training ARjMCO AIen and Women 229 CHAPTER XXII. The ARMCO Association 239 CHAPTER XXIII. ARMCO IN the Great World War 253 CHAPTER XXIV. The ARMCO Ambulance Corps 257 CHAPTER XXV. Manufacture of A^Iunitions for the World War 273 CHAPTER XXVI. ARMCO Organization 285 CHAPTER XXVII. ARMCO Traffic Department 289 Contents — Continued CHAPTER XXVIII. Page The Purchasing Department 293 CHAPTER XXIX. The Growth of the Treasury Department 297 CHAPTER XXX. ARMCO IN Civic Affairs 301 CHAPTER XXXI. ARMCO'S Pioneer ]Met,\llurgist 305 CHAPTER XXXII. Company Policies as Approved by Directors 307 Addenda 319 ISMCO ^PIISIT n "dct>Qimply dn exemplificdtion-^of the hid^he^t ddnddrd of Amencdn citizenship w o T h e No blest ORK — Konest labor — is one of tKe noblest tKings in life. i^J) "One wKo can feel that Ke is doing Kis fair sKare of the work of the world Kas good reason to be happ^?. "No normal man can, Kowever, be satisfied simply) to ■work. He wants to work to some purpose and to accomplish tke largest possible result, botK for Kimself, Kis associates, and his company). He wants to work effectively). "'There can be no real effective work without the inspira- tion of that thing called 'spirit', which is the mainspring of accomplishment. "It is for that reason that we have been so greatlj) interested in the development of real 'Armco Spirit'. |1^8j|RMCO spirit can first be compared with what, at school, ^Sgi is termed 'college spirit' or 'class spirit' as applied to those ,^ graduating in an^) given year. It compares with 'com- munity) spirit', or what might be described as 'group spirit' as representing the combined interest and purpose of an}) given number of persons working together in a common cause. "Spirit is that thing which grips and holds the hearts of men and gives the power of extraordinary) accomplishment, when working for a worth}) purpose. "Armco spirit is a comprehensive, vital force, which finds expression in the practical application of policies builded on a platform of Christian principles, in which selfish purpose has no place. R K n g I n Life RMCO spirit combines in proper proportion a spirit of fairness, a square aeal always, botK in theory ana prac- \^ tice; a tig, oroaa view of ever^) proDiem, cutting out all narrowness and littleness; a spirit of unselfishness, of loyalt]?, of courtesy) to and consideration for the other fellovJ. "Armco spirit is, in fact, simply) an exemplification of the highest standard of real American citizenship. "Armco spirit is all that and more; it is that spirit which is life itself. It is a distinct, vital, concrete force. It despises class distinction; it hates inferiority) in men or in products, and in all things affecting life itself. It vJill have naught to do with commonplace things, and glories only in the highest and the best. T is that intangible but intensely) vital thing which so I firmly) grips the hearts of men that it inspires them with °(^i the inconquerable will to be and to do the limit of their endurance and ability). "It is that latent power upon which the thoroughbred draws when, after running neck and neck with his adversary clear up to the home stretch, he suddenly? forges ahead to Victory). "It is that spirit which makes for the real brotherhood of man and the building of the highest type of Christian citizen- ship, which will in turn produce an indestructible democracy).' President. Work 4iou for pleasure: paint or sing or carve niie {king ^ou lovest, fhougK ^e bod;? starve, WKo works for glor;? misses oft fhe goal: Who works for mone^) coins Kis \eT;p soul. Work for {he work's sake {hen, and it ma^' be niiat {hese things shall be added unto {hee. KENTON COX Introduction A writer of small town stories twenty years ago could have found good material had he by chance visited Middle- town, Ohio. On July 12th, 1900, to be exact, the corner stone of the original works of The American Rolling Mill Company was laid. It was a gala occasion. The whole town turned out, the schools were dismissed, the national The Daily Signal. Daily Signal's Welcome to Armco [9] u a S Q <: < eii O guard proudly marched down the street, leading the parade, and the horses and carriages of the populace were festooned and decorated as for a carnival. In this, Middletown was no different from thousands of other small American localities that have experienced the same thrill, thousands of other hopeful communities that have given themselves over to such jollifications, as they joined together to hear the future prosperity of the city read as by a prophet of old. Not all of these thousands of cities have been so fortu- nate as Middletown — not all their enthusiastic prophecies have come true. The greatness and prosperity of the community has sometimes failed to materialize. And yet, the dreams of Middletown's appointed pro- phets on the day of the dedication of The American Rolling Mill Company have not only been fulfilled but very largely exceeded. In the light of the present day facts and happenings (December 192 1) the following report in the Daily Signal of June I, 1900, is very interesting. The entire paper with flaming headlines was given over to the event. WELCOME BY THE PEOPLE! A CORDIAL GREETING GIVEN THE AMERICAN ROLLING MILL CO. The Whole Populace on the Grounds to Express Their Ap- preciation of the Works to be Established Here. The City Decorated in Flags and Bunti?ig, the Business Men in Processiofi, Every Industry in the City Repre- sented in the Grand Parade. "Today the people of Middletown were in holiday attire. The business houses were closed this afternoon and the people with one accord assembled to witness the laying of the corner stone of the new American Rolling Mill and to welcome the company to our city. It was a glorious event, the opening of a new era of prosperity for this city in the estabhshment of a great industry, which is destined to renew again our old time energy and place Middletown high in the ranks of the great manufacturing cities of Ohio. "The securing of the works for this city was accomplished through the efforts of the Middletown Industrial Commit- Major Lloyd, Mr. Verity, A'Ir. Phillips and a group of Friends from Cincinnati AT THE Corner Stone Laying tee consisting of A-Iessrs. E. H. AicKniglit, Robert Wilson, and Jacob Schaffer, who were appointed by the mayor, under the provisions of a law authorizing the expenditure of ^100,000.00 for certain improvements. "The commission entered into negotiations with the American Steel Roofing Company, of Cincinnati, and se- cured the removal of their entire plant, constructed on a much larger scale, to this city. A brief history of the company is as follows: "The Sagendorph Iron Roofing and Corrugating Com- pany, of Cincinnati, was organized in 1883 by Major H. P. Lloyd and L. L. Sagendorph. The business was begun in a very small way, but it grew very rapidly, and soon became one of the principal manufactories of sheet metal goods in the country. "In 1891 the name of the company was changed to the American Steel Roofing Company as Mr. Sagendorph had severed his connection with the company shortly be- fore that time, having gone to Philadelphia to establish a new plant there. "Mr. G. M. Verity took the active management of The American Steel Roofing Company in 1889. This company manufactures a complete line of corrugated iron, iron and steel roofings of all kinds, galvanized conductor pipe and eaves trough, metal lath, roof ventilators, and a great many other specialties in the sheet metal build- ing material line. Its works have been located at 226-228- 230 E. Front Street, Cincinnati, for the past ten years. They expect _ to have their new factory here completed about the middle of September, when their entire works will be moved to this point under the firm name of The American Rolling Mill Company. "The American Rolling Mill Company was organized December 2, 1899, with a capital stock of ^200,000.00. On March 17 the capital stock was increased to ^500,000.00 to provide for changes, and improvements in the Com- pany's original plans. "The company was organized through the efforts of Mr. Geo. M. Verity, vice-president and manager of The American Steel Roofing Company, which company has backed the new enterprise from the beginning. "The officers of the company are: George M. Verity, president and treasurer; W. T. Simpson, vice-president; R. C. Phillips, secretary; James B. Strawbridge, general superintendent; William M. Reynolds, supt. of manu- facturing department. The above officers, together with H. P. Lloyd, of Cincinnati, and Jacob Maurer, of Brook- lyn, N. Y., compose the board of directors. "The exercises commenced this afternoon with the as- sembling of the people at the City Building. The whole population formed in line and led by Harry Wilson re- paired, with drums beating and colors flying, to Doty's Grove, adjoining the site of the big factory where the Mayor acted as master of ceremonies. Curtis Avenue then was Only a Country Road [13] "The invocation was offered by RufusW. Weaver, D. D., pastor of the First Baptist Church. "W. S. Harlan, Esq., the City Sohcitor, offered the wel- come address on the part of the people of Middletown. He spoke as follows: " 'I am happy to voice the sentiments of this assemblage, when I state that we all esteem it a pleasure and a privilege to be present at these ceremonies that bear so much import- ance to the future of the city of Middletown. " 'We have not met to garland the triumphant march of a returning hero, we have not met to signalize any vic- tory of American arms, but our mission today has to do with the gentle walks of peace, and concerns the industry and material development of our people. " ' "Peace hath her victories no less renewed than war," and so we have met to lay the corner stone of the building of a mighty enterprise that will bring employment, and with it prosperity, happiness and contentment to hundreds of our citizens, and to extend a welcome to the gentlemen of The American Rolling A-lill Company, whom we thank for locating here. " T may say that in another sense we have met to pay tribute to those traits of character that have made this country great, that have placed it in the very vanguard of the nations of the earth, namely, American energy and American courage. " 'It was that same energy and courage that enabled our forefathers to settle in the New World, to contend with wild beasts and wild men, to clear the forests, to till the soil, and to build churches and school houses. " 'It was that same energy and courage that even now is contemplating the construction of the great Nicaraguan Canal, lines of submarine cables, and all great move- ments that make for the betterment and uplifting of the human family. " 'We have a local pride in the city of Middletown. We are proud of the public spirit and patriotism of her people. She has ever hearkened to her country's call. Two years ago, when the call to arms came, Middletown was among the first to send forth her quota of brave boys. " 'We are proud of the position she has held from an early day as a center of trade and manufacture. [14] " 'The fame of her great factories has spread beyond the confines of her own land. Her tobacco, her paper, her bicycles, her agricultural implements, and other manu- factured articles, have gone forth and been recognized in all the marts of the world. " 'We are proud of this accession to her manufactories. The enlarged use of iron is one of the prominent character- istics of our age, each day witnessing some new application of it in the arts of life. " 'We gladly welcome new industries. When it comes to establishing new enterprises, our people believe in but one policy, that of the "open door." " 'Gentlemen of The American Rolling Mill Company, you have won our profound respect and admiration by em- barking in this great enterprise in our midst, by construct- ing this plant of such mammoth proportions and by doing so in such an expensive and durable manner. " 'You have demonstrated that you have the fullest con- fidence in yourselves, in our city, and in the future. We extend to you a most cordial greeting and welcome. May your success be as substantial and durable as the splendid structure you are building. May there ever exist harmony between employer and employee. Aday your business be profitable to you, and a blessing to this community. " 'My friends, we trust and believe this marks an epoch in the history of our city, that the laying of this corner stone of this new industry, at the dawn of the century, under such auspicious circumstances may be the beginning of a new era of renewed and greater prosperity, and that our city will enter upon a larger and wider field of activity and industry than she has ever enjoyed.' "Geo. M. Verity, in a happy strain, responded on behalf of The American Rolling Mill Company, He said: — " 'We have received many cordial welcomes from in- dividuals during the past few months, all of which have been greatly appreciated by us, but that we should receive such a magnificent welcome as you have accorded us to- day is beyond all expectations and will be appreciated by every member of our company. We feel the weight and sincerity of your good will most deeply, and it proves to us that the people of Middletown can not be excelled for cordiality and hospitality. [i6] In return, on behalf of our Board of Directors, I wish to welcome you one and all to yonder spot where our works are in process of construction. The location is in Itself historic, having been acquired from the government by Daniel Doty and settled upon by him almost a century ago. Mrs. Catherine Doty, who represents only the second generation, is still Hving in the old homestead. We hope that with your assistance we can make it famous as the location of the first steel plant and sheet mills in this broad valley, and that for you it will prove a start in the right direction; that not only other iron industries may follow our example in locating here, but that you may secure many others of various kinds, which will result in rnore than doubling the population of Middletown by the time we reach 1910. 'No more beautiful valley can be found on the face of this broad earth than that of the Big Miami from Dayton south. It is already the home of many industries, and the next ten years should see many, many more in successful operation; and you must see to it that your city gets her full share of the increase that is bound to come. " 'The struggle for commercial supremacy in this era of expansion, progression, and consolidation, between na- tions, states, cities, corporations, and individuals becomes greater every day, and only those can hope to win who are Laying Concrete Foundation for First Sheet Mill "Roll Train' [17] Central Works Under Construction awake, energetic, and progressive, and who keep con- tinuously at work. " 'For these reasons our old company, still located in Cincinnati, deemed it advisable to branch out into this new business at Middletown, where it could control the manu- facture of its own raw material; and for the same reasons we have made several important additions to our enter- prise as originally planned, it being our aim to strengthen ourselves in every possible way by incorporating all the known modern improvements and ideas in the manufacture of steel and steel sheets, and sheet steel building material. " 'When our plant is completed, your city can boast of having the most modern and complete works of the kind in the United States. " 'It was no small sacrifice for us to decide to bring our manufacturing business from Cincinnati, as it has been established there for more than sixteen years; but we could not give both the new business here and the old one there the close attention which each demanded. And so through the assistance of your Industrial Commission we effected the necessary arrangements for the transfer, and will have all our business interests in Middletown. Now that we are to become one of you, the best interests of your city will be our best interests, and we will do all in our power to make Middletown known to all the world as a manufacturing center. " 'We wish to take this opportunity to thank the mem- bers of your Industrial Commission for the great courtesy and consideration they have always shown us. While they have looked strictly after the interests of your city, they have at all times been eminently fair to us, and have been ever ready and willing to assist us in working out any problem that had to be solved. They did everything they could consistently to secure this enterprise for your city, and all our dealings with them have been of the most pleasant character. "'I'ou certainly do not know and cannot realize the amoimtof hard work they have had to do in connection with securing a suitable site and perfecting all details. They certainly deserve the warmest thanks of every citizen of Middletown for their unselfish and efficient work. "/In conclusion we wish to offer you a cordial invitation to visit us in the days to come, when our plant will be completed and in operation. 'We will at all times take great pleasure and special pains in showing our Middletown friends through the works, and we hope to see you often.' "The assembly then adjourned to the grounds of The American Rolling Mill, where W. H. Todhunter, in a very interesting speech, gave an outline of the industrial evolu- tion of A-Iiddletown. "Then came Major H. P. Lloyd, who in eloquent speech gave the multitude a history of The American Rolling Mill Company. The list of articles to be placed in the box in the corner stone of the structure, was then read by W. K. Rhonemus, the Mayor laying the stone. The meeting closed with an address from Benj. Harwitz and the raising of the American flag." Main Office Building 1907 [19] Thus did the newspapers record the birth of Armco. Twenty years is a short time in the annals of history and yet how far back it seems, revealed in the cold type of newspaper files. Yet in that brief space of time Armco has grown from an infant in swaddling clothes to a great institution. The story of its growth is a story of grit, determination, stick-to-it-iveness, and faith in funda- mental principles. No one thing could have accomplished so much. The building of Armco has required the combination of brains and genius on the part of executives, backed by many loyal workers in the plant, each giving that full measure of strength and devotion which together made up an invin- cible force for achievement and sound progress. Chapter I Past History and Accomplishments Original Conccplion^First Fivf-Ycar Period— Second Five-Year Period—Third Five- 1 ear Period — East Side Works — Acquisition of Blast Furnace and Mines — Fourth Five-Year Period — Addition to East Side JVorks. THE American Rolling Mill Company began opera- tions in A'liddletown in March, 1901, just about the time the United States Steel Corporation came into existence and absorbed practically all of the rolling mill companies which were then manufacturing sheet iron and steel. Prior to that period the iron and steel business of the country was divided into a larger number of distinct branches. The sheet metal business was carried on by such manufacturing companies as The American Steel Roofing Company of Cincinnati, whose business was absorbed by this company in 1900, and The Cincinnati Corrugating Company, owned by J. G. Battelle, J. H. Frantz and others, later owners of The Columbus Iron & Steel Company. At that time sheet iron and sheet steel were manufactur- ed largely by rolling mills who purchased their raw materials in the shape of billets or sheet bars from larger steel works, who in turn procured their raw material in the shape of pig iron from blast furnace companies. The galvanizing of sheet metal, making the product known commercially as "galvanized iron," was carried on by such companies as The American Galvanizing Works which was operated on Pearl Street, Cincinnati, Ohio, and owned by William T. Simpson, who later became First Vice President of Armco. This was at that time a distinct branch of the metal business. The American Rolling Mill Company was one of the first to bring together all of these various branches of the industry, with the single exception of the blast furnace. The original conception including an open hearth furnace department which manufactured steel ingots; a bar mill department which reduced those ingots to billets [21] o 0^ < O or sheet bars; a sheet mill department which converted the sheet bars into sheets ready for the market as black iron or steel sheets; a galvanizing department which coated a certain percentage of the black sheets, making galvanized iron and steel; and a factory department where both black and galvanized sheets were used in the fabrication of sheet metal building materials of all kinds. This brought to- gether into one harmonious whole what had formerly cov- ered four distinct lines of manufacture. The strength of this first conception lay not only in bringing together these various processes with the resultant economy of operation, but in the ability to use the open hearth furnace in the making of special and difficult grades of steel not readily obtainable on the market. The first five-year period of operation in Middletown was absorbed in working out the problems incidental to an amalgamation of the processes heretofore described; in acquiring the necessary experience in the manufacture of special grades of steel and iron, and in rolling and fabri- cating them; in developing an organization; and in acquir- ing all of the basic experience needed in the conduct of the business. The company had also to develop its small steel works to a point where it could not only make the quality of product desired, but could secure a fair cost of production that would insure a reasonable profit on finished products. The first installation included only one twenty-five-ton open hearth furnace. Sales at the end of the first fiscal year amounted to ^281,181.12. At the end of five years the company had two fifty-ton open hearth furnaces which were able to produce more raw steel for sheet bars than the finishing department, as then developed, could finish. Approximately seven hundred men were employed, and annual sales had reached a little more than one million dollars. • 1 , At the beginning of the second five-year period there was a surplus of steel from the open hearth department, and the business had developed to a point where it de- manded more tonnage of finished products than the plant could make. To solve that problem quickly without further delay in creation of organization and expense in develop- ment work The American Rolling Mill Company purchased the sheet mills and factory of The Muskingum Valley Steel Company of Zanesville, Ohio, a going concern with an [23] The Site of the East Side Sheet Mill Building established working organization, and paid for this property in stock of the company. This immediately gave Armco more than double the tonnage of finished sheets it formerly had available for sale, and made it possible for the company to take care of its growing trade and to greatly reduce its general overhead with a resultant increase in profit. At the end of the second five-year period the company had three fifty-ton open hearth furnaces, and was producing approximately forty-five hundred tons per month of black and galvanized sheets in the A/[iddletown and Zanesville mills, as compared with nine hundred tons a month during its first year. The number of employees had increased to fifteen hundred, and annual sales to over ^3,600,000.00. At the beginning of the third five-year period the sales department was again making demands for more tonnage to supply the growing number of valued customers. These demands were so insistent that further manufacturing development was given serious consideration. The first thought was to increase the capacity of the original plant, now known as Central Works, by a duplication of depart- ments then in existence; but mature consideration made It clear that this would be a very short-sighted policy. The plant at that time operated under what is known as "small mill practice," and produced in the open hearth department small ingots measuring eight by eight inches, by four feet long. These ingots were broken down into billets [24] or sheet bars on a small two- and three-high bar mill. This practice was necessary where the annual tonnage of mgots produced in the open hearth department was less than one hundred thousand tons. Careful investigation made it clear to the management and to the directors that if they were going to provide for a business of more than one hundred thousand tons per annum, that the company would have to adopt "big mill practice" which would enable it to produce ingots and sheet bars at a very greatly reduced cost. The decision resulted in the planning and building of the Company's large modern plant known'as "The East Side Works." This new plant consists of: A unit of four, seventy-five-ton open hearth furnaces, with equipment that would produce ingots six feet long and twenty-four by thirty inches at the base, instead of four feet long and eight inches square, as formerly; Soaking pits for the complete re-heating of ingots taken from the open hearth department; A forty inch blooming mill (the largest in use in stand- ard steel works) capable of reducing the large ingots made in the open hearth department to billets or slabs at a mini- mum cost of production; Making the First Charge at the East Side Open Hearth [25] A modern bar mill to reduce the billets made in the blooming mill department to sheet bars under the most approved methods; A large central power station, where the waste steam from the large engines necessary to operate the blooming and bar mills could be used in turbo-generator units to produce electric current at a minimum cost and in sufficient quantity to supph' power for the sheet mill department, for cranes, for lighting the plant, and for all similar purposes; Large maintenance shops; A sheet and jobbing mill department; and A finishing department capable of taking the black sheets from the sheet mills and converting them into gal- vanized sheets, alloy coated sheets, or high polished sheets for the use of automobile, stove, metal furniture, and other manufacturers. Ground was broken in March, 1910, for the East Side Works, and operations were commenced in September, 191 1. The ten-month period from September, 191 1, to June 30, 1912, was consumed in getting the big mill into successful and practical operation. In spite of the fact that this had to be done at a time when both demand and market prices were very unsatisfactory, the new plant was in successful operation at the close of that fiscal year which ended in June 1912. Pouring the First Heat at the East Side Works [26] In the construction of the new works the company's en- gineering department, which had been established in 1900, worked in connection with the drafting forces of the Con- sulting Engineer who had been employed to design the new works. On the completion of the East Side Works all the work of an engineering character was definitely centralized in a single department in the new plant. From the lone drafts- man who had first been employed, the engineering de- partment grew during this period into a well organized force capable of designing and supervising any construction work needed by the company. Making the Fields Bloom with Industry The engineering department has on file in fireproof vaults approximately forty thousand blue prints of the plant and equipment. Armco's plant development from 191 1 to 1920 shows construction work valued at more than ten million dollars which was planned by its own engineering depart- ment. Shown by years, it is as follows: 1911 $ 17,518.73 1912 86,535.65 1913 328,314.57 1914 4,27777 1915 217,707.97 1916 2,261.326.22 1917 1,265,143.46 1918 95,962.20 [27] I9I9 851,389.61 I920 57240^871.61 Total ^10,369,047.79 With the advent of the World War there was built and put into operation, in the shortest possible time, a forge shop capable of making shell forgings from five inches to nine inches in diameter; and at the end of the third five-year period the company was employing forty-live hundred men, and its annual sales were ^13,262,835.32. The fourth five-year period began under very auspic- ious conditions. The company's manufacturing methods had been so greatly improved and the production capacity Ready to Roll the First Ingot at East Side Works of all finishing departments so largely increased that the board of directors found it necessary to authorize a sub- stantial addition to the open hearth furnace department, in order to avoid the necessity of purchasing in the open market further supplies of billets and sheet bars. Four new open hearth furnaces, each with a minimum capacity of one hundred tons, were built, giving one hundred and twenty-five thousand additional tons of billets yearly for use in the various finishing departments. The company as then organized produced everything it consumed in the manufacture of its products except pig iron which had ahvays been purchased in the open mar- ket on very satisfactory terms. At a meeting of the board of directors the question of a future supply of pig iron was considered. The trend of the market was such that it seemed very certain the com- pany would have to pay an exorbitant price for pig iron for the next year, and possibly for an indefinite period. A committee was appointed to investigate the possibility and advisability of taking over a going blast furnace property. The investigation of this special committee resulted in an agreement with The Columbus Iron & Steel Company, from whom the company had purchased a large percentage of its pig iron for many years, covering the conditions under which a merger of the two companies could be accomplished. This was effected on the basis of their accepting securities of The American Rolling Mill Company in exchange for their entire properties at an agreed valuation. The Columbus Iron & Steel Company obtained its iron from its own mines in West Virginia; its coke from its by-product coke ovens at Portsmouth, Ohio; its ore from its mines In the Lake Superior District; and owned its own ore steamers on the Great Lakes. It had at Columbus, Ohio, a unit consisting of two blast furnaces which were capable of producing at least 200,000 tons of pig iron a year. The amalgamation of these properties put Armco in an impregnable position where it was not only certain of a constant and sufficient supply of raw material, but did not have to pay a producer's profit to any one for the raw materials entering into the manufacture of Armco products. It gave Armco the benefit of producer's cost in every process from the ore to the finished product. During this period the United States entered the great war. By that time the company was equipped with a large forge shop capable of producing shell forgiiigs of large size, crank shafts for marine service and miscellaneous forgings. Throughout this period a determined and con- scientious effort was made to supply the government with every possible pound of material that could be pro- duced. Immediately following the armistice, preparations and plans were made to follow the government's wishes in gradually reducing the production of war materials without great disturbances to the industry. This policy resulted [29] in the termination of their manufacture on December 31, 1918. After the forge shops were discontinued a comprehen- sive survey of the company's activities brought out the fact that its open hearth producing capacity was in ex- cess of its finishing capacity, and in A-Iay, 1919, the matter was carefuhy reviewed by the board of directors who authorized the building of eight sheet mills at the Middle- town plant. In December, 1919, it was decided to build four additional mills at Zanesville so as to balance the pro- duction capacity of the Steel Works and Blooming Mill at Middle town. At this time advantage was taken of the opportunity to entirely rearrange the processes and plan of operation of the sheet mill department at Middletown in order to insure a better and more uniform product, thus capitalizing the previous ten years of experience in the manufacture of high grade sheets. By July, 1919, financial arrangements had been com- pleted and contract executed for the construction of the new works. The first unit of the new mills at Middle- town started operations in December, 1920, and the remain- der shortly thereafter. Earh' in 1919, it was decided to enlarge the blast furnace plant at Columbus so as to increase its capacity to 250,000 tons a year. Each five-year period of Armco history has shown a marked expansion in organization and equipment. Start- ing with one twenty-five-ton furnace and a small fin- ishing department the company has in twenty years acquired twelve large open hearth furnaces with finishing departments capable of caring for their entire product, and has secured its own sources of supply of raw materials. The Company begins its fifth five-year period equipped to undertake every step in the process of manufacture from the ore to the finished product, with its various works and other departments perfectly balanced and modernly equipped, and with an organization the result of twenty years of training and cooperation in the making of products under the Armco standard of quality. 130J Chapter II Development of Plant Operations Bei^inningof Conslructioii— First Furnacf Design— Open Hearth Difficulties— Gas Supply— Operatives' Horseplay — Pouring of Ingots — Second Furnace Built — Installation of Labor Saving Devices— Pit Operations— Early Bar Mill Practice— Troubles of Opera- tion — More Labor Saving Devices — No. j Furnace Built — Improvement in Bar Mill — No. 4 Furnace Built — Installation of Water Cooled Doors and Frames — Stripping Molds from the Ingots — Installation of Top Pour Molds — Building and Equipment of East Side JForks — Improved Pouring and Stripping Practice — Training Furnace Men — Blasting the Salamander from No. 2 Furnace — Installation of Oil in Open Hearth — Flood in IQI^ — Raw Material Difficult to Secure Because of the War — Further enlarge- ment of Auxiliary equipment — Cooling of furnaces — Institution of Eight-Hour Shifts — Steel Strike — Coal Strike — Oiitlazv Railroad Strike. THE governing factor in locating the plant of The American Rolling Mill Company at Middletown, Ohio, was not primarily the proximity of raw mater- ials, but rather the fact that Middletown was situated in the heart of a beautiful valley adjacent to a thriving and prosperous farming community, where living conditions could be made to respond to the highest needs of its citizens and men could be trained to believe in and carry out the ideals of the company. Armco has been noted, from its inception, for the development of new products. Not the least of these has been the upbuilding of an organization that represents quality and service in its collective effort. In the fall of 1900, ground was broken for its first small plant, a complete manufacturing unit. Armco can boast of being the first plant in the country, in fact, in the world, to convert pig iron and scrap into manufactured building materials ready for the consumer's use, in one continuous plant and on one plot of ground. An open hearth furnace, bar mill, and sheet mills with their heating furnaces, gal- vanizing and factory departments were soon in the pro- cess of erection. The first shovelful of dirt from No. i open hearth furnace excavation was dug September 10, 1900. This furnace was built on a solid, concrete foundation, as was common practice in those days. The charging floor was on the yard level, which necessitated a deep ladlepit. The checker chambers were built as a unit under ground to [31] eliminate binding, conserve lieat, and save space. The furnace binding was very light, and not a permanent struct- ure. Ladle stands were unknown as the ladle was held under the spout at tapping time by a 30-ton crane. The furnace was built for burning producer gas and had two gas ports and one air port in each end. Reversal of the gas and air was accomplished by means of Forter and Velte valves respectively, but as these were operated by hand they were very difficult to reverse. In those days industry, as a whole, had not shown any decided effort to conserve the human element in manu- facturing establishments. Lack of ventilation and com- fort was very noticeable in the low-roofed open hearth melting department. Water-cooled doors and frames had not, as yet, been invented. The space provided for cleaning slag pockets and checker chambers was very inadequate, very inefficient, and so hot that they were veritable "man killers." Labor-saving devices were very rare. As labor was plentiful and cheap almost every operation was carried on by hand. The stock was loaded, pushed into the furnace, and charged by hand, the last operation being performed with the aid of a manually operated charging peel. When the bottom was made in No. i furnace, Austrian magnesite and tar were first intimately mixed, then this composition was rammed into the bottom and sides of the hearth with red hot tampers, or rammers, until the re- quired thickness had been reached. After this step, the furnace was lighted, dried out, and heated up to full operat- ing temperature. In order to close all crevices some basic cinder was then melted in the hearth and thoroughly splashed over the banks. This operation being completed the remainder of the slag was tapped out and the furnace was ready for steel making. The first heat was charged by hand on February 7, 1901, fifty thousand five hundred pounds of pig iron and scrap with 7% limestone being melted down into a merchant steel heat in twelve hours fifty minutes. The heat analyzed .040% sulphur, .065% phosphorus, .26% carbon and .74% manganese. The yield in ingots was only 57% of the charge. Three heats were made successfully. Open hearth departments are noted for the variety and the originality of their ways for keeping themselves in the [32] Tapping a Heat in the Early Days 133J plant's eye. This new plant was no different from any other. The ladle crane broke down before the fourth heat was tapped, and the heat had to be held in the furnace twelve hours after it was ready to tap. Then as the crane still refused to work, the heat had to be poured on the ground. Meantime the entire bottom of the furnace had come up and a grand mess resulted. In order to drain out the steel and slag remaining in the furnace, a hole had to be dug more than a foot below the tap hole. In those days the use of ox3^gen in open hearth work was unknown so this job must have required a tremendous amount of the most severe exertion and labor. In 1901 furnace men burnt the roof of the furnace so badly in forty heats that it fell in on a heat of steel. The bricklayers and laborers had their first taste of repairing a furnace with a hot heat in it. Eventually the furnace was completed and the metal melted out though the heat was a total loss. Not until many such events had occurred in those days did open hearth men learn how to success- fully tap out such "sticker" heats. The open hearth, bar mill, sheet mills, and annealing furnaces were all operated on producer gas. Hand-poked and hand-fed Duff stationary producers were installed west of the Central Works sheet mill proper. The steam control, unlike the present arrangement at the East Side Works, was in the gas house, and was jealously guarded by the gas foreman. During the day when the gas foreman was on duty the volume of gas was generally sufficient for all purposes, pro- vided the coal was of good quality. When he went home operations in the gas house slackened verv noticeably. As the gas house was always full of fumes, it was only natural that the foreign gas-makers would become drowsy and sleepy as night approached. First helpers had to wake the gas makers continuall}^ in order to have enough gas to melt and tap a heat. After a heat had been tapped and a new charge put into the furnace, tradition records the times when open hearth operatives, tired out by strenuous work, also took a nap, from the melter on down to the pullup. The super- intendent on the following day would wonder why a par- ticular heat was so far behind schedule. As a counter irritant he later "winked" at a mild form of hazing, called "bugging" which the men used to punish a sleeper. [34] This operation consisted in wetting a piece of red hot dolomite and placing it upon the arms or legs of the slum- berer. Every one immediately became very busy in some routine work. In a short time the steam would take effect, and the victim would let out an unearthly yell. He would wake up thinking he had stuck his foot or arm into a fur- nace. One application was usually sufficient to teach a man to keep awake. Such stunts are frowned upon in these days of "Safety First" as a man often had his leg badly blis- tered. Pouring metal into the ingot molds at this time was very interesting. At first, star-shaped bottom plates were set in the pit for holding twenty molds. The steel, after it had run into the ladle, would be carried by the crane over a group of iron molds, each eight by ten inches in cross section, so placed that when the metal was poured through a central fountain, it flowed through a hollow tile runner underneath the molds and rose by gravity into all molds at one time. This style of pouring was called "bot- tom pour." As each ingot weighed from eight hundred to one thousand pounds, four or five groups of molds had to be poured every time a heat was tapped. In the spring of 1902 business had progressed to such an extent that a second furnace became necessary; so No. 2 furnace with a capacity of forty tons was built. The first heat was tapped from it on July 30, 1902, with no mishaps. At this time several labor-saving devices were installed, simplifying work and increasing tonnage. A mechanical charger replaced the hand operated peel, a fifty-ton crane was installed to pour the larger heats, and a mule (four- legged) was secured to pull the stock from the stock yard into the melting house. Old Maud soon became an institu- tion. Eye witnesses claim that at times furnace delays were charged to her stubborn character. Fifteen minutes delay on account of a balky mule would sound odd to an open hearth furnace man today. The pit by this time became a very important part of the department. A large crew of laborers — all foreigners except the foremen — was required to place the brick in bottom plates, set the runners, molds, and foundations, strip the molds from the ingots after a heat was poured, and transfer the ingots to the cleaning floor at the bar mill. "Safety First" was absolutely unknown. The work was (351 difficult and dangerous. Men had to withstand intense heat, and have great endurance. Present-day operations are child's play compared to the work done by those pit- men. Grasping in each hand a chain hanging from a crane, men had to walk on a very unsafe, narrow board across the top of red hot molds after a heat had been poured. The chains were hooked into the lug on top of the molds, and the craneman was given orders to lift the molds from the ingots. In the meantime the stripper made his way back to the bank as best he could. After all molds on the bank side of the center runner had been taken off, another man swathed in wet sacking ran between the molds on the farther side, and hooked the chains into those molds from be- low^ After all molds were stripped, a man had to throw a chain around several red hot ingots in each group. Then the craneman would carry the entire twenty ingots to the cleaning floor. At this point the sprues or runners were knocked from the ingots after which the ingots were then ready to be charged into the bar mill furnace. These opera- tions caused frequent burns, and several times serious accidents resulted when red hot ingots fell over on men. When No. I open hearth furnace was built, a small two- and-three-high bar mill was installed, as the expense of build- ing a large mill was prohibitive and not adapted to the method of operation. The first bar mill furnace was built on exactly the same principle as an open hearth furnace with the exception that it was controlled by large dampers so that the steel placed in it was heated only to rolling temperature instead of being melted. The bottom was flat and made of sand. The first furnace was built at right angles to the roll train, on the north side of the run-out tables. The ingots were taken from the cleaning floor by a crane, placed on a truck, rolled in front of the furnace doors where, with large tongs handled by hand, they were charged into the furnace. The ingots were turned over and over to heat them uniformly from all sides. As soon as the ingots had become thoroughly heated through or "soaked," they were taken out of the furnace, one at a time, and conveyed to the flrst pass of the roughing rolls. They were handled on the mill train by large tongs supported from an overhead trolley. The eight by ten inch ingot was then given four passes back and forth through the roughing rolls. The ingot by this [37] Early Picture at Central Works Sho\vtn<; Pile oe Small Ingots time had been reduced to a four by seven inch billet. By means of a trolley this billet was carried to the finishing rolls on the same roll train. Eight passes reduced the bar to the required thickness and a seven inch standard width. The bar, now twenty-five to sixty feet long, ran out onto a large moving train of rolls which carried it to the hot shear where the bar was cut into desired sheet-bar lengths on an endless chain conveyor. The cut bars passed through a water bosh and were then loaded by hand onto trucks for the sheet mill. This mill was a "back breaker," and only the most powerful men could do the work. The main energies were bent in these years toward development of various products and improving furnace practice. The tonnage for the year varied from 23,000 G. T. in 1904 to 28,100 G. T. in 1908. When the plant first started there was no fence around the property and sightseers often wandered into the open hearth department. One Sunday morning in 1903 a young man, dressed in a very light colored suit, visited the plant. He was, of course, the center of attraction for all eyes. As he paraded in the rear of the boiler house near No. I furnace he suddenly disappeared. Only quick action on the part of the furnace men saved the young man's life. [38] The main tunnel to the No. i furnace stack had caved in under him. However, except for a few burns and a blacken- ed suit, he was none the worse for the experience. One of the greatest troubles in furnace operation was the fact that at times the tap hole froze full of steel after a heat had been tapped. This was called a "monkey." Generally twenty thousand to thirty thousand pounds of pig iron had to be melted in a furnace to clean the tap hole of this steel. When tapped out, this metal was al- ways a total loss. At the present day, by the use of several bottles of oxygen, such a monkey is melted in half an hour. The year 1904 was exceptional for its many diversified troubles in the open hearth department. In the last days of March, No. 2 furnace began to puff badly every time the valves were reversed. Heats began to melt very slowly. On Easter Sunday both furnaces were shut down and when they were heated up again it was found impossible to bring No. 2 furnace up to melting temperature. An examina- tion of the tunnels disclosed 14 inches of water under the checkers and tunnels. In attempting to run the furnace, much time and steel were lost until finally the roof fell in and a bad steel break-out resulted. Part of the steel ran into the slag pockets and dynamite had to be used to clear the furnace. A concrete mat was poured on the bottoms of the tunnels and checker chambers on which were laid hollow eight-inch tiles. Two courses of brick were laid above these tiles and grouted in. Then steam syphons lowered the water sufficiently that the furnace could again make steel. The water never rose higher than 6 inches in No. 1 furnace because the checker chambers were more shallow. A very serious fire broke out in the engine room July 30, 1904, causing so much damage that heat in No. 2 furnace was tapped into the pit to keep it from freezing in the furnace. In January of 1907 water again began to seep into No. 2 furnace. Finally the water rose till it practically shut off the tunnels and the furnace had to be shut down. Two fifty-foot wells were sunk at No. 2 stack, and in a week's time had lowered the water level in the adjacent ground sufficiently to clear water from No. 2 chambers, and no further trouble ensued. During the noon hour on July 10, 1906, a sudden storm tore down the boiler house stack and No. i open hearth stack. The falling stacks just missed the mule shed and [39] An Early Day Electric Charging Machine Struck the corner of the dinkey-engine cab in which the stock foreman was eating his lunch. The first water cooHng of gas ports on Central Works open hearth furnaces was tried in 1908. On account of very short roof-life and the difficulty in maintaining them the cooling of ports has always been a serious prob- lem of open hearth management. One inch pipes were put straight through the port end of the furnaces above the gas ports but were not very satisfactory. Vice-President R. B. Carnahan, who was at that time superintendent at Armco, and a pioneer in the open hearth steel making, was a man about whom many interesting stories are told. He was always intensely anxious to keep down delays. Once the stripping cranes broke down at a time when it was necessary to get a pit ready for the tap- ping of a heat. After a great deal of effort he succeeded in attaching a block and tackle to the roof trusses. He then fastened the tackle to a mold and attempted to use the stock yard mule for motive power. All his persuasive efforts were of no avail. The mule could not budge a single mold, and the attempt had to be dropped. In 1906, in order to improve charging time, increase ton- nage, and cut down cost, Mr. Carnahan bought a second-hand narrow-gauge locomotive. The furnace men resented this innovation because they believed he was trying to make steel [40] too fast. No one knew how to run the engine and no one wanted to learn till he secured the help of a C. L. & N. crew. In September 1909 ground was broken for No. 3 furnace, the capacity of which was to be fifty tons. During the period this furnace was being built it was necessary to make steel in an extremely small space because new crane girders had to be installed to carry the heavier ladle crane and heats. At the same time the building was extended consider- ably in order to house the foundry, and to eliminate the derrick for breaking slag and cinders north of the old shop. A yard crane for the stock yard was set up, and a ninety- ton ladle crane w^as purchased. No. 3 furnace was built for burning natural gas as fuel. As a result, a cheaper and simpler construction was possible. Both gas and air checkers were used for heating the air, as natural gas could not be preheated advantageously. One open port and one slag pocket were built on each end of the furnace. A new Blair valve was installed, as well as a new style of bottom binding for furnace iron work. In order to avoid any water trouble No. 3 checker chambers were not dug as deep as those of Numbers i and 2. The first heat from the new furnace was tapped March' 2, 1910. On account of electrical and mechanical troubles with the Blair valve and improperly designed port slopes of the furnace, it made only eighty heats on the first run. The Blair valve was discarded and replaced by a common An Early Picture of Armco Superintendents and Foremen [41] Velte valve and the port slope was changed, after which the furnace made a better showing. In 1910 a larger bar mill was installed at the Central Works in order to roll the increased tonnage from the open hearth department. Although on the roughing side the ingot had to be handled to a certain extent manually, the remainder of operations was largely mechanical. In A/lay 191 1, a small ten-ton furnace began making steel for foundry and experimental purposes. The furnace was the pan bottom type built by Armco to burn gas or oil. It had only one checker chamber, one slag pocket, and one port on each end. No separate stack was built at first but advantage was taken of an apparent excess draft from No. 3 stack. This arrangement held back both furn- aces and never proved satisfactory. In 1915 the capacity of No. 4 furnace was enlarged to twenty tons and the draft problem was solved by the erection of a new Ingot Iron stack. In 191 1 Knox water-cooled doors and frames were in- stalled at Central Works on all furnaces and the old style cast doors were scrapped. This change increased the com- fort and efficiency of the men very greatly so that the monthly tonnage of each furnace began to increase at once, because the men could watch their furnaces more closely with less physical discomfort. When these four furnaces began to make steel at the Central Works, handling so many heats with the bottom pour system becam.e a very serious problem. The stripping of ingots and the subsequent removal of sprues or runners from these ingots had to proceed with clocklike regu- larity unless the furnaces were to suffer delays. The pit was undoubtedly the narrow neck of the bottle. Riser heats, "cold" heats, poor stopper equipment, and other messes kept two assistants on the jump every minute, day and night. So many ingots stuck fast in the molds and could not be stripped that the cleaning floor at times was piled twenty feet high with a jumbled mass of stickers from dozens of heats. As these stickers had to be placed out of the operating area while still red hot they rarely had any identification marks. The mill had no stripper, and it was necessary to get the steel rolled as soon as possible. The common practice for stripping these sticker ingots was to attach the hooks of a long double chain to the lugs of each of two of these molds [42] and drag them out of the pile with an overhead travehng crane. The craneman then swung these molds back and forth until they were often as high as the crane girders. On the next downward swing the molds were allowed to strike a large roll on the cleaning floor. Something had to let go. Ordinarily the ingot flew out of the mold like a shot out of a cannon. At other times the molds were broken into pieces, or the chains would be torn apart. This practice was very efl'ective in removing the ingots stuck in the molds but as the operation was carried on in the midst of an active working area, it was unsafe and dangerous, to say the least. For this reason a horizontal hydraulic stripper was built. This machine was rather clumsy and difficult to operate. Pit foremen despised the apparatus and deliberately bent the ram at frequent intervals. In consequence repair and maintenance cost was so high that the operation had to be abandoned. The men willingly reverted to the more dangerous but also more effective method of knocking out stickers with the crane. On September l6, 191 1, the first large top-pour molds were poured at the Central Works. Since that date practi- cally all heats have been top-poured into large molds on buggies, except heats of electrical steel which were bottom- poured till January 191 2. This final transition from bottom-pour to top-pour was made on completion of East Side Works where such large ingots could be handled. After that date all ingots produced at Central Works open hearth were poured into large molds resting on stout iron buggies. These buggies were moved promptly to the East Side W^orks and placed in the soaking pits there while they were still red hot. They were in this manner made avail- able for "breaking down" at the new blooming mill. The old casting pit at Central Works was dug out and a de- pressed track served by a pouring platform was built. At this time the deep, dangerous ladle holes were eliminated. Up to this time the foundry had hovered around the outskirts of the open hearth department, making castings for the maintenance department. Now the former mold storage space in the pit was transformed into a foundry. A separate department was created, and some castings were made for outside concerns. The building of the East Side Works about a mile east of the Central Works, was an event in Armco's history. It began operations in September, 1911. [43] Three seventy-fivc-ton open hearth furnaces, of the most modern type known at that time, were erected in a large, airy building. These furnaces were built above the ground level and were completely enclosed in a very heavy, per- manent structural steel building. Four individual checker chambers regenerated the gas and air. A producer gas plant was built parallel to the open hearth building where three mechanically-stoked revolving Hughes producers, with their complement of dust catchers, dampers, and gas mains, served each furnace. All the accessories of a well equipped steel plant, such as stockyards with traveling crane, refractory plant, skull cracker, stripper cranes, and standard gauge engines, were provided. The skull cracker with its sixty-foot drop was a vast improvement over the derrick at the Central Works and the mechanically operated stripper crane with its powerful ram made the problem of sticker ingots of small conse- quence. Increased tonnages and a desire for more flexi- bility demanded a discontinuance of the old narrow-gauge system. Transportation at the East Side, as the new plant was named, was equipped with standard gauge tracks. Several safety features were incorporated in the new plant design, such as wider back-standings for the furnaces, safety platforms for the ladlemen and ladle cranemen, and a change from chains on crane hoists to cables. This latter change was soon afterwards made on Central Works cranes. From the beginning the steel at the East Side has been poured into ladles resting on ladle stands under the spout. The one hundred and twenty-five ton ladle crane then picks up the ladle and pours the steel into molds by the top-pour method. After the steel has solidified in the molds, buggies holding them are pulled to the stripper yard. There the stripper lifts the molds from the ingots and sets them in a drag of empty buggies. The ingots are then picked up by the tongs of a pit crane and deposited in mod- ern soaking pits in the blooming and bar mill departments. After being brought to the proper temperature, the ingots are rolled on a 40" blooming mill into blooms or billets. The blooms are then cut into suitable lengths by a large mechanically operated shear. From the shear they pro- ceed without any reheating to the bar mill where they are rolled into either eight inch or twelve inch bars of any desired thickness from three-eighths inch to one and one- half inches. The bars are then cooled on a large cooling [44] bed and sheared into thirty-foot lengths or into sheet bar sizes. The first heat at East Side Works was poured success- fully from No. 7 furnace on September ii, 191 1. The other two furnaces tapped steel a short time later. The open hearth management was faced with the im- portant problem of creating an organization imbued with Armco ideals. The school of experience soon taught that few furnace men from other plants were fitted to oper- ate furnaces at Armco, because their training had been to turn out tonnage irrespective of quality. The han- dling of Ingot Iron heats was a closed book to them, and they did not yield readily to new methods. At an early date, efi^orts were made to develop a crew of sober, loyal furnace men recruited from the locality and ac- quainted with the Armco ideal. One by one the out- siders were dropped because they were unable or unwilling to follow in the new path. The experience of the succeed- ing years had strengthened the belief that furnace men who had to uphold Armco's standard must be trained at Armco. In the spring of 191 2 business was dull and only one or two furnaces were operated at the Central Works. At this time No. 2 furnace was shut down for a general repair in order to remove the steel salamander which was in the bottom of the furnace and which was holding up the enlargement of the furnace. Attempts were made to dig out the steel, but to no avail, nor was the use of one- hundred-ton jacks more successful; so an expert dynamiter was secured who broke up the chunk of steel into five pieces, weighing in all five hundred and six thousand pounds. The work was very cleverly done so that no one was in- jured, though the piece broken was solid steel and measured eight feet thick, thirteen feet wide, and twenty-seven feet long. During the years from 1910 to 1912 various furnaces were equipped with oil burning apparatus. At this time No. 2 furnace was changed so that it might burn fuel oil. The trials and tribulations with this fuel were very great on account of the variation in specific gravity of the oil. At times a car arrived that was almost pure gasoline mak- ing it necessary to keep an exceptionally close watch on the furnace. Again, especially in winter time, cars would arrive in which the oil was so thick that it could have been Old TiiiE Sheet Bar Ready for Last Pass on Finishing Mill shoveled out. Such cars had to be heated with hve steam to make the oil liquid enough to run into tanks. In 191 2 another small cyclone visited Middletown and blew down all the boiler house stacks. They fell through the roof of the bar mill building into the mill just one-half hour before the crew came out to start their Sunday night turn. No one was hurt. Great excitement prevailed. Men lost their heads and wanted to tap all the heats into the pit. Calmer judgment prevailed. The gas was shut off and the metal allowed to chill. Later, after the stacks had been rebuilt, the heats were melted without any very serious loss. On March 25, 191 3, the most devastating flood the Miami \'alley has ever experienced, swept through Middletown. The A'liami River, usually a very small stream, had become so swollen by melting snow and many days of rainfall, that it became a rushing torrent, carrying everything be- fore it. At eight A.A-l. the banks of the A/[iami and Erie Canal adjacent to the mill property began to overflow. At that time furnaces Nos. 2 and 3 were ready to tap, and the iron in Nos. i and 4 was almost melted. About this time frantic wives began calling their hus- bands home. Before long only a corporal's guard was left. No. 3 furnace was tapped. In the meanwhile as man}^ men as could be spared were sent to the north end (46I 'I'hic 1913 Flood £ \Iaiu Office. - — Curtis Avenue Alongside Sheet Mill and Open Hearth. 3 — Showing Depth of Water on Curtis Avenue. of the mill to build a dam out of railroad ties and slag. Just before tlie pouring of No. 3 heat was completed, an enormous mass of water came rolling south on Curtis Avenue. It soon reached tlie improvised dam. The crest of the wave scattered the ties like cliaff, and water began rusliing down the depressed track. By the time all the steel had been poured into molds, the water had risen till it was above the bottom of the molds. Only the quickest work saved an explosion when the slag from the heat was dumped in No. i ladle hole. Confusion reigned supreme. The water penetrated into the slag pockets and checker chambers of all the furn- aces. When one considers that these chambers contained over sixty thousand white hot bricks, it is a wonder that the entire plant was not blown up at once. The steam, however, blew open all the sealed doors, which relieved the pressure in an increciibly short time. The water filled the entire pit. It came within half a foot of the top of No. 2 tap hole. It is problematical what would have happened had the molten heat in this furnace tapped its one hundred and thirty-five thousand pounds of liquid steel into this mass of water. Oblivious to the danger tiiey were in, furnace men threw up a small dam between No. i and No. 2 ladle holes while all this was transpiring. This dam, by holding back some of the water, undoubtedly saved No. i furnace from the fate of Nos. 2 and 3. Within half an hour a mass of boiling water, in places over fifteen feet deep, covered the entire open hearth department. The roar of the steam escaping from the checker cham- bers could be heard for a great distance. The steam rose in a solid column many hundred feet over the furnace building. A short time later, when the water floated the open hearth underground oil-tanks, the oil flowed out of the broken connections and was carried under the boilers by a current of water. There the boiler fires set the oil ablaze and a fire chemical wagon had to be dragged through the water from the factory to extinguish the fire. The assistant superintend- ent of the open hearth department and two others stayed in the plant all day. At night, on oil barrels nailed together in the form of a raft, they ferried themselves from the factory entrance, which is part of the old office across Cur- tis Avenue, and landed in the yard of the research building. Four days later, after the water had subsided, the entire plant presented a woeful spectacle. Slime and mud covered everything. The sight of such devastation, the ghostly silence, and the stench of the mud reminded one of the stories travelers tell of abandoned cities in plague infested regions of Asia. Formaldehyde had to be scattered everywhere to pro- tect workers from disease. The open hearth furnaces were a sight to behold. The bottom of No. 3 furnace was a mass of powder filling the entire furnace. The heat of steel in No. 2 furnace had been forced up to the roof of the furnace by the expansion of the bottom materials. No. 4 furnace was warped badly. The iron work and roof of No. I furnace had become badly bent and shoved out of line by the expansion of the brick work. For once a steel salamander in a bottom was an asset as it prevented the bottom from slacking. Though only a caricature of its former self, the furnace was immediately lit up and made a creditable run before it had to be torn down. After all the iron work of the furnace had been removed, the steel heat in No. 2 furnace had to be shoved into the pit with very large jacks, a job which was very difficult due to the lack of a crane over the furnace. No. 3 bottom was shoveled out. It is worthy of note, as evidence of the improvement in furnace practice, that when these two bottoms were taken out, very little steel was found in either although No. 3 had been operating more than three years. This makes a very favorable comparison with the two hundred and fifty tons taken out of No. 2 at an earlier date. November 26, 1913, No. 8 furnace was finished and the first heat tapped, which completed the unit at the East Side Works as originally designed. All furnaces were run till the summer of 1914. August saw the outbreak of the World War. In a very short time business came to a standstill. Central Works open hearth furnaces, with the exception of No. 4 furnace, were shut down, and in the spring of 1915 only two furnaces remained in operation at the East Side. In May, 1915, orders for steel forgings for Russian shells began to increase the demand for steel so that by late sum- mer of that year all the furnaces were again in operation at both works. [49] Armco's long experience in making high grade iron and steel enabled the company to produce the very difficult grade of steel needed for high explosive shells, without any delay. When the war broke out, several essentials in open hearth furnace practice disappeared. Among these items were Austrian and Grecian magnesite, ferro manganese, chrome ore, and magnesite brick. A stock of three hundred thousand pounds of Aus- trian magnesite on hand when Germany declared war was put under lock and key for future use. Magnesite brick disappeared entirely; consequently clay brick had to be used in the front and back walls and in the ports of the furnaces. This practice gave fair re- sults in other plants; but at Armco, on account of the manufacture of Ingot Iron, this practice was extremely costly and disastrous. Breakouts were very frequent thru the necks, front and back walls. Much steel was lost, furnace binding was badly damaged, and chill boxes were filled with steel. Nos. 7 and 8 furnaces had to be completely rebuilt in 1919, partly on this account. The lack of high grade chrome ore was very seriously felt in the manufacture of Ingot Iron, because of the neces- sity, when making this grade, of using large quantities in ports, tap holes, and jams of doors. Often chrome ore, specified as 45% chromic oxide and under 6% silica, would arrive with 25% chromic oxide and as high as 30% silica, making it practically worthless. English ferro-manganese was a standardized, uniform product before the war. The American substitute was very irregular in physical and chemical properties, and gave a great deal of trouble in the making of certain grades. In 191 5 No. 4, an experimental furnace at Central Works, was enlarged to a twenty ton furnace and the bot- tom was burnt in with magnesite and slag. In the spring of 1916 the capacity of the East Side open hearth department was increased by the addition of four one-hundred-ton furnaces. Once again the department was called upon to make maximum tonnage while major build- ing operations were being pressed to completion. No. 9, the first furnace finished, tapped a heat on September 25, 1917. The other furnaces were lit in succession till No. 12 was making steel on December 15, 191 7. [so] All the auxiliaries, such as enlarged stock yards, gas producers, charging machine, ladle crane, stripper crane, and new mold yard were added at this time. The same style of valves as those on the small furnaces was installed and electrical control was provided for doors and valves. A new type of back standing was installed and other slight modifications were made, but, as a whole, the original de- sign was continued. Operating difficulties during all the years of the war were very trying. Some new obstacle came up constantly. The climax probably came during the winter of 1917. In that fall the transportation problem began to grow very acute. The Government was bending every effort to speed up shipments of soldiers, supplies, and munitions of war. Commercial freight business became very badly de- moralized, and it was difficult to obtain supplies. Further- more the winter of 1917 was the coldest in twenty years. Hundreds of trains were stalled for weeks behind snow- drifts. Shipments were weeks and months overdue. The men of the sales department had to be called into service as traffic men in order to speed up belated shipments of raw materials so that the open hearth department could continue to operate. In the meanwhile the open hearth management had to divide the time between keeping pipes thawed out, molds dry, tracks cleared of snowdrifts, and devising sub- stitutes for supplies that did not arrive. The hydraulic jacks immediately on top of the furnaces froze while the furnace was in operation. On December 6 the temperature went to ten degrees below zero and operations almost ceased. Large kettles of coffee had to be kept steaming in order to get men outside to load the scrap and pig iron. Later in the winter, on many occasions, the depart- ment came within twenty-four hours of a complete shut- down,' due to the exhaustion of a certain supply. Then relief would come. The very next day the same condition might occur from the lack of some other material. At times heats had to be poured through sleeve brick. At other times nozzle brick had to be used as sleeve brick. Molds had to be poured till they simply would not hold any more steel. Any common brick had to be bought for use in the ladles so that at times a ladle fining would last only one heat. [51] The coal received at the gas house was often little better than coal from a coal dump. It was full of slate, and often very finely divided. The producers clinkered very badly, and the gas produced was of such poor quality that heats had to be held in the furnace for many hours. This caused "cut banks," bad furnace bottoms, "off analysis" heats, and other troubles. From a furnace maintenance standpoint, the most serious problem faced by the open hearth department at the East Side was the wear and tear of ingot iron heats on the furnaces. In this connection, the question of an adequate supply of clean, cool water to cool essential parts of the furnaces was uppermost in every one's mind. When the East Side furnaces were originally built the supply of water was sufficient to take care of the open hearth needs because fuel oil was used. Later, when producer gas began to be used, the problem of protecting the gas port became important. As dry ports were hard to maintain and never were satisfactory, a patented Parks' port was installed, and gave good results until No. 8 furnace was built. The water supply then became inadequate. Further troubles resulted whenever the water supply was discontinued, even for a short time, due to electrical storms or some other cause which put pumps temporarily out of com- mission; for at such times all the water-cooled pipes would burn out. Furnace maintenance became so expensive and loss of tonnage so serious, that a new circulating system was installed at the time the new furnaces were built in 1917 in order to prevent the water being shut off when the river pump failed. As this system used the main mill supply, in order to economize on the use of water, it was never satisfactor}^, because the initial temperature of the water was too high for such "hard" water. In the year 1920 an entirely new water cooling system was devised and work was begun on its installation in the fall. A large, concrete cooling basin, one hundred and forty-two feet by ninety-four feet with three-inch spray cooling nozzles was built several hundred feet from the open hearth plant. All waste water from the open hearth department runs to this pond by gravity. The cooled water returns by gravity to the open hearth pumps, south of the open hearth building, which have sufficient capacity [5^] (six thousand gallons a minute) to supply all needs for water cooling furnaces. The make-up water, which should not exceed 3%, will consist of treated, filtered water, and therefore should cause very little deposit in cooling equipment. A great deal of excitement was caused in the spring of 191 8 when No. 9 furnace at the East Side Works blew up an hour after it had been charged. The gas checker roofs and the entire main roof from end to end were blown off. Because the explosion happened in war time, the be- lief was expressed that foreigners had blown the furnace up with dynamite. To this day the exact cause has never been discovered. The Armistice on November 11, 1918, changed con- ditions in the space of a few days. War orders were can- celled, and Central Works open hearth department, with the exception of No. 4 furnace, was shut down. The or- ganization was transferred to the East Side, and absorbed in the East Side open hearth organization. The shut down of the forge shop curtailed operations still further. On account of the lack of orders no heats were made from January 24 to February 9, 1919, and during the greater part of the year 1919 only six furnaces were operated. As they were manned by the pick of the crews from both works, excellent results were obtained. In August 1919 the management decided to stud)^ the possibility and advisability of instituting the three-shift day in the open hearth and the blooming mill departments. Accordingly, the betterment department began to make a very detailed survey, and study of open hearth organiza- tion and operations. In midst of this work, in which the furnace men gave a great deal of help, the much heralded "great steel strike" was called. Men of Armco, true to tradition, did not give the strike very much attention; but during October, when the strike was at its height Armco proceeded to break all monthly tonnage records for the year. Repre- sentatives of the steel strikers visited Middletown and inter- viewed several of the open hearth men. Their reception was so cool that they left immediately. In December 1919, as the effects of the steel strike be- gan to wear off, the entire country was paralyzed by the coal strike. As all manufacturing establishments require large tonnages of coal, this strike struck home at once. [S3] But farsightedness had prepared Armco for just such an emergency. Central Works open hearth department, after a year's shut down, was started and in a short time was making steel, using oil as a fuel. East Side furnaces, though built for producer gas, were converted temporarily into oil furnaces in forty-eight hours. As a result, Armco did not shut down, and orders began to come in from all sides. In the meanwhile the study of the three-shift plan had continued for a period of more than six months without hindrance, and on March I, 1920, the open hearth de- partment began to operate on the three-shift basis. In a short time the organization had expanded from a six- to a twelve-furnace crew. In addition, one-third more first and second helpers had to be created to put the new scheme into effect. Again the leadership and assistance of the foremen had to save the day. It was a risky under- taking. Many of the first helpers had not had very much experience in running a furnace; but their enthusiasm, willingness to learn, and cooperation with their foreman were great assets and the men produced results. This change from the two-shift day to the three-shift day, was not actuated alone by a desire to improve work- ing conditions. The conviction had been formed that men on continuous operation of twenty-four hours a day, could do more and better work without raising the cost if they worked eight hours a day instead of twelve. One of the main conditions of the change was that cost must not be increased or the scheme would be economically un- sound. There is no doubt that men, who for many years had worked the two shifts, now had more time to spend with their families. Home held a new meaning to the whole family which acted as an incentive for better and more efficient work. Following on the heels of the coal strike came another one in the form of an "outlaw railroad strike." Like the former, it struck at the very vitals of manufacturing, and quickly produced a depression in business. The traffic department was again called upon to expedite ship- ments in and out of the plant. Again Armco did not shut down any producing units. The greatest difficulty en- countered was the job of getting sufficient pig iron from Columbus to Middletown. [S4] During the summer of 1920, needed repairs for the Columbus blast furnaces brought the open hearth depart- ment to such a point that for weeks the pig iron on hand at the steel furnace in Middletown could almost be counted at the beginning of each day. The company was forced to buy any pig iron it could get, which resulted in the pur- chase of an odd assortment of off-grade pig iron. In the use of this material great care had to be exercised in order to keep furnace and quality troubles at a minimum. In the fall traffic conditions improved. Supplies began to come in on schedule. Columbus blast furnaces were again in operation, and were turning out pig iron at a rapid rate. The organization was keyed to top notch for a record production, when almost out of a clear sky, came the "buyers" strike, the beginning of the Great World War readjustment period. In this narrative, chronological as far as possible, an attempt has been made to hit only the high spots in the open hearth department's variegated history during these twenty years. Accidents, messes, lost heats, and other more or less spectacular operating difficulties are the ex- ceptional events, and thus make history. At the same time, in between the lines should be read the gradual, steady, and substantial progress from the archaic methods of steel manufacture in the early days, the lack of care in steel making, and the disregard of the human element, to the present highly developed modern practice with its many ramifications, both in operation and in quality control; and to the development of an industrious, sober, loyal organization able and willing to carry out the ideals of Armco's founders, and to impress quality in all of Arm- co's products. I5SJ o s O Chapter III History of the Zanesville ARMCO Plant The Building of the Zanesville Plant — The Work of the Citizens League — Rolling of the First Bar — Merger JVith ARMCO — Making Tin Plate — Neui Additions to the Plant — The Zanesville ARMCO Association. GROUND was broken for the erection of a sheet mill plant, now known as the Zanesville Division of The American Rolling Mill Co., in the city of Zanesville, Ohio, May i, 1901. The corporation back of this enterprise was known as The Curtis Sheet Steel and Corrugating Co. The location of the plant in Zanesville was brought about by chance conversation at the Clarendon Hotel between a traveling man and the president of the Citizens League of Zanesville, an organization which preceded the Chamber of Commerce. The traveling man happened to mention that he had been told by two fellow passengers who had just entered the hotel that they represented a steel concern and were going to locate a plant in Coshocton, Ohio. Through the manager of the hotel, the president of the Citizens League was introduced to the strangers, who proved to be E. H. Curtis and Lou Jack. A strong bid was made for locating the new plant at Zanesville. The directors of the Citizens League were called on the phone and a meeting arranged for although it was then past 10 o'clock at night, and when the meeting adjourned at 2 o'clock the next morning a rolling mill was assured for Zanesville. Associated with Mr. Curtis in the enterprise were some of the men formerly employed by the Hyde Park Iron & Steel Co., which had been taken over by The American Sheet & Tin Plate Co. Some of the rollers still engaged were among the original stockholders. The original plant consisted of a bar mill and four sheet mills. The first bar was rolled October 15, 1901, and the following day the first sheet was rolled with two mills operating. [S7l Bar Storage at the ZanesvilLe Plant Much was expected of the new plant. The venture, however, was incompletely financed and in a short time found itself in deep water. In 1902 the principal interests were taken over by W. S. Horner and business associates, of Pittsburgh, Pa., and the name of the corporation was changed to The Muskingum Valley Steel Company. From 1902 to 1905 the plant operated under more favorable circumstances, and the fifth and sixth mills were installed. During this time Mr. W. S. Horner took hold of the exec- utive management of the business and was in charge of sales. In this connection he made several trades with The American Rolling Mill Co., of Middletown, in which Armco furnished the bars against which the Zanesville concern supplied sheets. Independent purchases of steel bars from Armco were also made and the two concerns drew closer and closer together in their business relation- ship. After several years' trading of that sort, a merger was suggested and effected on June 24, 1905. Mr. W. T. Simpson, Vice President of The American Rolling Mill, took personal charge of the Zanesville plant, which position he held until his death in 191 5. The Zanesville plant has shared in the activities and growth of Armco. In the spring of 191 2, work was started covering the erection of a tin house consisting of six com- [58] plete sets of tin stacks. The manufacture of terne plate was started in April, I9i2,but it did not prove a satisfactory venture and was discontinued August i, 1916. In later years the plant has chiefly been engaged in making high- grade electrical steel sheets for which there has been a large and growing demand. As the business continued to grow, additions were made from time to time to the Zanesville plant. A seventh sheet mill was added to the plant and it began operation on April 17, 1916; the eighth sheet mill on July 17, 1919; and the ninth sheet mill on February 9, 1920. In the great period of industrial expansion which took place in Armco during 1920, a group of business men representing the Zanesville Chamber of Commerce and the city officials visited Middletown with an earnest petition that a considerable part of Armco's expansion be made in Zanesville. The board of directors of The American Rolling Mill Co. held their next meeting in Zanesville and went over the situation very thoroughly. As a result, the first of January 1920 saw the work started on the construction of a complete new "four-mill" unit at Zanesville — also large extensions to the power department, annealing department, warehouse buildings and crane runways. This development Sheet Mills at Zanesville Plant [60] The Zanes\'ille Akmco Band on a Visit to Middletoun provided a substantial increase in the industrial life of Zanesville and gave employment to 200 to 300 men, making the total personnel of the Zanesville plant then approx- imately 800 men. The new sheet mill building is 90 x 200 feet and is most modernly equipped throughout. The roll train is driven by a 1000 H.P. electric motor. In the extension of the annealing building, eight new annealing furnaces were provided. A 750 kilowatt turbine engine, with room for another of the same size to be added later, was installed in the new power house, which more than tripled the former power of the plant and provided ample power for the driv- ing of the new mills by electric motors. A new brick stack 7 ft. in diameter and 200 ft. high and a new 600 H.P. Stirling boiler were added to the boiler plant. A large pumphouse was installed on the Muskingum river to pro- vide ample water for the operation of the high and low pressure turbines. The new four-mill unit at Zanesville started operation January 17, 1921, the first sheet being rolled by D. S. Dodds, who rolled the first sheet in the original Zanesville plant October 16, 1901. The employees of the plant at Zanesville are loyal and enthusiastic. The system of promotion which applies all through the Armco organization applies in Zanesville & where "roughers" and "sheet heaters" are advanced to the positions of "rollers," the "pair heaters" to "sheet heat- ers," the "catchers" to "roughers," the "doublers" to "catchers" or "pair heaters," and the "matchers" to "doub- lers." The advancement is based on length of service with the company and ability to hold down the new jobs. The Zanesville Armco plant is distinctive for the large number of young men from the farms and outlying sections of Zanesville who have heard the call of industry and found their first position with The American Rolling Mill Co. Young men enter the organization at the bottom of the ladder and climb round by round. A large number of the men occupying responsible positions at the Zanesville plant stepped directly from the farm into the steel works. Sometimes the advancement has been very rapid, depend- ing upon the aptitude of the person and also upon the rowth and expansion of the business. The Armco Association at Zanesville is an integral part of the Armco Association with headquarters at Mid- dletown. It has its own club room where Armco men and their families meet for social diversion. The Zanes- ville Band, the Mando Club, the Orchestra, the Drum Corps, the Baseball Team and the Clown Band — all of these go to make up the recreational forces of Armco at Zanesville. A cordial relationship exists between the men of Zanesville and the men of Middletown, and on National Armco DaA', September 25, 1920, the band from Zanesville and many hundreds of the employees made a pilgrimage to Middletown where they helped to make the day a great success. For years the Armco Association at Zanesville was housed in one of the large buildings in the main part of the city. Later it was moved into a commodious club house near the plant. A new Association club house and entertainment building with athletic grounds adjacent are now planned. When this is completed the Armco Associa- tion of Zanesville will have a real home that will give happiness to the men and their families for years to come, as the Zanesville plant continues to grow with the larger destiny of Armco. [62] Chapter IV The Advent of the Blooming and Bar Mill Change to Big Mill Practice — Description of Blooming Mill Practice — Practice of Pint Year — Growth in Tonnage — Extension of Equipment — Eight Hour Turn and Pro- duction on Bonus — Tonnage Records. THE operation of the blooming and bar mill de- partment of the American Rolling Mill Company when the East Side Works was completed in 191 1 was an epoch making event in the compan^^'s history. It marked the change from small scale to large scale production with the greater economy and efficiency which that entails. Formerly it had been necessary to pour small ingots for the bar mill. With the new blooming mill large ingots could be poured, production speeded up, and a vastly greater tonnage secured. When the ingots are extracted from the ingot molds by powerful stripping cranes they are solid on the out- side but still in a molten state within. In order to bring the ingots to a solid state and a uniform heat, twelve soaking pits with cranes for handling the ingots were built and put into operation immediately adjacent to the blooming mill. In addition there was a crane in the blooming mill and another in the slab yard. After the ingots have reached a uniform temperature, in the soaking pits, the soaking pit crane delivers them to a roller table in the blooming mill. In the mill the white hot ingots are guided back and forth through the blooming rolls until they are reduced to the proper size for the bar mill. Three men on a platform overlooking the blooming mill control the ingots during the rolling process. Each of these has a different duty to perform but each must coordinate with the others in the manipulation of the heavy machinery. In the blooming and bar mills, ingots from the soaking pits are rolled out thinner and thinner till at the close of the process the ingot has taken the shape of a long narrow thin bar which after being cut into short lengths at the bar mill shears is ready to be rolled into sheets or light plates. [63] Rolling the First Ingot The blooming mill began operations on September 9, 191 1, and for one month operated on one twelve-hour shift per day until the East Side bar mill got into opera- tion after which it went on two twelve-hour shifts per day. During the month of October, 191 1, seven thousand, four hundred and ninety-three tons were rolled. In November, the month following, nine thousand, five hundred and ninety-three tons were rolled; but in December the tonnage decreased to eight thousand, one hundred and thirty-two tons. In 1912 the blooming and bar mill operated all year on two twelve-hour turns. A total of one hundred and twenty thousand, nine hundred and fifty- nine tons was rolled, the record month being November with twelve thousand, two hundred and thirty-three tons to its credit. The efficiency of the department was some- what increased by the addition of a new crane in the slab yard to handle the tonnage of sheet bars. The year 191 3 showed an increased tonnage on the blooming and bar mill, a hundred and thirty-five thousand, seven hundred and sixty-seven tons being rolled with a record of fourteen thousand, one hundred and fifty tons for the month of January. The two twelve-hour turns continued until November 24, when the remainder of the year was finished on one twelve-hour turn. [64] January and February, 1914, saw the blooming and bar mill continuing on its single turn, but the double turn was resumed on A-larch 3, for three months, after that time it was replaced by the single turn for the rest of the year. Conditions did not improve in the blooming and bar mill until A/lay 19, 1915, when it went back on double turn for the rest of the year. A large amount of new business came from orders for steel forgings for shells for the Russian government. This business began in May and ex- tended to November. A total of one hundred fifty thousand, one hundred and seven tons were rolled during the year, the record month being December with a pro- duction of fifteen thousand, nine hundred thirty-seven tons. The year 1916 saw the blooming mill operating on double turn throughout the entire year, during which time it rolled one hundred eighty-seven thousand, one hundred sixty-three tons, of which twenty-four thousand, eight hundred and sixty tons were shell steel for the British government. The record month for this year was Decem- ber which showed a tonnage of sixteen thousand, seven hundred and nine tons. The full double-turn operations were continued during the year 1917, with a total production of two hundred nineteen thousand, one hundred seventy-seven tons. By this time the blooming and bar mill was getting into its stride. The single turn record of the mill was broken May 13, 1917, when No. i turn rolled three hundred and twelve ingots, or six hundred seventeen tons. The monthly record was also broken with a total tonnage of twenty thousand, eight hundred and eighty-three tons. During this year the soaking pits were extended and a new stripper crane installed, in order to take care of the rapidly in- creasing tonnage of the mills. The year 191 8 saw a still further increase in the number of tons rolled, the total tonnage for the year being two hundred and twenty-four thousand, two hundred and twenty-five tons, with the mill operating double turn. The record month was October when twenty-five thousand, forty tons were rolled, and the single turn record was also broken June 25 when three hundred seventy-six ingots, or a total of six hundred seventy-eight tons, were turned out. [65] A new chipping building used in the manufacture of shells was completed during this year, and the blooming and bar mill saw a number of special improvements. The mill roller's pulpit was moved back and a high transfer, a forty-inch saw, tables, and other equipment were in- stalled in the bar mill, in order to facilitate production. During the year 1919 the blooming mill did not break either its yearly or monthly production record, falling be- hind the previous year's record by twenty thousand tons, and failing to equal the monthly production record by about five thousand tons. During this year some two hundred men who had been busily engaged chipping the billets for shell forgings, were permanently discharged and the department closed down. During the year 1920 the blooming mill crews made a determined effort to break all former production records. Their efforts were crowned with success as during the year the mill turned out two hundred and ninety thousand, two hundred forty-seven tons, the record month being March when thirty thousand two hundred thirteen tons were rolled. It was during this year that the blooming mill was put on the three-shift basis, with a tonnage bonus. The best run for an eight-hour turn was made on June 6, when five hundred fifty-five tons were rolled, and the record for a twenty-four-hour day was made February 18, with a production of thirteen hundred and twenty-six tons. The average tonnage for an eight-hour turn during the year was three hundred fifty-eight tons, and the average production bonus paid was 35%. In eight years without anything like a proportionate increase in equipment the blooming and bar mills more than doubled their output. Their production of roughly one hundred twenty-one thousand tons in 191 2 contrasts sharply with the two hundred ninety thousand tons rolled in 1920. Its record during that period stands as an Index to Armco accomplishments In the past and is an Indication of what may be expected in the future. [67] o u a Chapter V The Blast Furnace Division Properties of the Blast Furnace Division — Construction and Equipment oj Blast Furnaces — Limestone Supply — Coke Supply — Coal Supply — Transportation Companies. THE Blast Furnace Division of The American Rol- ling Mill Company, producing the pig iron for the Middletown works, consists not only of its blast furnaces and coal mines, but al;.o of coke ovens, iron ore mines, timber land, and transportation lines, with gener- ous reserves of coal, iron ore, and timber; a long-time contract for limestone provides the blast furnaces with a full supply of excellent flux. Thus the Blast Furnace Division controls its own raw materials, being practically self-contained, and thereby assuring dependable sources for pig iron and fuel for the open hearth furnaces and rolling mills. At the close of 1920 the Blast Furnace Division owned wholly or in part the following properties, the history and development of which form an interesting chapter in the growth of Armco from a small plant to a great corporation. Annual Capacity 2 blast furnaces 240,000 tons pig iron I sinter plant 24,000 tons sinter I by-product coke plant with its own coal mine 360,000 tons coke 3 coal mines 300,000 tons coal 21 iron ore mines 2,000,000 tons iron ore 19 lake ore vessels 156,400 tons carrying capacity 9500 acres timber land In these properties are reserves of more than eighty million tons of coal, fully forty million tons of iron ore, and at least eight million feet of timber. These properties were acquired by The American Rolling Mill in 1917 when it effected the merger with The Columbus Iron and Steel Company whereby the two companies were consolidated, payment being given for the Columbus Company in stock of The American Rolling Mill Company. [69] In the autumn of 1899 a group of men, already engaged in the manufacture and sale of pig iron, conceived the idea of building two blast furnaces at Columbus, Ohio, for the manufacture of merchant pig iron. In this they were no doubt influenced by the fact that Columbus was located in the center of a heavy consuming district with advantageous rates of freight, which opened up a wide territory to the sale of its products; also by the un- usual transportation facilities, eight lines of railroads at that time entering the city. Columbus is located near large limestone deposits suitable for flux, but its greatest advantage is its location directly in the path of the stream of coal that goes from West Virginia and Kentucky direct to the Great Lakes region, and in the path of the great stream of ore going in the opposite direc- tion from the Great Lakes to the interior furnaces. Construction work on the new plant was started late in 1899, ^i^d the first furnace was blown in on October 17, 1900. The east furnace was completed the following winter and blown in on April 9, 1901. These furnaces and the sinter plant, which was later constructed, are located on an eighteen acre tract adjoining the southern corporation line of the city of Columbus. It has direct connections with the Hocking Valley and the Toledo & Ohio Central railroads. To the east of Parsons Avenue, which bounds the east side of this eighteen acre tract, the company owns eighty-two acres of land. Part of this land is used for the work of the plant, part for an industrial Y. M. C. A. for playground, baseball field, and athletic grounds, about twenty acres for employees' gardens, and the rest is rented out as farm land. Compared with merchant blast furnaces of that period, the two furnaces when built represented the most improved designs and attracted much favorable notice from trade journals. The double skip hoist which was designed for the use of the Columbus blast furnaces was a great invention and in general design has not been improved upon since. With minor alterations these skips are still in use at the Columbus Works. The two blast furnaces as originally built were seventy- five feet high with seventeen foot bosh, both with a capacity of about one hundred seventy-five tons a day. The original boilers and blowing engines have been entirely replaced with up-to-date equipment, which includes two [70] IxTKRiOR View" of Cast Hoi sl blowing engines for each furnace and an extra one which can be used on either furnace in case of necessity. The original pig beds were of sand, requiring long cast houses which have been entirely replaced by the steep roofed steel cast houses adapted for casting into pig machines. In 1905 the sand pig bed at east furnace was replaced witli a cast iron "chill" pig bed for the mak- ing of basic iron, and in 1910 this improvement was made at west furnace. These "chills" were used for all grades of pig iron up to the time of installation of modern, single strand pig casting machines with overhead cranes and "short pour" seventy-five ton casting ladles in 1916 and 191 8. Originally, wooden trestles were used for the storage of ore and the unloading of coke and stone, but these have since been entirely replaced with steel trestles, and steel bins. Until 1914 all the ore and limestone was loaded into hand buggies and dumped into the skip cars. In that year electric scale cars were installed and the practice of handling all material directly through steel bins and these electric larry cars was begun. In 1909 the first locomotive crane was put in service. The use of cranes has developed until at present all pig [71] iron is handled with a magnet crane, and all ore and other material is moved by tvventy-five-ton bucket cranes. Before the installation of these labor-saving devices about three hundred men were required to operate the furnaces, but at present one hundred fifty men are able fo obtain considerably more tonnage than could the old crew of three hundred. The Columbus blast furnaces are unique in regard to their water supply. Usually blast furnaces are located near rivers or bodies of water in order to obtain the large quantities of water necessary for cooling, and for the boilers. Underlying the whole of the Columbus plant is a body of limestone gravel extending from a few feet below the ground level to as deep, in some places, as ninety feet. This gravel contains a large body of underground water estimated to be a total of about fifty-seven million gallons. For over twenty years water was pumped through driven wells, the steam pumps being placed in pump pits from twelve to twenty feet below the surface of the ground. At times the water would "drop away" from the pumps, making it necessary to drive the wells deeper. Finally it was decided (in 1920) after a thorough investigation of the available water supplies, to install a Layne and Bowler deep-well electric pump capable of producing one million gallons every twenty-four hours. Gradually the capacity of the two furnaces has increased from one hundred thousand tons per annum to two hundred forty thousand tons in 1920. In the first twenty-one years of their history the two furnaces together produced two million four hundred twenty thousand tons of pig iron, the record year being in 1920 when the production rose to one hundred eighty-six thousand, seven hundred and eighteen tons. In spite of the fact that repairs were badly needed on both furnaces they were kept in continuous blast through- out the entire period of the World War. But as soon as the armistice was signed plans were made for the complete reconstruction of the two furnaces, and the eight hot blast stoves. Ordinary repairs would not have sufficed because the long run made a thorough rebuilding impera- tive. When this reconstruction was completed the Col- umbus Works was thoroughly modernized in every detail except for the ore handling system which lacked an ore [72] bridge and transfer cars. The total capacity was then increased to seven hundred tons of pig iron a day. The end of the first twenty years of history finds the Columbus Works better equipped than ever before for the production of a large quantity of pig iron on an eco- nomical basis. This favorable situation was due in part to the rebuilding of the Columbus Works and in part to the development of the raw material properties which had been much improved in the years just previous. The limestone for flux at the Columbus blast furnaces has come almost entirely from quarries along the west bank of the Scioto river just north of Columbus. At intervals some dolomite from quarries near Springfield, and also from near Sandusky, has been used. Steamship A. M. Byers Up until 1909 the Columbus Iron & Steel Company owned and quarried its own flux through a subsidiary company known as the Franklin Stone Company which owned the Franklin Quarry consisting of about twenty acres. But at that time all the capital stock of the Frank- lin Stone Company was sold to the Casparis Stone Com- pany, and its successors, The Marble Cliff Quarries Com- pany, from whom the Columbus Works has purchased all its limestone. Previous to the sale of the Franklin quarry, the Col- umbus Iron & Steel Company bought the Wilson tracts of land, aggregating one hundred and thirty-seven acres located farther up the Scioto river. These were sold to [73] The Marble Cliff Quarries Compaii}' in 1921, with the further provision that the company would supply the Columbus works with its supply of limestone at an agreed price. Almost two and a half million tons were taken from this quarry up to 1921 at which time a survey was made showing that there was somewhat more than a million and a quarter tons remaining to be quarried. The polic}' of owning its own coal mines and coke ovens was authorized by The Columbus Iron & Steel Company in 1902. Since that time this policy has been persistently followed until in 1921 The American Rolling Mill Company had a total or part interest in four coal properties and a large b3'-product coke oven plant. The first step in this field by The Columbus Iron & Steel Compan)' was the purchase of a fifty year lease to run from the first of January, 1903, on the Marting Mine which is a two thousand acre tract of No. 2 gas coal on Smithers Creek in Fayette County, West \'irginia. The Marting mine is a drift mine in a coal seam running about sixty-six inches in thickness. More than two and a half million tons were removed from it between 1903 and 1920, leaving approximately eight hundred thousand tons to be recovered. Below the No. 2 gas seam which is being mined, is the Eagle seam estimated to contain from eight to ten million tons of coal, which is being held in reserve. The capacity of the mine has at times been as high as one thousand tons a day, but by 1921 had de- creased to se\-en hundred tons a day. Up until 1 919 the double bank of eighty-four beehive coke ovens at the Marting Mine was operated. At that time the by-product ovens at Portsmouth owned parth' by The American Rolling Mill Company were making shipments, so these beehive ovens were abandoned and partly torn down. The town of Marting consists of one hundred and twenty-seven dwellings, a store and office building con- taining a post office, a church, and a school house. The requisite power houses with a tipple contain a storage bin holding five hundred tons of coal. Part of the electric power is purchased and the rest is produced by two gener- ators. The rest of the equipment consists of six electric mine locomotives, eight electric mining machines, and a steam plant of six hundred horsepower. [74] In 1920 the upper seam of coal in the Alarting mine was about worked out and it was found that it would be necessary either to tap the lower Eagle seam or to acquire new propert}-. A committee was appointed to deal with this problem. This committee estimated the require- ments of the Aliddletown, Zanesville, and Columbus plants for the next fifty years and then started an investi- gation as to how these might be met. After much investigation the Nellis leasehold of five hundred acres of proved coal land, and about ninetv-five hundred acres of undeveloped coal land (Fork Creek Tract) which their own drillings showed to be of great value, was purchased in the summer of 1920, from Messrs. T. E. B. Siler and Alathew Slush. When the property (all in the northern part of Boone County, W. ^''a.) was taken over there were at Nellis mine nine new dwellings and one boarding house. During 1920, fifty high-grade miner's houses were erected; and in 1921 twenty-five more dwellings. A railroad was extended from the main line of the Brush Creek branch of the C. Sc O. R. R. up to No. 2 Nellis mine and the first coal was shipped from it on the last day of 1920. General plans have been prepared for the mining of the whole property, both the Nellis lease and the adjoin- ing Fork Creek lease. A large central tipple is to be erected which will handle all the coal mined in the Nellis lease and will also care for about six hundred acres of the Fork Creek property. The mine plan for the entire tract is based on the double entry pillar and room panel system, using primary and secondary panels. This plan is designed to recover between ninety and ninety-four per cent of the total mineable No. 2 gas coal. In 1916, the coking facilities at the Alarting A-Iine were found to be both inadequate and expensive so at this time The Columbus Iron & Steel Company took part in the organization of The Portsmouth Solvay Coke Company, Portsmouth, Ohio. This corporation was organized by the Whitaker-Glessner Company, the Semet-Solvay Com- pany, and The Columbus Iron and Steel Company, each company owning one-third; in 192 1 Semet-Solvay Com- pany sold its entire holdings in this company to the other two owners and now The American Rolling Alill Company owns half and Whitaker-Glessner Company owns half. 1751 The name has been changed to The Portsmouth By-Product Coke Company. The ovens of this company are of the Semet-Solvay type in a double block of fifty-four ovens each, making a total of one hundred and eight ovens, each with a capacity of fifteen tons of coal. The by-product plant produces tar, light oil, and ammonium liquor. The other by- products are coke-breeze and surplus coke oven gas. The coke produced is almost wholly blast furnace coke, and the normal output will supply the one big furnace of the Whitaker-Glessner Company and the two Columbus Works furnaces. Some domestic coke is also regularly made and marketed. The plant was started in December of 1917 under a tremendous handicap. The shortage of coke which was being felt throughout the entire country made it impossible for the two steel companies interested to obtain coke on the open market, so they insisted that the coke ovens be put into operation immediately, although the by-product plants had not been completed and there was neither coal nor coke handling equipment. To make the operation even more difficult the winter of 191 8 was one of the most severe in the history of the Scioto valley. The business was operated at a loss during this period but in spite of the handicaps encountered, a sufficient supply of coke was obtained to meet the emergency faced by the con- trolling companies. In these ovens a higher quality of coke is made than is customary in coke oven practice. While this extra quality makes a higher cost per ton the furnace practice has shown that it is cheaper in the long run to use this higher quality coke. But this saving in cost is not the greatest advantage which has accrued to the company from owning coke ovens. The greatest benefit was found in the regular supply of coke which made it possible for the Columbus Works to operate, without losing a day, at a time when many blast furnaces were banked for weeks because of the impossibility of securing coke. In order to be assured of a steady supply of good quality coal for its ovens. The Portsmouth Solvay Coke Company purchased from the Turkey Gap Coal & Coke Company in 191 7, the Freeburn coal property in Pike County, Ken- tucky, consisting of about twenty-six hundred and eighty- one acres of coal land, partly by lease, a little in fee, and [76] about fifteen hundred acres in mineral rights only. The Freeburn mine is on the west bank of the Tug river opposite the station of Delorme, West Virginia. The property contains three workable seams in which there are about thirteen million tons of recoverable coal. In 1919, there were five months when the production at Freeburn mine was more than twenty-nine thousand tons of coal a month, so that the total production for the year amounted to almost three hundred and sixty thousand tons. On account of the strike this was reduced in 1920 to about three hundred thousand tons, though at the close of the year production was again in full swing. The Columbus Iron and Steel Company began to acquire control of its own iron ore mines as early as 1904. All of the purchases it has made have been in the Lake Superior district with one exception. This one exception was the purchase of about eight hundred and fifty acres in Martin County, Indiana, which is underlaid by both iron ore and coal. At the time of purchase it was thought possible to mine these ores, but careful assay proved that neither the coal nor the iron were of a high enough grade to repay for the mining. A part of these lands has since been sold and the company retains the title to a little more than six hundred acres. As in the development of its coal properties. The Col- umbus Iron & Steel Company in acquiring its iron ore rights pursued the policy, later followed by The American Rolling Mill Company, of participating in the organization and ownership of subsidiary companies. The first of these to be organized was The Castile Mining Company, which was organized in 1904 by Oglebay Norton & Com- pany, Cleveland, Wheeling Iron & Steel Company, and The' Columbus Iron & Steel Company, the last named owning one-fourth interest and the other two each having a three-eighths interest. The Castile Mining Company has opened up three profitable mines on its property. These are known as the Eureka, the Asteroid, and the Castile. The ore pro- duced by The Castile Mining Company is mined by the slicing and caving system, shipped to Ashland, Wis- consin, by rail, thence by boat to lower lake ports. The same year The Columbus Iron & Steel Company became interested in The Consumers Ore Company. This company was organized by M. A. Hanna & Company, [77 1 The Rochester «S: Pittsburgh Coal &: Iron Company, and The Columbus Iron & Steel Company, each owning a one-third interest. They acquired four properties on the Mesaba Range, and opened up at different intervals the "Yates," "Frantz," "Hanna No. i" and "Hanna No. 2" mines. At the same time The Consumers Ore Company acquired a lease on the properties of The Richmond Iron Company, which was a large siliceous iron ore mine in the Marquette district. Later a separate organization was formed to take over this property, which was operated under the name of The Richmond Iron Company, the stockholders being the same as in The Consumers Ore Company. The properties owned by The Consumers Ore Com- pany have been operated continuously since 1904, and practically all these properties are now exhausted, with the exception of the Frantz Aline, which has sufficient ore remaining to justif)^ its operation for three or four years. The Richmond Mine is a very large property, and has ample reserves so that it will be operated to at least the end of the present lease. In 1906, The Columbus Iron & Steel Company, in connection with Oglebay, Norton & Company, The Wheel- ing Steel & Iron Company, and A. M. Byers & Company organized The Fort Henry Mining Company, and pur- chased from The Algoma Steel Company a property on the Mesaba Range known as the "Wood'bridge Mine." This property has been operated continuously from the time it was acquired until November, 192 1, at which time all the high grade ore had been taken out, and the property was abandoned, and the lease reverted to the State of Minnesota. The next mining venture undertaken by The Columbus Iron & Steel Company was made in 1912, when, in con- nection with Oglebay, Norton &: Company, of Cleveland, it organized The Fortune Lake Mining Compan}% and took one-third of its capital stock. The properties of this company lie on the Menominee Range in Iron County, Michigan. In 191 7, The American Rolling Mill Company par- ticipated in the organization of the Hanna Ore Mining Company, a Minnesota corporation. In the beginning- eleven iron and steel companies were interested in this [78] project, but from time to time some of the holders have merged, until by 1920 the membership in the corporation had been reduced to seven. The interest of The American Rolling Mill Company then amounted to seven and a half per cent. During the year succeeding its organization, the Hanna Ore Mining Company purchased from the Great Northern Ore Company properties containing in all ten mines located with one exception in St. Louis County, Minnesota. A little later three other mines in the same county were acquired from other parties. Of these all but three were producing in 1920, the ones not yet developed being the Missabe Chief which is located in Itasca County, the Enterprise and the Wabigon. From these mines only one grade of ore is shipped, that being known as "Hanna." The estimated reserves in the thirteen mines owned by the company on July i, 191 7, was more than thirty million tons, all of which ac- cording to the agreement, must be exhausted by December 31, 1956. From this property alone the Columbus Works is entitled to draw ninety thousand tons of ore a year until the lease expires, this being approximately one-fourth of their total ore requirements. The oldest of the mines is the Leonard, which was opened in 1903. The next mines to be opened were the Brunt and the Hobart. the former being an open pit mine with a maximum vertical depth of one hundred ten feet, and the latter being an underground mine. They were opened in 1906. Three mines were opened in 1910, the Harold and North Uno Mine G. N., which are worked by underground methods and the South Uno Mine G. N., which is worked by the open pit method. In 1914, the Throne Mine was opened and worked by underground methods, the greatest vertical depth being ninety-five feet. And the last mine to be opened prior to 1920 was the Pilot, which was opened in 1917 and is worked by underground methods, the greatest depth being seventy feet. By its holdings in these various companies. The Amer- ican Rolling Mill Company placed itself in a very strong and satisfactory condition in regard to ore reserves, as its share of the "assured ore" and "probable ore" com- pares very favorably with the total known and the probable reserves of the Lake Superior region. The per- I79] centage which the blast furnace capacity at Columbus bears to the blast furnace capacity of the entire country has such a relation to the company's control of ore reserves, as to assure an adequate supply far into the future. Not only did it gain control of its own coal and iron mines, but The American Rolling Mill Company found it advisable to control its own transportation facilities on the Great Lakes. In 1914, The Columbus Iron & Steel Company became interested in The Fort Henry Transit Company and the Castile Transit Company, each of which was operating one boat to carry the ore of a par- ticular mine. These two boats were under the management of one of the oldest operators on the lakes, who also managed the boats of six or seven other companies, each of which owned a single boat. This arrangement was neither economical nor elastic, so in January of 1921, ten steam- ship companies consolidated their holdings and organized into The Columbia Steamship Company. The company thus formed owned after its organization eleven boats with a total carrying capacity of a little more than eighty-nine thousand tons. If they were all placed in line, touching each other at stem and stern, these eleven boats would reach almost exactly one mile. In 1910, The Columbus Iron &: Steel Compan}' became interested in the North American Steamship line which was just being organized at that time. Although not controlling a majority of the stock the Columbus company was enabled to have the use of all the facilities of the company as fully as though possessed of a controlling interest. This company built two boats in 1910, the Peter Reiss and the A. M. Byers. In the year 191 3 three more boats were purchased by the North American Steamship Company, two of which were of antiquated design and were promptly disposed of when the great demand for tonnage came during the war. This left the North American Steamship Company with three boats which they operated until 1920, when they merged with The Reiss Steamship Company of Duluth. At this time the control of the entire company was taken over by Mr. Peter Reiss, a coal operator with docks at Sheboyan, Greenbay, Duluth, and Ashland, who alone is able to furnish the boats with all the coal thev can transport on the up-trip. The A. M. Byers Company and The American Rolhng Mill Company, who are both interested in The Reiss Steamship Company, are both shippers of ore and, with some outside connections, are able to supply the boats with all the ore tonnage the}^ require. This plan assures a low cost of operation and a fair margin of profit on the fleet of eight ships, the com- bined capacity being sixty-seven thousand tons. In the first twenty years of the history of the Blast Furnace Division of The American Rolling Mill Company, this sturdy blast furnace company reached out for the control of its raw materials, gradually acquired coal and iron mines, limestone quarries, and transportation facilities until it had obtained the greatest eificiency possible along these lines. One management controls every phase of the operation from the raw material in the earth to the finished product ready for manufacture or immediate use. Chapter VI Twenty Years of Progress of Galvanizing Old Galvanizing Shop—Equipment and Methods— Unannealed SIteets—Installalion of Gas — Cast Iron Equipment replaced by Ingot Iron — Order System — Gakanizivg Ingot Iron—Improvement of Equipment— East Side Works Galvanizing Department— Closing of Central ^ Works Galvanizing Department— Tight Coated Sheets— Alloy Coating- Building of New Shop at East Side — Improvements in Practice. WHEN The American Rolling Mill Company decided to build a galvanizing department a new example was given of the pioneering spirit which character- ized the founders of the company. Up to that time gal- vanizers had bought Bessemer sheets almost exclusively and had failed in some instances where they had attempted to galvanize open hearth sheets. Armco, however, never had any unsurmountable difficulty in putting a heavy coat of closely adherring spelter on open hearth sheets. On February 24, 1901, some days after the first heat was tapped the first galvanized sheet was coated at Armco. The original galvanizing shop at Central Works was located on the south side of the driveway back of the time office where the culvert department has since been installed. A depressed track ran between the machine shop and the galvanizing department. The galvanizing department building was constructed of brick, and the pickling room was a low roofed, wooden lean-to on the north side. Operations were started when only one galvanizing pot was ready for use but in the course of the first year two hand-fed galvanizing pots and two hand-operated picklers were installed. The hand- dipped pots were operated by belt driven machinery which was driven by a small steam engine in the galvanizing room, the steam for which was delivered from the main boiler house. Covered pipes were unknown at Armco in those days so by the time the steam reached the engine it was often half water. The belts themselves were affected by the fumes and were continually giving trouble. For the first six years the pots were heated by coke and were so built in sections that a separate fire box was [83] tended from each side of the pot. As long as coke was used as a fuel there were no stacks to the pots and an open- ing was left around the edge of the pot to gain the necessary draft. Nor were there any cast steel cover plates on the top of the fire boxes. The pots were painted white when built, though of course they did not stay that color for any length of time. It was a far cry from the early method of bringing the sheets to the galvanizing shop to that used today. The sheets were loaded on hand trucks which were hauled onto a hand car that ran on a depressed track from the sheet mill and annealing department to the galvanizing depart- ment. This car was pushed opposite the door where it was desired to unload the sheets and the hand truck was run off into the building. In part the severe conditions under which the men had to labor in the first years of the galvanizing shop's history were due to the fact that galvanizing itself was in its infancy and such appliances as are in use today had not been per- fected, and in part they were due to the policy so prevalent everywhere in those days of giving little thought to the im- provement of working conditions. In the pickling room the low roof, the lack of ventilation, and the fact that all pick- ling had to be done b}^ hand made it difficult to get men to work in the department. During the early years the labor turnover often ran as high as fifty per cent a week. In winter the galvanizing room sometimes grew so cold that the men wore overcoats while feeding the pots and icicles froze on the rolls through which the sheets were fed. The sheets were fed into gum rolls by hand. A man stood between the two pots to govern the exit rolls. After the sheets had cooled two men picked them up and fed them into the leveler. As the sheets came from the leveler two men marked them and piled them on trucks to be bundled and hauled to the stock room. All of this work was done by hand because, with the exception of an old derrick in the center of the room which took the place of a crane, there were for several years no mechanical devices to reduce labor. With the old coke-fired pots, a great deal of difficulty was experienced in keeping the spelter hot enough for gal- vanizing. On a lot of a hundred thousand 20-36-120 sheets, thirty-six was the highest number of sheets run consecutively without freezing up the pot. When the pots froze the men on the crew lay down and went to sleep until the pots [84] heated up again. Salammoniac was thrown on the rolls to determine whether or not they were hot enough. The flux boxes were made of cast iron and rarely lasted more than a week and occasionally as many as three were used in that length of time. Later "Armco" ingot iron boxes which lasted eighteen months were installed. The exit rolls were equipped with cast iron gears which did not have nearly enough strength to withstand the strains put upon them when a pot froze or an extra heavy lot of sheets was run so that gear stripping caused a great deal of trouble. The gears also dissolved very readily in the spelter so that their average life was rarely more than one week. After the development of Ingot Iron the gears were made from this metal and were found to last on the average about three months or twelve times as long as cast iron gears. Only occasionally was any galvanizing done for a special order. Each week the sales department instructed the gal- vanizing superintendent what to produce. The sheets were galvanized in stock sizes and weights and orders were filled from stock, the superintendent of the galvanizing depart- ment being responsible for the shipment of his own product. The life of a foreman in those days was not one of un- alloyed bliss. Almost always he had to manage a green crew who knew little about its work and he was continually confronted with difficult problems of both production and management. The crew in those days consisted of about thirty men on each shift working eleven and thirteen hour turns. The foreman served as timekeeper for the shop, keeping the record on a large sheet on a board with pegs where the men left their checks on going in and coming out of the shop. Because of the practice of galvanizing unannealed sheets in those first years a great deal of difficulty was experienced due to the stiffness of the sheets and their unmanageable characteristics. In some cases a man reached over the exit rolls and pushed them down in order to keep them from doubling back around the rolls into the spelter. Another method of meeting this difficulty was to allow the sheets to overlap as they went through the rolls. The first big improvement came in February, 1907, when gas was installed in the pots. But gas brought its problems. The coke furnaces without flues were not suited to the use of gas and until alterations were made in the design of the pots, trouble with their freezing up or getting [85] so hot that even the flux burned up, was a common occurrence. With the introduction of gas for heating the pots, flues had to be installed. These were at first built of brick and filled quickly with scale and waste of various sorts, in one case to the depth of eight feet. Every year the stacks had to be dug out and finally a loose place was left in the base of each stack to make it easy of access for cleaning. The first Ingot Iron was galvanized in 1907 and the usual difficulties attendant upon the treatment of a new sub- stance were encountered. These difficulties however were overcome with the discovery that Ingot Iron required a longer time for pickling or else a much hotter temperature in pickling in order to prepare it to take on a good coat of spelter. This was due to its superior resistance to acids as compared with steel. The higher temperature at which this pickling was done made the fumes in the old pickling room even more disagreeable than before. Wheat bran on top of the pickling tanks was used to reduce the fumes and was found very effective. Once the peculiarities of this new product which Armco had perfected were under- stood, the galvanizing department found Ingot Iron no less difficult to coat than steel although it required a higher temperature and longer pickling. The uniformity of Ingot Iron sheets permited much more uniform practice than was obtainable with steel sheets. Beginning with the year 1907 a steady improvement was made in the galvanizing equipment. In that year two machine-fed pots were built in addition to the two hand- fed pots which had been in the shop since the first year of its operation. A little later four machines were built, but great difficulty was experienced in getting enough room for the machinery on account of the narrowness of the shop. In 1910 the company installed a ten ton crane which greath' lightened the work and speeded up produc- tion. A plunger type of pickler in the center of the shop supplanted the hand-dip methods which up to that time had been used in pickling. However, the location of the pickler in the center of the shop, away from ventilation, made the fumes from the acid very bad. Scientific control of galvanizing was a long time in development. The acid was not tested at all until 1907 and not until 191 1 was a full S3^stem of chemical control of spelter and acid developed. Spelter was often dumped into the pot ten bars at one time. Even the heat of the pot was for a long time subject to variation without the knowl- edge of the crew, for it was not until 1914 that p3n-ometers were installed to accurately register the pot temperature. From time to time various changes have been made in the method of handling the rolls. At first they were shoved into place from the end and fitted very snugly. Later practice leaves them a quarter of an inch loose. Heavy "gum rolls" coated with rubber were used to dry the sheets as they came from the acid. These rolls were coated in Akron and were both expensive and troublesome, so finally they were discarded and replaced by Ingot Iron rolls which served the purpose very effectually. At first it had been difficult to run heavy gauge sheets on the hand-fed pots, but after the introduction of the machine- fed pots difficulty was experienced in running light gauge sheets because of their tendency to curl up on the rolls. When the East Side Works were first planned there was no intention to install a galvanizing department because it was felt that the four pots at Central W^orks had ample capacity to finish all the sheets which would be needed. However, late in 1910 when the possibilities of the new plant became clearer a galvanizing department was started at the East Side Works. The pickler at the East Side began operations on the 7th of October 191 1, and the first pot started on the first of November of that year. The original equipment consisted of four machine-oper- ated pots and one Mesta pickler. In 1913 the most severe flood in the histor}" of the city swept through the Central Works, leaving ruin in its wake. The Central W'orks galvanizing department never re- opened. Instead two more pots were built at the East Side and all the galvanizing work was transferred to that plant. A seventh pot was installed about one year later. From time to time improvements were made in the new shop. In 1915 a motor drive was put on the pickler and a storage battery locomotive was purchased. In the same year a pot was built to coat sheets with an alloy of lead and tin. In 1912 a new lightly coated sheet was devised. This sheet was run in through lead and out through spelter giv- ing it a very light and closely adherent coat. This prac- tice was continued where a sheet of this nature was de- sired. In 191 5 spelter grew so expensive that one pot was given over to coating sheets with an alloy composed of [87] lead and tin. These sheets proved so satisfactory that the practice was continued. In 1919 when a five milhon dollar addition was made to the East Side Works a new galvanizing shop was in- cluded in the specifications. It was completed in the fall of 1920 and was operated during the last three months of that year. The new shop is equipped with seven spelter and one alloy pot, a Mesta steam pickler with a special turning device, storage battery locomotive, and a forty ton crane. In this shop, as in the previous East Side shop, the pickler Is in a separate room which is well ventilated. The hoods over the galvanizing pots are also of late design and serve very effectually to carry away the major portion of the fumes so that the galvanizing department is now a pleasant place to work. In the growth of the sheet metal industry, for many years there was a race between the capacity of a sheet mill and the capacity of a galvanizing pot. At last the gal- vanizing pot won, and now a light-gauge pot can galvanize the sheets from two light-gauge sheet mills. In 1905 and 1906 the tonnage per pot-hour was two thousand seventeen pounds. At the end of the next five years this figure has increased to thirty-four hundred ninety pounds. By 1915 the production per pot-hour had climbed to fort}^- four hundred pounds, and in 1920 fifty-three hundred pounds per pot-hour was galvanized, this being a gain of more than two hundred and fifty per cent in fifteen years. In the same time the facilities of the plant had so increased that the yearly tonnage had increased a thousand per cent, rising from seventy-five hundred tons in 1905 to seventy- five thousand, eight hundred tons in 1920, fifty thousand tons of this increase in annual capacity having come within the previous five years. The pickling process also grew more efficient as time passed. In the fiscal year of 1911-1912 its average production was seventy-five hundred pounds per hour. This figure by the year of 1920-1921 had increased to thirty-one thousand pounds per hour. Ten years were required to decide on scientific control of galvanizing, five years were necessary to install it, and five years were required to perfect it. But at the end of its first twenty years of operation the galvanizing de- partment has reached a sound scientific basis where quality and quantity production go hand-in-hand under efficient management and operation. [88] Chapter VII The Developement of An Electrical Sheet The Need of Special Sheets for Motors, Generators and Transformers — Experiments at Arm- co—Difficulties Encountered—Installation of Research U'ork— Transformers, Generators and Dynamos made of .Irmco Electrical Steel — Laboratory Testing Machines. WITHOUT steel or iron there could be no electrical machinery. Ever}- dynamo, motor or transformer requires metal in some form in order to produce the magnetism necessary for the generation of electricity. An electrical generator is a machine for convert- ing energy in the form of mechanical power, such as supplied by steam engine, into energy in the form of electric currents This definition covers all machines, the action of which is dependent on the principles of magneto electric induction discovered by Faraday in 1831. Fifty years ago the dynamo first came into general use as a power in the commercial field and the develop- ment of electrical machinery since that time is unques- tionably one of the greatest triumphs of the age. No ma- chine is too large, no instrument too small, but that electricity can play its part economically and efficiently in its operation. From the heavy train that crosses the Rocky Mountains, down to the modest vacuum cleaner or electric fan in the home, then further on to the delicate instruments of science, electricity is performing its daily task. The development which has taken place in its use during the past half century only shows what may be ex- pected in the future. It has literally become the hand servant of man and must needs take its place in every household and in every walk of life. While the magnetic properties of iron and steel have been known for a great many years, it is only since the year 1880 that iron and steel have been used in sheet form in large dynamos and motors. The early dynamos were those of the permanent magnet type where the rotary part and the stationary part were each a solid forging. These machines had very narrow limitations. [89] IXOO Volts. SeCONP^RY WINDING rSf^MW^'-'S no v<,iti. £L£CTR/C .STEEL C07^£ c^s£: COPPCK COIL h/IAISIDIC *795 Tn/{NsronMen i952 The next step was the use of cast iron in the frame or pole pieces and of sheet metal in tlie armature or rotating part. It was found that by building up the armature with sheets that the heating effect, caused by the magnetic friction, was much reduced. This was also found success- ful in the development of the alternating current apparatus for transforming electric currents of high voltage to low voltage and vice versa. About 1888 a large manufacturer of electrical machin- ery, believing that the use of laminated sheets for trans- former cores was unnecessary and that cast iron might serve as well, put their ideas to test. The result was un- satisfactory, for the cast iron cores became red hot, burned the insulation, and destroyed the transformer. Since that time solid sections have not been used in those parts of electrical machinery subjected to magnetic friction and so far as known nothing will successfully replace electrical sheet steel or iron for this purpose. Early in the progress of the work when the importance of laminated iron and steel sheets became known, another prob- lem presented itself. No mill was at this time was special- izing on electrical sheets; the manufacturers of steel sheets knew practically nothing about the magnetic requirements. [90] The method of purchase was on the basis of a common commodity sheet, with all the sins of non-uniformity in- cluded, and the ultimate price of the sheet was regulated by the quality as proved on test by the electric company. Most of the sheets furnished were of Bessemer steel. It was now apparent that uniformity was essential before a high quality electrical sheet could be manu- factured; and the manufacturer of electrical apparatus believed that a closer connection with the mills making steel sheets offered the only solution to the problem. Following negotiations in the fall of 1902 one of the largest manufacturers of electrical machinery accepted an opportunity to work out its problem with Tlie American Rolling Mill Company, and arrangements were made to purchase an entire heat of steel that should be made under their direction at jMiddletown. In May 1903, the first heat of electrical steel was made in Middletown. One of the most important requirements was that the steel should be low in sulphur and phosphor- us and that the carbon should be at such a point that by careful annealing the finished sheet would analyze under .08. The manganese specification was placed at .35 to .50. This was the first attempt to secure uniformit}^ in electrical steel, and it was agreed that clean scrap and pig iron were the necessary basis for such a material. The heat was charged about noon and tapped about I :oo a.m. When the heat was ready to tap, the telephone rang in a little bed room over the general office, where the superintendent — who was at the plant twenty-four hours a day — could always be found. "Quick!" called the voice at the other end of the wire, "don't stop to take off your night shirt, pull on your breeches and get down here in a hurry or we'll lose the heat." All went well from a pouring standpoint and the in- gots (bottom poured), size 8 inches by 10 inches, were charged into the bar mill furnace and were ready to roll about 7 a.m. The rolling of the ingots into bars was ac- complished without difficulty. The bars were then taken to the sheet mill where they were rolled and delivered to the annealing furnace. On June 4, the first car of electrical sheets made from this heat was shipped and put through the usual test._ The result of the experiment was very encouraging and it was agreed that further work should be done at the mills. [91] On July I, 1903, The American Rolling Mill Company put in a special department for the further development of electrical steel sheets, giving special attention to the uniformity of the product. The analysis and selection of raw materials were made matters of first consideration, metal was tapped on carbon and manganese content, and bars and sheets were rolled and annealed under pyrom- eter temperature control. Producer gas was then used as fuel and this, together with an inferior grade of coal, made it difficult to keep the sulphur within the required limits. This necessitated care in coal selection and investigations of the use of other fuels. As the development progressed the uniformity require- ments of the electrical machinery manufacturer were being well served, so other grades of electrical sheets were ordered to meet new needs in the development of their product. Among other things there was a great demand for im- provement in sheet steel for transformer purposes, and experiments were begun with this in view. A clue was obtained from various sources which seemed to show that ferro-silicon would help the magnetic properties of steel. The adding of a silicon content presented a problem not yet encountered in open hearth practice. - It was found that the silicon could not be successfully added in a fur- nace, the lining of which was basic. On the other hand, if the required quantity of silicon was placed in the ladle before the heat was tapped, the molten metal became ex- £ND M0U3INC £L£crf!lc STCEL CoyfC COPPEI^ COIL IVZ/VDINSS conriur/iTor{ /iH'l'jTurtei L/i/^Wftre-p roLE 4^^'iruf!£ Pu/vc/fj/vs ai97 A 7Wo Pole Moron . 4954 [92] cessively hot. On several occasions the metal bored its way through the bottom of the ladle and the heat was lost. To further complicate matters, it was found that ferro- silicon added in the molds produced a non-uniform ingot. Notwithstanding these difficulties it was decided to con- tinue the experiments in the molds to determine physical characteristics, as this presented the most inexpensive and least dangerous method. In the early days of this electrical sheet steel develop- ment, the open hearth practice at Middletown was to cast small ingots, bottom poured, approximately one hun- dred and fifty ingots to each heat. Their weight was around 600 lbs. each, and their cross section 8 inches by 10 inches. The stripping was done by a small crane assisted by "pit" men whose duty it was to place the hooks. With ordi- nary steel it was possible to cool the ingots with water before carrying them to the reheating furnace, but in the case of silicon steel it was found that water cracked the ingots. The result was that the ingots had to be air cooled thus adding greatly to both labor and time used in their production. In the reheating of these ingots a num- ber were often lost due to the strains set up in the coarse grained material. The next step, which was the rolling of these high silicon ingots into the bars, required much care. It differed from ordinary steel practice in that the bars had to be handled hot instead of passing through a tank of water, which served as a cooling device. Hand trucks were used to carry the hot bars into the yard for cooling before de- livery to the sheet mill. The red oxide which appeared on these bars and the difficulty encountered in rolling them, gave them the name of "red devil." These difficulties had a disorganizing effect on the men because their tonnage was cut, and, even after the bars were received they were of such varying dimensions as to discourage production. They could not figure on a regular output. In order to meet this condition, the company, at great expense, guaranteed definite tonnages to men, but even this did not take away the discouraging feature. In the rolling of the bars, the nature of the steel and the limita- tions of power were such that they had to be rolled very hot. This often resulted in "collars" — bars curled around the roll — and the only way to remove a collar was by [93] ^^'^ 'I'esting Core — Epstein Core Loss Tests chisel and sledge or by changing the rolls, which required several hours loss of time. This condition happened as often as twice a day. The lack of facilities for the work was a constant handicap. Insufficient space for rolling bars that proved to be extra long because they were made from ingots that might be only a few pounds heavier, extended the ribbon of red hot metal to such a length that it would strike the shears and buckle in the air. If the shearman could not take care of it because of either a breakdown of the shears or the lack of men to straighten the bar before it cooled, it had to be broken up by sledges and carried away to the scrap pile. This diffi- culty was chargeable entirely to the composition of the electrical steel, as ordinary steel could have been handled cold with very little loss. In regular mill practice a standard conveyor carried the bars from the shears through a tank of water for cooling purposes. It was soon found that any water striking the surface of a hot silicon steel bar would cause it to crack. [94] It was therefore necessary to eliminate the water coohng and handle the bars hot. What happened to the conveyor under these conditions was a tragedy to the operating department. The heat of the bars buckled the conveyor plates so it would not run satisfactorily and was a constant source of expense and trouble. But after much expense the difficulty was finally overcome and a conveyor designed that could carry the hot bars without prolonged shut downs. Whatever progress The American Rolling Mill Com- pany has made in the development of electrical sheets has been no accident. It was a struggle of the first magni- tude. Without the intense loyalty of the men of the organization who backed the management in this most critical period, little could have been accomplished. Hard work and painstaking effort have brought their own reward. The close cooperative arrangement between the manu- facturer of electrical apparatus and The American Rolling Mill Company has also been a real source of inspiration and has unquestionably worked to the advantage of both concerns. The complete apparatus for the testing and advance- ment of electrical sheet industry has long been an impor- tant part of the research laboratory at Middletown, where all processes of the work are carefully followed and checked from the raw material to the finished test of the electrical machinery in accordance with American Rolling Mill Company standards. [95] Chapter VIII Development of High Finished Sheets Early Experiments— Bo-.v Socket Sleel—.Juto Body Stock—"Jrmco" Polished— Meeting the Demand for Deep Drazving— Solving the Radiator Casing Problem— Inspection De- partment Taken Over by Operating Department— Following up Customer's Requirements — Attempt at Efficiency Methods in Finishing Processes. BACK in 1906 Armco was making steel sheets which had a very high phosphorus and comparatively low manganese content. But for special drawing pur- poses a grade of steel was made very similar to the present "H" which was low in phosphorus and .04 or higher in manganese. This was known as"DS"or "Deep Stamping." There had been no special attention given to annealing or finishing sheets for special purposes. It was in this same year that Armco made its first pickled sheets. They were intended for pressed steel steam radiators. The sheet was 20 gauge and as much care as possible was given this order on the hot mills to keep it clean and smooth. The sheets were sent to the galvanizing shop for pickling where every precaution was taken to have these sheets come out clean and well annealed. The first boxes of sheets were badly stained, due to their having stood around wet between the pickling and annealing. Numerous experiments were made and the best results were obtained by partly drying the sheets on the gum rolls in the galvanizing shop and using a short, hot firing in the annealing. It was slow laborious work. Sheets obtained in this way had a very handsome ap- pearance but gave a great deal of trouble due to sticking. It required several days to strip sheets after annealing and the sheets were often badly bent and some of them ruined in this manner. After a time the effort was aban- doned and it became the first item in the price Armco paid for experience, in the manufacture of specialty sheets. Armco's first attempt at a highly cold rolled pickled specialty, was Bow Socket Steel, for a concern at Cort- land, N. Y., in 1907. These sheets were in 24 gauge and of a rather large awkward size. Saddle blocks were put on [97] the cold rolls and the resultant sheets were very beautiful to look at, but the results to the customer were not al- together satisfactory, for the sheets broke in double seam- ing. About this time, however, the sheet mill began to make much larger tonnages, so that the cold roll equip- ment was taxed to keep up in ordinary one pass orders, and no longer had capacity to experiment with fancy cold rolling. About 1910 Armco began experimenting with sheets for auto bodies. In the light of the present day these auto sheets would be curiosities as they were merely un- pickled, deoxidized, lightly cold rolled sheets, afterwards known as "Armco Grey Smooth." Armco's first customer for these sheets was the Racine Manufacturing Company. Their order required sand blasting and a great many coats of paint in finishing and the practice of making sheets of this character was continued in a small way for some time. In the meantime the automobile manufacturers were growing very rapidly and were carrying on experiments in the use of sheets for their purposes in conjunction with some of the sheet and tin mills which had established reputations for the quality of their fancy cold rolled products. Their object was to obtain a surface on their sheets which would reduce the painting operation to a minimum. In 191 2 Armco started to make automobile sheets in earnest and for this purpose installed a pickler for sheets and a train of cold rolls especially for high finished sheets. Experiments were made with double pickling and a grade of steel which did not require bar pickling was adopted. This grade was called "DS," altho it was quite diflferent from the former grade of the same name. This grade of steel for auto sheets was used until a bar pickler was installed. The first experience with sheets Automobile Fender Drawn from Armco Steel [98] for dipped enameling came when the company undertook to make fender stock for the Chalmers Motor Car Com- pany, which was followed very closely by an order for fender stock from the Cadillac Company. The experience with the Cadillac Company was exceedingly satisfactory from an operating standpoint, because they knew exactly what they wanted for their enameling process. These sheets for dipped enameling required a much sounder surface than Armco had ever put on sheets before. This quality was obtained by means of special cold rolling, the sheets being given many extra passes on the cold rolls. This excessive cold rolling was necessary, because at that time no one knew how to make a sheet with a good enough hot rolled surface so that it could be finished with a reasonable amount of cold rolling. For a considerable time after Armco started making auto sheets in earnest, all the sheets for this purpose were "silver finished" and resquared. This was a standard which the sales department insisted upon because they believed it added distinction to Armco sheets. Both these practices, however, have since been dropped except in a few cases where the customer requires them. The resquaring, especially, at one time was a serious problem. Shears were placed in every available space, working double turns, and yet were not able to keep up the resquaring on the growing tonnage. Intensive study and a bonus system for the shearmen managed finally to keep the shears about half a jump ahead of the tonnage until the practice of resquaring auto sheets was finally abandoned. As more and more draws began to be made by the auto- mobile manufacturers, it was found that the "DS" grade of steel could not meet the demand from a draw stand- point. Armco therefore, in the Summer of 1913, in- stalled equipment for pickling bars so that bars of ordinary analysis could be used. But this change from pickled to unpickled bars caused much trouble on the hot mills which Armco has been busy solving ever since. One serious hot mill trouble which had to be overcome was the tendency of the pickled bars to quickly roughen the hot mill rolls. Great difficulty was also experienced in rolling long, wide packs, due to the low temperature at which the pickled bars must be heated. To solve the difficulty experiments were made with a grade of steel called "RB" which was adopted as an experi- [99] ment for lessening the trouble with wide, long packs on the hot mills. This "RB" grade of steel was much softer than ordinary mild steel and contained high phosphorus to prevent sticking. However, it was not very satisfactory from either a surface or a drawing standpoint and was later abandoned as the Armco organization became more skillful in rolling steel in long, wide packs. One of the first serious difficulties with meeting the demand for drawing purposes was in connection with rad- iator casings. The earlier models were a simple draw and could be made from almost any sheet. All the manu- facturers suddenly changed their model so that the casings had to be drawn, then expanded, and in this process Armco's troubles began. Even if the sheets successfully stood the two operations they were so badly strained and crystalized that the casings were likely to snap in subse- quent handling. The emergency was met with a lot of experimenting which finally evolved a sheet that was satisfactory. From the foregoing it will be seen that Armco's early experience in making sheets for drawing auto parts was a series of desperate emergencies similar to the ex- perience with the radiator cases, and these emergencies had often to be met by desperate expedients. There was a time when Armco was making auto sheets by so many diff'erent treatments that it was almost impossible to keep track of them. In time, with a better understanding of the customer's requirements, the different grades and treatments were standardized so that for several years past Armco has seldom found it necessary to make anything special to meet its customer's requirements, no matter how severe these may be. Increasing the severity of draws, in addition to chang- ing the grades of steel, early suggested a very close investi- gation of the heat treatment of sheets for drawing purposes. A committee was formed under the direction of the re- search department of The American Rolling Mill Com- pany to study the problem. Extensive experiments and investigations were carried out and the results were ap- plied to Armco practice as rapidly as possible. At the same time it was decided that the operating department should know more about the requirements of individual customers, especially as regards the different conditions existing in difl^erent plants. A member of the operating department was detailed to work in conjunction with tlie inspection department for tliis work and a great amount of time was spent in customer's plants. As a result of this intensive study Armco was able to satisfy the demands of its customers to a much greater extent and consequently to give them better service. Later the inspection department was taken over by the operating department, which is still continuing this work of following up customers' requirements. At the end of this two years study a policy was adopted by the operating department of furnishing Armco customers what they needed, working closely with the sales depart- ment. This could be done only by scrutinizing closely each order sent to the mill and by giving these orders one of the standard routings which had been worked out from past experiences. During these two years of investigation, a great many experiments were tried which developed a standard routing by grade. But few changes have been made in these routings in the three years since they were established and most of these have been due to the demand for in- creased production and better average quality. As early as 1916 or 1917 Armco started special finish sheets for stove purposes under the term "Polished." The first attempt was to make a steam blued sheet. A-lany sheets with a handsome blue color were made, but in doing so a very peculiar trouble was encountered. It was found impossible to put a steamed blue oxide which would stick on "Armco" ingot iron nor has it been done to this day, altho a considerable tonnage of steam blued steel sheets has been produced without any difficulty in making the oxide stick. The surface of these early sheets was also quite unsatisfactory. At the time the new East Side Works was being contem- plated the question of a special department for making high grade sheets was considered. The company even went so far as to make an investigation and draw up plans for such a department, but the idea was finally abandoned. The history of the development of an Armco polished stove sheet is principally concerned with producing the right color and quality of oxide on the sheet. It was found that a very slight variation in practice makes a de- cided difference in the oxide coating. The progress which has been made during these years has been toward improv- ing the uniformity of the process in order to put it on a better commercial basis. The development of these processes for making high finished sheets was accomplished for the most part during periods when Armco was under tremendous pressure for tonnage and it was necessary to make changes in machines, methods of handling, and recombination of processes, at the same time increasing the amount of tonnage going through the mills. It would require a poet to do justice to the story of the pickling and drying apparatus. Originally designed and built as an experimental machine, it suddenly became a vital link in our chain of operations. The annealing de- partment organization, upon whom it was thrown, was immediately up against a nightmare made up of every con- ceivable kind of breakdown, combined with inexperienced crews and an apparently hopeless congestion of material. Then as fast as they were able to fix conditions to nearly take care of this tonnage, the tonnage was promptly boosted and the same process had to be gone through again and again. The original sheet pickler, for instance, with difficulty turned out two tons per hour. Its tonnage has gradually been worked up to the present sustained average of about ten tons per hour. In fact some of Armco's first attempts at "efficiency methods" were made in these finishing processes. For example, it was found that the cold rolls were putting through only 20% of the surface speed of the rolls. This was increased to more than 50% by the use of conveyors on the mills and a production bonus for the crews. Similar methods were applied to the sheet pickler, resquaring shears and bar pickler. An attempt was made to increase the capacity of the cold rolls by grinding and polishing the rolls in a machine made for this purpose instead of in the housings, but this practice was dropped because the specially ground rolls did not turn out sheets of required finish. The increase of mill equipment for the manufacture of high finished sheets has kept pace with the growth of the business. The earlier tonnages were turned out with in- adequate equipment and insufficient space. New buildings and equipment have been added from time to time until at present there is ample space and facilities for the hand- ling and finishing of large tonnages in any special finish desired. Both tonnage and quality of high polished sheets have steadily gained during the years which have elapsed since Armco filled its first scattering orders for these special finish sheets. In the number of tons produced and the high finish which is now given these sheets the change reflects the growth of the automobile and stove industries from which the demand for this product has come. The technical difficulties which were overcome, the increase of tonnage at the same time that new methods of production were being installed, and the highly polished, densely sur- faced sheets which are now being rolled, all mark one of the production triumphs of The American Rolling Mill Company. I103I Q IS vm ^^^Z' ■■■■. '*'^'' i- ., ■:i; %- 'iM^^^^^Sr. ^^yfelE^^B i 1' ^m r T 3 % The Soldiers of Industry on Parade [255I Comfort Kit sent to all Armco Service Men under this contract the firm which had it was unable to assemble a single gun carriage capable of meeting the rigid specifications which had been set up. The ordnance department oflice at Cincinnati appealed to Armco ofiicials to take over this plant and operate it until the contract was completed. Because the difliculties of ad- ministering their own plant were absorbing all their atten- tion Armco at first refused. Then the company's officers were asked to come to Washington where they were requested to take over the plant as a patriotic service. This they did and operated it successfully until the end of the war as The American Rolling Mill Gun Carriage Plant, Hamilton, Ohio. Armco men and women not only worked faithfully to produce that which the government wanted from time to time, but they gave largely of their effort and earnings to every patriotic purpose presented to them for their support. Armco men and women in Middletown subscribed for ^2,007,950.00 in four Liberty Loans issued by the Govern- ment; they subscribed ^74,187.48 for Red Cross and other war service organizations, making a total subscription for all war purposes of ^2,082,137.48. The Zanesville and Columbus organizations did proportionately as well in their respective communities. Li all, nearly seven hundred Armco men entered in one branch or another to do their part to keep aloft the flag of liberty. Ten gold stars in the service flag of Armco tell of the heroism of the ten stalwart brave Armco boys who gave their lives for their country. No sacrifice can compare with theirs. [256] Chapter XXIV The ARMCO Ambulance Corps Organization of the Jrmco Jmbulance Corps— Its Service zvith the French Jrmy—Cila tions—JVinning of the Fourragere — Welcome Home. ON May 2, 1919, the steamship "New Amsterdam" arrived in New York Harbor. On her deck, im- patient to land, were the men of the Armco ambu- lance corps returning home after nearly two years in the ambulance service with the French Army in France. The story of this group of fifteen men, the forming of the ambulance corps and their service during the war, is unique and interesting. Due to the series of unusually fortunate circumstances the men were held together in the same unit during the entire period of their service, an almost unheard of thing in the army. Soon after the entrance of America in the World War, a few of the Armco men in Middletown conceived the idea of helping along the cause by enlisting as volunteers in the American Ambulance Service that had for some time been operating so successfully with the French Army. Armco approved the idea and became very enthusiastic about it, seeing in it an opportunity to serve the French fighting forces immediately with some definite visualiza- tion of America's really intended help. It was realized that much time would be needed to put into motion Ameri- ca's great war machinery before it could be made really effective; but here was an opportunity to do something quickly that would help uphold the morale of our Allies already so wearied by the three years of intensive fighting. The idea grew and was taken up actively by the Armco Association as well as by The American Rolling Mill Company itself. A call was sent out for volunteers and men responded from almost every department of the mill both in Middletown and Zanesville. The ambulance corps could only consist of a limited number of men and fifteen were finally chosen representing as nearly as possible the entire organization. They were: A. P. Preyer, C. S. Simpson, Wm. P. Pease, R. P. Myers, H. B. Marshall, [257] The Section of S. S. U. S. E. Graeff, J. E. Bryan, R. T. Maneely, A'aughan Horner, }. M. Beard, Lee Ware, Aictor CoUord, Sidney Gold. N. E. Ebersole was chosen as leader with H. W. Rinearson second in command. An agreement was drawn up explaining the ideals and aims of the organization and the obligation of its members to their country, Armco and the corps itself. This agree- ment was signed by all of the men and a copy kept by each man. [2SS1 By this time tlie Armco Association had started to build up its Armco War Fund to which nearly every em- ployee of the company contributed a certain part of his or her earnings. This fund was to be used for the assistance of any Armco man injured in the service of his country, or to lend aid to his dependents if the occasion required it. The American Rolling Mill Company so greatly appreciated the spirit back of this action that it agreed to contribute to the fund a dollar for each dollar raised by the Association. Originally it was intended that this fund should also take care of the necessary expenses for the equipment and maintenance of the Armco ambulance corps, but these plans were soon changed and no part whatever of the fund was ever used for the Armco ambulance corps. The Amer- ican Rolling Mill Company, however, took this work directly under its own care and at once made arrangements for the complete outfitting of the whole unit and authorized to be purchased in France seven Fiat ambulances, which were to be fitted out with the best of equipment and to be known as Armco Ambulance Unit for work with the French Army. It was necessary at this time for some hard and fast work to be done in order that there would be no unnecessary delav in getting started. It was at first thought that the Akmco Ambulance Corps on its Return [259] Ne\v Year's Eve. 1918. in Alsace. French Cook i.\ the Foreground corps should be attached to the American Field Service that had been doing such splendid work with their volun- teer ambulance services with the French Army. It soon developed, however, that this plan would be impossible; and very quickly another scheme, even more attractive, began to work itself out after a conference had been held with Mr. Elliott Norton, of New York. The whole corps then signed up with the Norton-Harjes Volunteer Ambu- lance Service, which had been operating most successfully in France since the very early part of the war in 1914. At last, after much difficulty, the passports had been secured and a special car left Middletown on August i, carrying the boys and some of their families to New York, where they bought their last piece of equipment and set sail at ten o'clock on the night of August 7 on board the French Line Steamer "La Tourraine." After a twelve days' zigzag journey through the sub- marine infested waters of the Atlantic, unconvoyed, in absolute darkness of night, the steamer docked at Bor- deaux. From there the boys immediately went to Paris where they met Mr. Richard Norton, then at the head of the Norton-Harjes Service. Mr. Norton was a splendid type of man, lovable and kind, an earnest volun- teer soldier smce the early days of the war when he used his own touring car as an ambulance in the first battle of the Aiarne. [260] The corps went at last to the training camp at Sandri- court, ordered its seven ambulances and awaited the for- mation of the new section to which it was to belong. Just about this time the first troops of the American Army began to arrive in France and the early plans of the A. E. F. were being laid out. The U. S. A. A. S. (U. S. Army Ambulance Service) under the direction of Colonel Kean and Colonel Jones was one of the very first services on the field and they were very anxious to take over those experienced men who were then working as volunteers in the ambulance service. These plans developed rapidly and soon it was found that it would be impractical for the old vol- unteer sections to continue as they had done in the past The branching of the road was now reached. One of three plans must be chosen immediately. First, the corps could break up and the members go back home in order that those who cared to could enter the officers training school and be in line for a commission; second, each man could enhst in France in the particular branch of service in which he thought he could make the greatest advance- ment; third, the whole corps could enlist as privates in the U. S. Army Ambulance Service and take the long chance of being held together, and thus in a small way attempt to carry through the original plans as an Armco unit. This last choice had in it much uncertainty, as when it was once made there was no changing, regardless of what the sacri- fice might be. The whole matter was put frankly before the men and they were relieved of any responsibility except that each At the Dock Ready to Sail for France [261I <^WJ? The Welcome Home by Armco man should do exactly what he thought best. The de- cision was, however, almost instantaneous and unanimous. Fourteen of the fifteen men agreed that they would stick together and take the chance of doing what they could to uphold the original plan of the Armco ambulance unit and in this way fulfill as nearly as possible the services and ideals laid out for them by their Armco ccmrades at home. This necessitated a considerable change in their plans; as the Government could not accept the Fiat ambulances that had been bought, the order was canceled on September 20, 1917, and the whole corps was regularly enlisted as buck privates in the Army of the A. E. F. Before actually being detailed to duty, the boys were sent to La Harve to bring back to Paris a convoy of twenty new touring cars that were to be used by the Red Cross. This was their first convoy and it developed into something of a road race through the apple orchards of Normandy, finally ending up by each car separately entering Paris through a difterent gateway. Orders were now received instructing the unit to join the old volunteer section 22, which was then stationed at Montiere on Der, near the birthplace of Jeanne d'Arc. After spending some days with its new section learning the ropes, the whole division was ordered into the line just outside of Verdun. Here at a little place known as Marken- terre, in sight of the German lines, the boys received their baptism of fire and carried on their first real work under the enemy shell bombardment and within machine gun range. Fortunately, however, no one was injured. [262] On October lo, the old section 22 was relieved from duty by one of the regular army sections and the Armco boys were ordered to report once more at the base camp at Sandricourt. Here the)' were joined hv a number of others _ who had enlisted in the U. S. ArmA" after their work in the Norton-Harjes Service. Twent)' new Ford ambulances in charge of this new detachment were im- mediately put under way with instructions to report to Lieutenant Drake in command of section 5 then operating on the Chemin des Dames with the 66t]i Division of Alpine Chausseurs, one of the greatest of the French shock troops, known as the Blue DcA-ils. Section 5 had been founded as the first volunteer section in 1914 and had worked with a splendid record on many battle fronts since that time, earning a number of French decorations for conspicuous bravery in action. The section was equipped with large Packard ambulances and contained a personnel of many experienced men, who had been doing effective work with their division preparing for the proposed attack on the Chemin des Dames. Natu- rally it was a great blow at this time to receive orders to send back to Paris the big ambulances which were being replaced by the Fords and to reorganize the section, re- placing those volunteers, who had not signed on with the American Army, by the new recruits going out with the Armco boys. There was much confusion in the reorganiz- ing of the work, but, in spite of all, during the severe work of the attack, which started two days later, the section con- ducted itself so well under the intense bombardment of the enem}' that it was later awarded the Army citation of the Croix de Guerre with palm for the part it had played in the capture of the Chemin des Dames and Fort Malmaison. The section previous to this time had already won two similar citations, as well as a third of a lesser degree, and was therefore eligible to the greater honor of the Four- ragere. The Fourragere in itself is a braided cord which is worn looped over the left shoulder. It is not given to individuals, but only to a regiment or group of men when all members of that group are entitled to wear the decora- tion. It is a distinction handed down from the early days of the great French Armies, when the cavalry squadrons composed the pick of the fighting forces. Although the section as a result of this last engagement, coupled with the splendid record of the unit before this [263] time, was eligible to be awarded the Fourragere, it was thought that such a distinction would be impossible, hav- ing never before been awarded outside of the French Army, and even within their own organization this decoration had never been given to a motor unit. It was, therefore, with a feeling of justifiable pride that the section, nearly two months later, received word from the French Grand Headquarters that it had been awarded the Fourragere of the first grade; that is, in the green and red colors of the Croix de Guerre. This was a certain proof of the ap- preciation of the French for the American aid that had been given them. The Armco unit being a part of this section during the last action felt proud of their part in the work and that they had, in at least some degree, proved worthy of the trust placed in them by their comrades at home. After the successful battle of the Chemin des Dames the division was relieved and the boys followed it south- ward to Chateau Thierry for a period of rest. Here orders came detaching the section from their beloved 66th Chaus- serts Division. The French General Brissaud Desmaillet shook hands with each of the men, thanked them for the work done during the last successful attack, and promised to ask that the section again be placed with his division in the springtime. Then followed the cold winter of 1917-18, during which time there was little activity along the front. From Chateau Thierry the section went into quarters at St. Remy Blanzy as a part of the reserve of the 6th army. Mf^^ . ^ m^ ^^^ ^V@ WSi The Full Section Ready for Inspection [264I Here the work was very light and most of the time was spent in trying to keep warm. The official name of the section was now changed from Section 5 to S. S. U. 646. On November 20, with much rejoicing, the section received the news that it had been attached to the 27th French division, and a hurried night convoy brought them to le Thillay, near Paris, where the first Thanksgiving away from home was celebrated. Early in December the division was again on the move going toward the front and found quarters at Pierrefonds in the shade of the great castle which overshadowed the whole of that little com- munity. The spirits of all were running high but im- immediately fell when orders came detaching the section from the division and sending it once more to St. Remy Blanzy to be held again as reserve. Christmas and New Years were celebrated as well as could be expected, and it was here that the first of the boxes sent from home reached the boys in time to help in the celebration. The next move was on January 7 when, after unlimited rumors of action, the section moved to the town of Villette near Fismes, where later on occurred such severe fighting by the American troops. The winter dragged on in dull monotony with little action, and it was during such periods as these that the spirits of the men were at the lowest ebb and there seemed to be no end in sight to the unchanging weariness of the war. Then came the beginning of the great German offensive in March 1918 and the section had much work to do al- though it was not regularly attached to a strong division. In April the Army Headquarters decided to double up the section making it a unit of forty cars and sixty men instead of twenty cars and about thirty men. This meant army corps evacuation, which, for the most part, was back from the lines and was always hated by everyone. However, on May 27, 19 18 the German advance along the Aisne commenced, and, by this time, the section had moved to a little town of Fontenoy just west of Soissons. The advance was so rapid that it was impossible to keep the work in regular order. Most of the cars were running in charge of their drivers who received but little supervision, doing their best night and day handling wounded and keep- ing from being captured. Very many of the men of their section working in the near vicinity were captured and it [265] ARMCO AMBULANCE CORPS FOR FIELD SERVICE IN FPJVHCE WITH THE AlffiRICAN RED CRESS ifeir.orandurr, of Agreement TOEREAS the working organization of The American Rolling l,;ill Company of Ulddletoim, Ohio, hereinafter called the "Armco Organization", proposes to asGUir.e the expense incidental to send- ing an "Arir.oo Ambulance Corps" to France, and to maintain it In the field for the duration of the war; and KlffiREAS It is desired to have an agreement outlining definitely the oonditione under which said Ambulance Corps is to be organized and under which its members are obligated to serve; and KREREAS it is desired to demonstrate the value of that combination of loyalty, co-operation and cheerfulness in the per- formance of duty, whatever oS: wherever it may be, which is the mainspring of "Armco Spirit": This memorandum of Agreement by and betVTeen lix • George M. Verity, representing the Armco Organization and the Armco Com- pany, hereinafter called the "Sponsor", and the undersigned ";!ei7iber3"of said Corps, WI TNESSETH: First; Said Sponsor agrees to pay all traveling expenses from >addletown, Ohio, U.S-A., to the field of action in France and return therefrom, as well as all necessary expense for equip- ment and maintenance, including clothing and living expenses, ex- cspt such part of said expense as may be borne by the American Red Cross, or other agencies which are to be served. Second: The sponsor agrees for the Armco Company that said Members shall remain as employees of The American Rolling Mill Company on leave of absence, detailed to special service with the "Armco Ambulance Corps" in Franca, under the personal supervision of a competent leader elected from their own number, who will be directed by the American Red Cross or some authorized representa- tive of same; such service with said "Armco Ambulance Corps" to be without pay except whatever may accrue through the taking over of this service by the military authorities of France or the Unit- ed States. As employees of The American Rolling Hill Company in good standing , with leave of absence for this special duty, their rights as such under the company's Group Insurance Plan now in ef- fect will be maintained, as well as their interest in any Profit Sharing plan to which they may be eligible. Said Sponsor further agrees for the Armco Company that when any of the said Members shall return from the field of action to Middletown, Ohio, in good etajiding, they shall be returned to the positions which they held at the time this contract was ent- ered into, or in case that is impossible or impracticable because of length of absence and the changes incidental thereto, or their physical condition, they shall be placed in other positions of equal value and importance within the individual's abllitymto per- form. Third: Each of the undersigned for himself agrees that in the signing of these articles he assumes all of the obligations of a "Member" of the "Armco Ambulance Corps", and that he does [266] ■faind himself to serve with the Aijerioan Red Cross in France for the duration of the war, or until honorably discharged by the said the American Red Cross or other proper authority, and is released by a three-fourths (3/4) vote of the rembers of said Corps at the time of his disohairge. He further agrees to heartily support all of the pro- visions of this contract and to exemplify on all occasions, no matter how trying the situation, what is known as nARMCO SPIRIT"* Fourth; Whenever twelve (Is) or more Armoo men, approv- ed by the sponsor, shall have signed this contract said Members shall hold a meeting at the call of the .sponsor, who shall act as Chairman of said meeting. At said meeting said Eembers shall proceed to elect from their number a Captain of said Corps. They shall also elect from among their number a First Lieutenant, who shall act as assistant to the Captain in such capacity and with such authority as he may designate from time to time. Individ- uals receiving a two-thirds (3/3) vote of the membership shall be declared as elected to fill -such office, and shall serve un- til their successors are elected. Fifth: If at any time the Members of said Corps become dissatisfied with the oonauct or the ability of the Captain of said Corps, they may, on due notice to all members, call a meet- ing for the purpose of electing a successor, and the Member re- ceiving a two-thirds (2/3) vote of the active membership of the Corps who are in good standing, shall be considered Captain un- til his successor is elected in the icanner provided. Sixth: All funds provided by the sponsor for the purpose of complying with the provisions of this agreement shall be for- warded to the Captain, and deposited by him in the best deposi- tory available, and disposed of in accordance with the Provisions of this agreement impartially and without favor. Any instructions or sfuggestions Which may be deemed ad- visable by the sponsor shall be transmitted to the Corps through and by means of the Captain. said Captain shall furnish the sponsor with suoh per- iodical reports as may be desired by the si>on3or and permitted by the authorities in charge of military operations. seventh: With full knowledge of the danger of the work undertaken and the hardships to he endured, the Member sign- ing this contract agree to comply with the orders and ins oruo- tions given them directly by the officers of the American Red Cross, and to be governed directly by the orders and instruc- tions of their Captain in accordance with this contract, when such orders do not conflict with those of the proper officers of the American Red Cross or their representatives in tne tieia. Eighth: If a Member, violates any of the provisions of this contract, charges may be filed against him by any other Member, and the Captain or any two (2) llembers may call a meeting of >.he Corps for the purpose of investigating such charges. If said charges shall be supported by a three-fourths (3/4) vote of tae Members of said Corps, said Members shall be deemed expelled from said Corps and shall forfeit all rights that he may have unaer this contract. Ninth: The sponsor may at his discretion revoke the com- mission given the said "Armco Ambulance Corps" by the Armco Or- ganization and suppbrted by the company, and order its Hembers 267I to report for duty at home within any stated periodi In caee BMoh an order when Issued shall be nullified by action of the American Red Cross or any authorized representatives In Franoe-i then and in that event said Members shall not be held respon- sible for any delays so caused in carrying out the Instructions of the sponsor: Tenth; Any person chosen to membership In the "Armoo Am- bulance Corps" shall sign this contract before assuming any of the duties or obligations of said Corps, and in so signing he shall be bound by all of the terms and conditions thereof. Agreement of Individual I hereby agree to join the "Armoo Ambulance Corps" for Service in France with the American Red Cross, or with such oth- er military agency as may take over the work of the said the American Red Cross. I Further agree to heartily support and abide by all of the provisions of the above agreement, and the orders and in- structions oft its Captain. Dated! Signed! Igneij: ''^x^^'^^^' ^^^-^^^ ^-^ ■ t^ ^ J L. ia^ksuf. ^ ^)0P7\r. xrxEk£ ^^ ,.^ .-.0,. ^SiZ^SII^ " ARMCO SPIRIT" "ARMCO SPIRIT" oomblnea, in proper proportion, a spirit of fairness, a square deal always, both in theory and in practice; a big bread view of every problem, cutting out all narrowness and littleness; a spirit of unselfishness, of loyalty, of oourtesy to and consideration for the other fellow. "ARMCO SPIRIT" is, in fact, simply as exemplification of the highest standard of real American citizenship. :681 was only through pure luck that section 646 did not lose a number of men in this way. Then followed quick moves through the forest of Villiers Cotteretts, Mont Gobert, Compeigne, Betz, Crepy, Morte Fontaine, Taille Fontaine. The work all through these days was almost incessant; but on July 18, the second battle of the Marne commenced and even more work was ready for the men as they followed the advance of the retreating Germans through Boursonne, Vouty, Corey, Billy sur Ourcq, Chouy, St. Remy Blanzy. 'Through this time Section 646 worked in close connection with another section, 539; and shared with it in a citation of the order of the division in which the section flag was decorated with the Croix de Guerre and silver star, this being the fifth citation of the section. The Allies continued their advance and from August 1st to 13th, the boys participated in the heavy fighting near Oulche le Chateau and Arcy St. Restitute, where Corp. S. H. P. Pell was severely wounded. From August 13 until along in September the section was camped in the woods of Pierrefonds as a part of the reserve of the lOth Army. During this time the entire section was on active service at some distance from its base, and at this time Lee Ware, while bringing his car back from the front, was badly wounded during an air raid. About the middle of September the section, after having been on the move for some time, was delighted to receive orders attaching it to a section of the division of the Maro- caines, who with the Foreign Legion, were considered the most famous fighting troops of France. The division was then on its way to the Champagne sector where from the little station of Ferme Beau Sejour on September 26, the great Champagne offensive started. This was probably the most severe work that had been required of the men up to this time; and day and night they followed the re- treating Germans across those desolated fields and blown bridges as they had been left by the Bosche. At the left edge of the Argonne Forest the section advanced under terrific lire through Repont and Gratenil towards Buzancy. The roads were blown to pieces and the terrible white mud made progress for the cars most difficult. For the action during these days, the section was given its sixth citation of the order of the Army, that being the Croix de Guerre with palm. [269] Then followed a few days rest at St. Menehould, after which the division again went into action in the region of Olizy and Grand Pre, advancing through Voux, Mouron, Termes and Olizy. This was the last real active service of the section as the division was withdrawn a few days before the armistice in order to build up its depleted ranks, expecting to be again shot into the line on the march toward Germany. How- ever, on November ii, the armistice was signed and active operations ceased. The division, followed b)^ the section, was sent south- ward to Belfort and Grandvillars and almost to the Swiss border, then later on moved up and took its position along the Alsacian Rhine, the section being quartered for a time at A-lulhaus and Gebweiller. Here the section flag was dipped in the waters of the Rhine. The work of the sec- tion now consisted of taking care of the sick of the division. Some changes in the personnel of the section had now taken place. Lieutenant Drake was transferred to other work, being replaced by Lieutenant B. E. Tremblay. Stew- art Flagg one of the most beloved men of the section had taken sick and died of exposure while in action. Joubert, the French A/fechanic, also died of exposure. N. Ebersole, suffering from an attack of appendicitis, had been placed in a French hospital. As the weeks went on every one was anxious to get home, feeling that the work they had set out to do had been accomplished. The section moved first across the \'osges Mountains to Luneville and from there to the base camp at Ferrier. Here word was received that those who had enlisted in France might be mustered out of service on French soil if they so desired. It was decided by all the Armco men that this would be very desirable because they could then return home on board ship and enjoy more comforts as civilians than would be the case if they should travel as enlisted men. Application was finally made, and, after having been thoroughly "de-loused" several times, and sent through the "mill" at St. Aignon, the Armco men received discharge papers, were then quartered in Paris a few days until they had obtained transportation on the "New Amsterdam" which was to sail from South Hampton, England. Just before leaving France however, word was received from the Headquarters of the French Army giving the sec- [270] tion its final award of the Fourragere in the yellow and green colors of the French A'lilitary Medal. This was indeed a great climax to the distinctions given to the section in that, although a number of other American units had by this time won a lower grade of the Fourragere, no other x^merican section or unit had ever been given this second, or yellow and green Fourragere. After a stay of three days in London the unit came safely to New York; landed on May 2, 1919; were gloriously met by their families and friends. The very next day. May 3, all Middletown turned out to welcome home the Armco ambulance section. When the men sprightly stepped from their special car in which they completed the last leg of their journey, they found the city in full gala attire with thousands of friends, relatives, and admirers eager to show that the communitA' wholeheartedly appreciated the splen- did services of the Armco ambulance section. Following their reception by the home folks, the men once more stepped into the ranks of civilian life; and, as far as it was possible to do so, took up their work where it had been laid aside two years before. After nearly two years the Armco Ambulance unit had again returned home feeling that it had been bound together and protected through its trials by that Armco Spirit which had inspired both the men who went with the unit and those who helped them on their way. For action at various time during their work in France the following Armco men had been decorated individually with the Croix de Guerre: Corporal H. W. Rinearson,Lee Ware, James Bryan, J. M. Beard, Wm. Pease, C. S. Simpson, J. B. Marshall, V. Horner, A. P. Preyer, Sergeant N. Ebersole. The honor conferred on these men, however, was to a large extent only made possible by the loyalty and devotion of their fellow workers, each of whom so well played his part in the service. [271I o s cu o Pi 8 [272] Chapter XXV Manufacture of Munitions for the World War Erection of the Forge Shop — j" Russian Shrapnel Shell Forging — Equipment of Shell Forg- ing Shops — Russian Machined Shells — 5" Holland Shells — iS lb. British Shells — 4./' U. S. Shells — 4" British Quick Firing High Explosive Shells — S" and g.2" British Shells — Reclaiming Defective Shells — Base Adapter Forgings — 6" British Shells — 1$$ MM. U. S. Shells — Sawing, Fracturing, and Loading 6.7" Diameter Rounds for ISS MM. Shell Billets —Mechanical Devices for 755 MM. Shells. THE American Rolling Mill Company secured its first contract, for one million 3" Russian shrapnel shell forgings, on March 19, 1915. As practically no planning had taken place previous to this date, it was necessary for the engineering department to work very rapidly. Buildings had to be erected, additions made to the power house and necessary equipment purchased so that the shipments could be made on scheduled time. On April 5 the first purchase order was issued from the engineering department covering the structural steel for the original forge shop, which was a building one hundred and eighty feet long by sixty-two and one-half feet wide with a twenty foot lean-to on the south side. Less than one month after securing the contract, three shell furnaces were in operation, one forging hammer and part of one hydraulic press erected, tracks laid, and most of the building foundation in place. On April 30, three presses, three furnaces and one ac- cumulator were ready for operation, and on May 5, 1915, just forty-eight days after receipt of the contract, ten sample shells were shipped. The manufacture of shells began before any of the material for the buildings was on the ground. For al- most three months the crew worked without a roof over their heads, often in the rain and wearing rain coats, for the spring of 1915 was the rainiest in many years. Most of the equipment was delivered by April i, 1915. During the assembling and erection of the equipment, the addition of steam and motor-driven high-pressure hy- draulic pumps was being made to the power plant, and it was found necessary to trench from power house to forge [273] shop to take care of high and low pressure water, steam and air hnes for connection to accumulators, presses, etc. While the engineering force was at work on these prob- lems, the Armco research and inspection departments were making plans to take care of their part of the task, which covered the responsibility for rolling steel of the proper chemical composition for the inspection, chipping, heat treatment and testing of the metal; for the heat treat- ment of the punches, dies and other forge shop tools. It was also necessary to see that the outside inspectors, par- ticularly the representatives of the Russian Government had all the necessary tools and material to carry on their work properly. The first real work which was done along these lines was to make experiments and find a satisfactory method of quenching and tempering steel of the analysis specified by the Russian Government. This was necessary, as up to that time Armco had worked very little with high carbon steel; nothing could be found in printed form in any of the libraries of the vicinity, and no one was kind enough to volunteer this information. Heat treatment data, however, were obtained a short time before the forg- ing of shells was commenced. Unit for Making Shell Forcings [274] The Russian specification for machined shrapnel caUed for a firing test before beginning the wholesale manufacture. The choice of shells for the experimental batch was left to the factory, and a representative of the factory was per- mitted to witness these tests if he cared to. This experimental batch was composed of fifty shrapnel. Twenty-five were tested by firing for accuracy and solidity, twenty-two for solidity only and three for mechanical and tensile tests. Ten shrapnel were picked from the twenty-five that were fired for accuracy, and were loaded with black powder and detonator; each of these was placed, one at a time, in the exploding pit and fired. In this test, splitting of three shrapnel shells is allowed provided the remaining seven are all in good condition. The American Rolling Mill points with pride to its record of ioo% in these tests. After getting well started on the Russian contract, Armco was asked to take additional contracts calling for larger shells. Late in August 1915, plans were com- pleted to extend the original forge shop building one hun- dred forty feet to the west. Structural steel was ordered and delivered so that these extensions were under roof by the last of November 191 5. A building sixty feet by one hundred twelve feet running north and south and connecting to the extreme west end of the forge shop was erected in 1915. In this building the most modern equipment that could be purchased was installed for machining the various tools necessary to give the best results in the forging operations. A constant effort was being made to find some material that would give longer life to the tools. In connection with this machine shop was a very complete heat treating department, which was equipped with submerged, car type and standard furnaces, electric oven, oil and water temper- ing tank, lead pots, etc. This department received the forged punches, dies and other tools from the new blacksmith shop which was located in the west end of the shell forge shop, and was equipped with one five hundred ton press, two two thousand pound steam hammers, one eight hundred pound hammer, and one three thousand pound drop hammer. In June 1916, it was again found necessary to increase the floor space, and a forty foot extension was added to [27Sl Scenes in the Shell Forge Shop at Armco. 276] the eastern end of the forge shop. This was the last ad- dition made to the main plant with the exception of several low buildings erected to house the inspection and shipping department. The second contract received by Armco was from the government of the Netherlands calling for twenty gross tons, or about twenty-five hundred three inch high ex- plosive shell forgings, and was known as the Holland shell. This contract was received October 25, 191 5, and complete shipment made November 5, 1915. Trench Mortar Bomb and Shells The third contract which was received on December 14, 1915, called for one hundred thousand, eighteen pounds, British shrapnel forgings. The first shipment made was December 28, 1915, and complete shipment February 12, 1916. An additional order for one hundred thousand was received January 4, 1916. The first shipment was made on January 27, 1916, and the contract completed April r, 1916. [277I The fourth contract received February 14, 1916, called for three thousand 4.7" United States shrapnel, rough machined. As considerable difficulty was experienced in forging, complete shipment was not made until April 19, 1917. The original forgings were made from a square billet which had been given one pass through the rolls used for 3" Russian billets to flatten the corners. The billets were then hack sawed to length. In forging, an attempt was made to pierce the powder chamber to finished size, but was unsuccessful in obtaining a surface free from seams and other defects. It was found that more successful i\IlNES MADE OF AriMCO InGOT IrON forgings could be made from round slugs; so billets were swaged to 5" rounds in the blacksmith shop and sawed to length. By reducing the size of the piercing punch, thus allowing for interior finish, the contract was com- pleted satisfactorily. The fifth contract calling for sixty-eight thousand four inch quick-firing high-explosive shells was received from the British Government February 28, 1906, and com- plete shipment made June 21, 1916. [278] The next contract was received February i8, 1916, and called for 8" and 9.2" British high explosive shells. The first shipment was made one month later and final shipment was made April 1917. It was necessary to make many changes in the forge shop to handle this order, as these were the first shells to be forged nose downward, heated in continuous furnaces, and drawn horizontally. The chemical composition of the steel was about the same as used on previous orders. Northeast of the forge shop a building was erected which was later known as the shell proving shop. This department was equipped with seven lathes and three drill presses. The 8" and 9.2" shells were first drilled and then a rough cut was taken on the outside. The proving operations for 6" shells consisted of centering, rough turning, and facing ends. This department reclaimed over 85% of the shells which had been rejected by British inspectors. At the same time that Armco secured the contract for 8" and 9.2" British shells, an order was received for two hundred thousand 8" and one hundred and two thousand 9.2" base adapter forgings. These forgings were to be used in the make-up of the completed shell. Since these shells were made with noses, a separate forging had to be supplied to form the base. From the drawings submitted at the time the order was secured no trouble was anticipated in their manu- RussiAN Shrapnel at all Stages of Manufacture First, the inspected slug ready for forge shop furnace; second, the pierced or forged shell ready for annealing; third, the shell ready for assembling and loading department; fourth, the shrapnel fitted with Zinc screw; fifth, sectional view of shrapnel; sixth, fin- ished product ready for firing. [279] facture. It was soon found, however, that the three hun- dred ton presses to be used were much too hght to make them without many rejections. These rejections were caused by over or underweight billets, scale, cracks, and seams. With all its presses scheduled up on 8" and 9.2" shells, Armco worked at a great disadvantage in completing the contract. In fact, about one-fourth of the 9.2 adapter contract was sublet in order not to delay the shipment of shells which were so badly needed. On June i, 1916, an order was received for fifty thou- sand 6" British Howitzer Mark III shells. This was the largest shell Armco had attempted to make on the smaller presses up to this time, and due to the weight of the billets, mechanical devices had to be installed, so that it was not until July 8, that the first shipment was made. Additional orders for three hundred and five thousand on June 19, 1916; three hundred thousand on September 6, 1916; and four thousand on March 22, 1917, were received, making a total of six hundred and fifty-nine thousand shells of this size. The last order was completed on August 4, 1917. As soon as the United States entered the war, it seemed certain that Armco would receive further orders for shells; consequently as many as possible of the old shell organization were located, so that they could be collected in a short time. It was not until November 9, 191 7, however, that an order for shells was received. This initial order called for five hundred thousand shells to fit the 155 MM French guns, and was received direct from the United States Government. This shell more than any shell Armco had previously made was like the 6" British shell, being approximately the same diameter although several inches longer. The increased length made it impossible to draw this shell on the old vertical draw presses. At that time it was practically impossible to buy hydraulic presses of any kind, so the company decided to cut the two long stroke horizontal draw presses in two, and make enough additional parts in their own plant to make four horizontal draw presses of sufficient stroke. On the one hundred and fifty-five MM shells many new mechanical labor saving devices were perfected. A shed, with a light overhead crane on which was hung a trolley and air cylinder, was built over the place at which the cars of billets were to be unloaded. On the end of the air cylinder piston rod a pair of tongs was fastened. The unloader placed the tongs on a billet anywhere in the car, picked it up by running air into the cylinder by means of a valve clamped on the end of the tongs. With slight exer- tion the carriage and trolley could be moved so the billet could be placed on a vertical conveyor, also operated by an air cylinder. This vertical conveyor raised the billet to the top of a gravity conveyor which carried it to the charging platform where it rolled off on the racks at the end of the furnace. Workmen kept the billets straight and fed them into the furnace. After passing through the continuous furnace, the billets rolled down a fore plate on the scaling machine, which was a motor driven machine extending across the entire width of the furnace, with two corrugated rolls turning in opposite directions, on which the billet "rode" until it was entirely scaled, after which it was pulled off by a light hook to another gravity conveyor. This conveyor brought the billet to the "billet tilter," a rotating arm with a hopper on one end, which by operation of air cyl- inders, raised the billet over the forming die and allowed it to fall into the die. Bolted and dowelled to the moving platen of the press was a sliding punch holder operated by air into which were screwed the upsetting and piercing punches. When the billet tilter dropped back after putting the billet into the die, the press was operated with the upsetting punch over the die, and pressure left on until the press was stalled. During the upsetting operation the piercing punch lowered into a cooling tank alongside the die housing. Pressure was then reversed long enough to raise the mov- ing platen sufficiently high for the piercing punch to clear the die. The piercing punch was then slid over the die while the oiler dumped a spoonful of fine coal in the center of the billet to lubricate the punch, and the press was operated downward until the moving platen hit the stops. The press was again reversed, and, just as the piercing punch cleared the mouth of the shell, the hydraulic ejector cylinder was operated, shoving the shell out of the die, while at the same time the piercing punch was slid back out of the way leaving the press ready for another billet as soon as the die was blown out and oiled. As the shell rose from the piercing die, the draw press operator placed a hook around it and pulled it over an apron into the draw press. By means of a tilting air pipe, [281] he blew out the burnt coal and scale from the interior of the shell and then operated the draw press, sending the shell through the drawing dies. On the end of the draw press was an automatic stripper of door design, which was pushed up by the shell and dropped down on the punch when the end of the shell was reached. When the press was reversed, this door removed the shell from the punch and the shell dropped on a short gravity conveyor which ran to the stencil machine. This machine was a jaw riveter, mounted vertically over the center of the conveyor, into which had been placed a special head containing specially made stencils for stamping heat number, steel code, forging code, and squad boss number. After the shell was stamped, the set-up man pulled a lever which threw the shell off the conveyor, and it rolled over to the hot-inspector. The inspector tried the length gage to determine proper base thickness and length while the shell lay on the floor, and then the set-up man stood it up on the closed end by means of a pipe. The in- spector then inspected the shell for eccentricity, straight- ness and bore. While the inspector "rang up" on the proper register what defect the shell possessed, if any, the set-up man knocked the shell over and gave it a shove into a gravity conveyor a few inches below the floor level which ran outside the building on the south side, across the track to a vertical conveyor in the inspection shed. The vertical conveyor was a motor driven endless chain type, with special arms for carrying the shells. It delivered the shells to another gravity conveyor, starting about five feet above the ground level and running about eight feet from the vertical conveyor. Here the shells fell on the ground and were rolled and piled at the proper place by men with shell rollers. The shells from each heat and from each turn were piled separately, allowed to cool, and then were taken to the cold inspection mandrel by heats, where they were given their final inspection. After inspection, they were stamped with the government inspector's OK and rolled on the ground to the railroad track where they were lifted on hooks, five at a time, by an air cylinder, hung on a trolley and swinging boom, and piled in the car ready for shipment. No annealing or heat treatment was given these shells by Armco. [282] The first shipment of six hundred and sixty shells was made on February 14, 1918, and the order was completed December 27 of the same year. In the meantime a second order was received September 12 for one hundred thousand, and a third order for seven hundred and fifty thousand was received on October 4. The second order was completed December 31, 1918. On that date Armco had made one hundred and forty-two thousand eight hundred and eighty-two shells on the third order, making a total of seven hundred and forty-two thousand, eight hundred and eighty-two shells in ten and one-half months with the entire equipment working only a small percentage of the time. In the fall of 191 8 the influenza which was sweeping over the country began to make great inroads upon the force at the forge shop. Because of the shortage of men it was sometimes necessary for men to work as long as sixty hours at a stretch. Finally, General Williams of the Ord- nance Department sent out a telegram to the munition plants stating that production was falling off and making a plea for more shells. In that month there were twent}^- four deaths in the forge shop, but in spite of this dis- ruption of the working force the shop broke its monthly production record. Until about November I, 1918, the only thought had been the greatest possible production and the making of equip- ment for two additional units had already been started. About the first of November the prospects of an armistice began to be considered seriously and the matter of ad- ditional equipment was dropped. Shortly after the ar- mistice was signed Armco was given assurance that the forge shop would be permitted to run until the following spring in order to provide for the government in any emergency and also to allow time for readjustment to a peace basis. This advice was quickly followed by instruc- tions to begin immediately curtailing production and cease operations entirely not later than December 31, which instructions were accordingly carried out. The record of the forge shop will always be one to fill the heart of every Armco man with pride, for the company had a record not equalled by any other shell forging plant in the United States. Each month the com- pany was asked for promises of shipments for the suc- ceeding month, and up to November each promise was [283] for a very considerable increase over the amount for the preceding month. Armco was the only company mak- ing shells in the United States to meet its full promises. Armco did not fail on a single month's promise in spite of the many handicaps under which the shop was operated. While the record for delivery was not approached by any other concern, eagerness to produce in quantity did not lower the Armco standard of quality, for in the final government tests Armco had the lowest percentage of rejections of any concern in the United States. The final record for rejections was 0.3%, the closest rival running 0.6%. In addition to shells having the highest record in the rigid government tests, letters came from the various machining companies to which they were sent, stating they preferred Armco shells above those made by any other company due to the fact that they were more uniform in every respect. For the cause of civilization Armco made in all more than three and a quarter million shell forgings. The pro- duction of this quantity of shells with the small percentage of rejections which attended their manufacture by an or- ganization working at times without a roof over its head, and always facing severe mechanical obstacles, is an achieve- ment worthy of the high cause for which it was done. Total production of shells manufactured and shipped during the war by Armco: 114,300 — 3 "Russian Shrapnel (Machined) 770 Net Tons 1,001,559 — 3 " Russian Shrapnel forgings. . . 5642 Net Tons 2,500 — 3 " Holland High Explosive Forg- ings 22.8 Net Tons 201,995 — 18* British Shrapnel Forgings . . . 1994 Net Tons 3,000 — 4-7" United States Shrapnel (Rough machined) 60 Net Tons 68,000 — 4 " British Quick Firing High Ex- plosive forgings 1475 Net Tons 44,600 — 8 " British High Explosive Shell Forgings 5992-5 Net Tons 114,228 — 9.2" High Explosive Shell Forgings 20392 Net Tons 200,000 — 8 " British Base Adapter Forg- ings 3025 Net Tons 102,000 — 9.2" British Base Adapter Forg- ings 2575 Net Tons 659,000 — 6 " British Howitzer Mark HI Shell Forgings 46460 Net Tons 742,882— 15 5A'I.M. United States Shell Forg- ings 56459 Net Tons [284] Chapter XXVI Armco Organization The Hub, the Spokes and the Rim of Armco — First Line — Emergency Committee — Fore- men's Forum — Departmental Advisory Committee — General Advisory Committee. INDUSTRIAL Democracy is a term given to a formal sort of organization whereby representatives of the management and employees enjoy friendly relationship. Organization of this nature has become necessary in most plants to hold the personal contact between the employer and men such as existed in the days when manufacturing was done in small shops instead of in mills employing thousands of men. Armco has been in the forefront in the development of practical industrial democracy. From the very begin- ning of the organization, Armco has never permitted itself to lose personal touch with its men, but through personal contact has always endeavored to secure the con- fidence, respect and good will of its workers. The interests of the men in the plant and of the company have been held as mutual, and on this basis a spirit of loyalty and co- operation has been built which has reached its fullest de- velopment in what is known as "Armco Spirit." Just as the hub of the wheel transmits its power and motion through strong and reliable spokes to the rim where the real work is done, Armco transmits the spirit and ideals of the management through radiating "spokes" to the many men and women composing the Armco organiza- tion as a whole. The Armco organization wheel has the active executive officers as its hub. The spokes are composed of the main heads of divisions and comprise a group and designated as "First Line" men. A gold ring with the company's in- signia as a seal is worn by this group as a visualization of the close cooperation that exists between them, and of their large responsibility in passing on to the general organiza- tion the plans, policies and ideals of the company. [285] AdMINIS-TRATIVE Oli&ANIZATIOM OuTLINE -- The inner rim of the wheel is the "Foreman's Forum" aiid the o^uter rim, which makes up the last and largest circle, is The General Advisory Committee. The Foremen's Forum meets once a month for the ex- change of opinions, the charting of operations, the study of company policies, and a thorough understanding of the human element in business as it should be known by these men who represent the management on the job. The General Advisory Committee represents each group in the organization. In 1920 there were fifty-seven of these committees with a total membership of one hundred and fifty-three men who are elected annually by secret ballot. Every employee who has been in the continuous service of the company for one year is entitled to vote and is eligible for election. The General Advisory Committee is made up of smaller departmental advisory committees which represent to the management in an advisory capacity, the employees of the respective departments. It is the committee's privilege and duty to take up with the department superin- tendent any matter which in their opinion is not being han- dled properly. It may be a question of production or a personal matter. The superintendents may likewise call upon the committees for advice or first-hand information which they should have. These departmental committees meet whenever need for their action and service arises. Once each month all of the departmental committees meet as a General Advisory Committee under the chair- manship of the general manager. This larger committee holds the same relation to the general management that the departmental committee does to the department. Its functions are to advise and learn the policies of the general management, to convey to the employees an understanding of these policies, and to reflect the senti- ment of the employees on such matters as may be of help to the general management. The committees have no administrative, legislative, or executive functions. An Emergency Committee was organized to aid in carry- ing on the Middletown hospital drive in 1916 and then was retained as a permanent organization to act whenever The American Rolling Mill Company as a company chooses to put itself behind a public welfare campaign. The Red Cross, Liberty Loan, and Civic Fund were all carried on successfully in the plant by the Emergency Committee. [287] This committee is composed of division heads, department heads, and their principal assistants. Since 1904 the men of the sheet and jobbing mill de- partment have elected a committee from their own mem- bership whom the management has called in for advice and consultation and who could in turn present matters of mutual interest to the management. In 191 8 similar groups known as War Service Committees were chosen from the employees in all departments. These rendered a signal service in keeping the wheels of industry running smoothly during the trying da3^s of the war. By these radiating circles of influence and counsel The American Rolling Mill Company has succeeded through- out its growth from a small plant to a great corporation, in keeping, between management and men that personal contact without which progress and prosperity are not possible. This personal contact has resulted in industrial peace and the co-operation of all members of the organiza- tion in the development of the Armco plants and of Armco products. [288] Chapter XXVII ARMCO Traffic Department lis Organization and Functions — Difficulties Encountered to Keep Supply of Raw Mate- rials Coming in in Order to Keep the Plant Running. THE expansion of any industry inevitably calls for an expansion of its Traffic Department, which has charge of the movement of all raw materials into the plant and finished products out of the plant. This is especially true of an iron and steel works, where large tonnages are involved. For the first few years of Armco history the details of the in-going and out-going freight were under the direct charge of the general manager. As the volume of the business grew the movement of the vast amount of material that entered into the manufacture of Armco products became a matter of increasing im- portance. It was not until 1910, however, when Armco built the East Side Works and entered the field of big mill practice, that a full fledged Traffic Department, reporting to the general manager, was organized. At this time the freight business of the company comprised about three hundred carloads each month. During 1920, ten years later, the volume of freight at the Middletown plant numbered more than three thousand cars each month, which gives some idea of the tremendous amount of work that falls on the department whose duty it is to see that this freight moves in and out without delay or disturbance. Armco was not alone in this new idea of a separate and distinct traffic department. Industry generally was adopting it as the problem of traffic became more and more complex. It became apparent that someone should be assigned the duty of keeping in touch with the require- ments, not only of the law governing transportation, but with all the conditions brought about by its applica- tion in the matter of rate adjustment and special services. Ten people today comprise the Traffic Department of Armco, consisting of a manager, assistant manager, [289] and eight clerks. This force is supplemented from time to time temporarily by the loan of men from other depart- ments as emergencies may demand. The Traffic managers and their assistants are responsible for the proper inter- pretation and application of the traffic and transportation law, classifications, rate adjustments, shipping practices and all other information that has to do with the trans- portation of raw materials and finished goods in and out of the plant. The details of the work are divided into seven sub- divisions, each one of which is operated as a separate unit with special tasks assigned. These divisions include car supply, tracing and embargoes, demurrage, rates and classifications outbound, rates and classifications inbound, together with the auditing of freight bills and the handling of overcharge and loss and damage claims. Inbound freight, car records, and weight and tonnage abstracts are also carefully recorded. The Armco Traffic Department also has charge of export shipping, with all its complicated and exacting rules and regulations. This includes contracting for steamer space, securing railway and other necessary permits, supervision over and preparation of necessary shipping documents, issuance of insurance papers, and the com- piling of all documents in bankable form for the use of the treasury department. If the goods are lost enroute the handling of the claims against insurance companies for losses from warehouse or marine causes or other details, is under the charge of the traffic department. For the reason that errors in handling documents in export business often result in heavy fines or other serious losses, it can be seen that this division has many added responsibilities which call for alertness and wide experience in foreign tariffs. One of the widest fields for service to the company lies in the work of handling the car supply, tracing goods shipped, and weathering the embargoes. These handicaps to industry were especially serious during the period of the World War and the situation was so acute at times that the entire Traffic Department organization was out in the field "riding cars" to keep the plant in operation. This was especially true during the coal strike when the plant was operated on fuel oil. The situation was so serious at one time that not only all the members of the [290] traffic department were on the road but a very large part of the sales department was requisitioned by the traffic department to "ride" the cars to keep the wheels of industry turning at Middletown. Some idea of the extent of the traffic of Armco each month is evidenced by the fact that at the end of its first twenty years, the freight bills at the Middletown plant when operating normally amount to approximately two hundred thousand dollars a month. This does not include the other plants located at Columbus, Zanesville, and elsewhere, which would considerably increase this total. Each of these bills must be properly audited as to rates and extension, classification and weight billed, and be closely checked to avoid error. Such matters as the filing of claims for overcharges, loss and damage, requiring intimate knowledge of rates, classification and rules gov- erning proper application and the legal methods of han- dling such matters, are daily problems of the traffic depart- ment. The various departments of the plant are kept in touch with materials enroute by the traffic department and records are kept covering all shipments coming into the plant. Each individual car is followed from its start- ing point to its final unloading, in order that there shall be no guess work as to the time of the receipt of the raw material. In addition to handling the freight movements at Armco, the traffic department is also able to render a valuable personal service to the business offices, in securing tickets, sleeper reservations and other conveniences con- nected with traveling, which saves much time, trouble and expense. The work of the traffic department under normal con- ditions is not spectacular. Transportation is however the artery of business, through which the necessary supply of raw materials and finished products flow. It is apprec- iated most when it is realized that the clogging of a single vein, insignificant in itself, may mean the shut-down of a great plant. [291] J.C.PWILLIPJ - Se-ciyr^ WE FOUhlDEfif Ah/D f/f^T OFFICE/^ OF The AMER.ICAK I^LLi>viq Mill Co. [292] Chapter XXVIII The Purchasing Department The Orgauizalion of a Purchasing Department — Difficulties Encountered During IJ'ar Period — Grozvtii in J'olume of Purchases. BACK in 1901, at the very beginning of things at ARMCO, there was no purchasing department. Among the varied duties of the then president- treasurer and general manager was that of buying all things needful for the operation and maintenance of the plant. To be sure, there was only one little 30-ton open hearth furnace to be fed, four sheet mills, a galvanizing shop and factory, and fewer men to break up things that must be repaired. Nevertheless, at that time it seemed to be a great big job, and when we consider it in connec- tion with all else that was to be done in the foundation building of a great industry, it was a real task. There is in existence today a certain small red book in which is recorded in the president's own handwriting the first purchases of scrap and various other supplies. By 1903 the open hearth department consisted of three furnaces and, of course, the work of buying increased accordingly. In April of that year, the president and general manager indulged in the luxury of a private secretary and assistant. For a time after the new secre- tary-assistant's arrival, the purchases were still handled in the same old way, the orders all being written out in longhand. Gradually, however, the work of placing some of the local orders was passed on to the president's secretary, and with his aid and that of a typewriter, orders were for the first time made out on a machine; perhaps at this time we find the first signs of life of the real purchasing depart- ment of the future. An order book was established, and in it purchases were recorded and a permanent record made. With the advent of the Zanesville mill in 1905, addi- tional duties came to the purchaser and the president's [293I secretary was then given the title of assistant purchasing Agent, although there was no other purchasing agent at that time. In 1909 the real position of purchasing agent _ was first created and the secretary advanced to that position. The old washroom on the first floor of the original office building was removed and in its place a separate room was for the first time set aside as the headquarters of the purchasing department. The building and equipping of the new East Side Works in 191 1, gave the purchasing department its first real big work. There was a great deal of new equipment to be ordered and the purchasing agent and his assistant, working in connection with the engineers in charge of plant specifications, received a splendid training in the art of big buying. At the same time important changes were made in the character and manner of handling the work of the depart- ment. A branch office was maintained in Detroit in order to be near the great scrap center of the country. At that time the purchasing department took over supervision of all mill supply stores which had formerly been report- ing to the treasury department. The stores continued under their management until 191 8, at which time they were transferred to the operating department. The work in the plant had now changed from small to large mill practice and, with the substantial development of all producing departments, the responsibilities of the purchasing department increased proportionately. In 1913 a representative of the purchasing department was sent to Europe to investigate the source of supply of certain materials, such as ferro silicon, ferro manganese, magnesite, aluminum and other alloys and minerals used in the manufacture of Armco products. His report, made jointly to the purchasing and research Departments, cov- ered nearly six months' work in Norway, Sweden, Denmark, Germany, Austria, Switzerland, France, and England. Things now began to move swiftly and called for much study and planning by the department, for with the break- ing out of the great World War in 1914, the supply of some necessary raw materials was entirely cut off and new sources had to be found immediately. Those were unprecedented times, and every move was most carefully watched. Austrian magnesite, Eng- 1294 J lish ferro manganese and Norwegian ferro silicon could no longer be imported and could only be bought from the fast shrinking stocks held in America. By that time Armco began to figure on war orders, and new equipment, and all types of supplies were needed. By 191 7, with the entry of America into the World War, the quantity and variety of articles purchased had increased incredibly. Prices were mounting skyward, and it was no longer a case of getting an article for the best price, but to get it at any cost, provided quick delivery could be assured. The personnel and the work of the department during this strenuous war period naturally varied greatly due to the uncertain conditions that were to be met. At one time the personnel of the department consisted of 13 mem- bers, this being about double of what is normally required. During the war period, as the requirements of the mill increased rapidly, the work of the Purchasing Department was doubled many times over. The nature of purchasing is, however, such that if centralized and handled in an efficient manner, a very large amount of work can be taken care of without materially changing the organization itself. To give some idea of the quantity of work that passed through regular channels, it is interesting to know that some 30,000 tons of coal had to be purchased or produced from the company's mines for each month's requirements. Scrap iron purchases amounted in value to some $75,000 per month; spelter six thousand tons per year. In all, there was carried by our store depart- ment an inventory of about twenty thousand items. A record has been kept of the number of salesmen that are interviewed by the various members of the pur- chasing department. The greatest number during any one month was 260, the average being somewhat below this, or about 210. Methods of handling the detail of the work of the department in the placing of orders, recording of prices, keeping in touch with and watching the markets, and following the long swing of the price curves in order to buy to the best advantage, these are the things in which tremendous advancement has been shown in the last twenty years. [295I What the story in the next twenty years will be we do not know, but with the steady expansion of our compan)^ at home and the acquisition of auxiliary plants in other cities, the purchasing department has a great field for work and service before it. Plans are now in the making covering a further centralization and standardization of purchasing through headquarters at Middletown, to ob- tain a more effective use of the purchasing power of the company. 296] Chapter XXIX The Growth of the Treasury Department The Organhation of a Tirasury D,-parlnienl — Thr Inslallaiion of a Cost Department — Stores Jccounling Department — The Development of the Credit Department. DURING the first five years of the company's history the functions of the president, treasurer, general manager, and purchasing agent were all combined in one person. When the first pay check was issued in A'liddletown there was no regular treasury department as such. All work of that kind was taken care of by the company's single bookkeeper under the direction and supervision of the president, who handled all the financial afi'airs of the company. In this respect the company was no different from many other small growing concerns. It was not until 1905 that the company's accounting and financial interests had assumed sufficient importance to justify the creation of a distinct department. By 1910 the demands of a rapidly growing business made it necessary to separate the different functions of the treasury and accounting department into sub-depart- ments, thus creating a division. The work of the timekeeping department, on which the pay rolls of the business are based, had originally been carried on under the supervision of a timekeeper's clerk. In the creation of a treasury division the time- keeping department was put under its jurisdiction and it has ever since that time been conducted in close co- operation with the accounting department. The time- keeping records are very interesting, showing as they do the advancement of the different men in the employ of the company. They show that some of the men who began at the bottom of the ladder are today occupying high executive positions. This department grew from one man in the very beginning to thirty or thirty-five men during the war period. During that period of develop- ment many changes in method of working were made. [297] A substitution of calculating machines for the pencil m the figuring of tonnage rates and wages, enabled all such work to be done more quickly and accurately. During this period the company's pay rolls grew from twenty thousand up to a full million dollars per month. This gives a very clear visualization of the growth of Armco and of the importance of the timekeeping depart- ment of the treasury division. The accounting department of the treasury and accounting division originally consisted of one book- keeper, who is still on the job and is one of the oldest employees of the company. In the beginning the books of the company consisted of about one ledger and two journals. At the end of twenty years nine men were required and with the use of the most modern labor- saving machinery they were able to handle about seventy times the amount of business that was originally handled by one man. When the order and billing section was first organized it was made a part of the treasury division. It was later placed under the supervision of the sales division in order to provide a better coordination of the work of the two functions. The stores accounting department, originally in charge of one individual, was established to keep records of all purchases and to have a supervisory control of all of the miscellaneous supplies of the plant. This function finally grew into such proportions that it was again redivided into a stores department under the operating division and the stores accounting department, which was contin- ued under the treasury division as a record department of purchases. Probably one of the most important functions of the entire organization is carried on in the credit department, which has to do with the granting of credit to customers. In the early days this responsibility was entirely in the hands of one man, who judged credits through a personal visit or from personal knowledge of the customer. This method was obviously impossible as the business grew to greater proportions. It finally became necessary to organize a more modern credit department, that could work along the most improved lines. The department now consists of five individuals especially trained in credit work. Through the efforts of the credit department, [298] Armco's losses have remained very small, averaging not more than one-twentieth of one percent of sales. The Manager of the credit department often visits customers and assists them in the reorganizing of their own financing to enable them to meet new conditions. In this way Armco has saved many good accounts and the service rendered has been greatly appreciated. This special service is somewhat unusual in big industries but it has made the company many friends and has proved very satisfactory to all concerned. The cost department, which is under the treasury division, was originally handled by one man and even then the work did not absorb all of his time. A/[odern industry has, however, come to see the light and today cost accounting is one of the most important depart- ments of the treasury division. Accurate detailed cost accounting is especially important in an iron and steel works, where there are so many things entering into the manufacture of a finished product through which money could be lost without any real knowledge of it unless a very close check was kept at every point. For instance when a ton of raw material is put into an open hearth furnace for melting and refining, there is necessarily a certain waste loss and it falls upon the cost department to know where every pound of waste has gone during that operation. In the old days that information was obtained by estimate, but today it is all a matter of accurate record and knowledge. The treasury and accounting division is the real record-keeping department of the company. It is the medium through which all money comes into the com- pany and the channel through which all money is paid out on proper order or requisition. Practically every function is so tied into its operations that it becomes the real heart of the business. The treasury division is not only the HEART of an industrial organization, but it must also furnish the Life Blood in the shape of money, real money, to meet the pay rolls of all departments, to pay bills created by the durchasing department, and to meet appropriations made and dividends declared by directors. 12991 "Win the War" Parade, Labor Day, 1918 [300] Chapter XXX ARMCO in Civic Affairs Influence- Upon the Community Life— Flood of IQI^— Booker T. U'asliington School— IFar Drives — Civic Fund — Playgrounds — City Park. A CORPORATION is a legal person and as such has most of the duties and privileges of citizenship. Its progress and prosperity, like that of the individ- ual, are bound up with that of the community in which it is located. As a prominent citizen in its community, The American Rolling Mill Company has always recognized its duty to take an active part in civic affairs, and has tried in every way to meet its obligation and responsibility as a citizen. In 1909 when the board of directors was debating where to locate the new plant which they were planning, the president of the company laid before the business men's association, which grew into a chamber of commerce, the plans and specifications for a greater Middletown. For the company was not willing to locate its new plant in Middle- town unless the city could be made a good place for its ever increasing number of workers to live. In the years which followed. The American Rolling Mill Company working with the other manufacturers and busi- ness men of the city contributed its influence, its organiza- tion, and its financial support for the accomplishment of this program. A public library was built, a hospital erect- ed on a hill over-looking the city, parks and playgrounds were opened, a Y. A-l. C. A. and a Y. W. C. A. were es- tablished, efficient city government was secured, and the public school system was expanded as rapidly as the finances in the city would permit. In all these changes The American Rolling Mill Company played its part as a big-hearted, public spirited citizen. In 191 3 the Miami river rose in a flood which covered the business section of the town to the depth of six feet. When the waters subsided they left ruin and desolation in their wake. Transportation facilities were cut off, [3C1] people were homeless, without a change of clothing and in a large number of cases without food. The mud and rubbish, which the flood had left in the homes and on the streets, formed a serious menace to the health of the people. Al- though itself a heavy sufferer because the Central Works had been under water, The American Rolling Mill Com- pany came to the aid of the city, supplied labor and teams and operated a complete railroad train on the main street of the city for cleaning the streets and carting away the water-soaked, disease-ridden rubbish, brought in food sup- plies, helped to police the city during the period of disorder. To its timely and efficient action was due Middletown's rapid recovery from the ravages of the flood. The financial resources of the city did not expand with its increasing obligations, so from time to time Armco pro- vided certain civic betterments and then turned them over to the city for operation when the city became able to undertake their management and support. The first of these civic improvements to be built by Armco was the Booker T. Washington School, which was built at a cost of ^70,000 and turned over to the public school board for administration. During the World War the Armco organization, as a whole, devoted a great deal of time to the conduct of the Liberty Loan, Red Cross, Y. M. C. A., and kindred drives. Not only did Armco men and women give liberally of their money, but they took an important part in the organiza- tion of the campaigns and the actual work of solicitation. On January 20, 1920, the president of The American Rolling Mill Company again addressed the business men of the city, now organized into a vigorous and efficient chamber of commerce. Li this address he reviewed the progress which had been made in the ten years which had past since Middletown had started on its way to future greatness. He pointed out the growing needs of the city, the need of an enlarged Y. M. C. A., and a building for the Y. W. C. A., the over crowding of the schools, the financial embarrassment of the city government, the need of parks and playgrounds, the inadequacy of the hospital to care for the needs of the rapidly growing city. And to meet these needs he proposed that a great civic fund of ^1,000,000 be raised to bring A'liddletown into first place among the progressive cities of Ohio. [302] The city caught the vision and in a short campaign end- ing in March 1920, raised the million dollars for civic im- provement. The whole city co-operated. Every family and every institution did its full part by giving what it could. Armco employees supported the campaign to the limit of their ability. The civic fund was placed under the control of fifteen representative citizens, and its disburse- ment was apportioned over the succeeding five years. For several years Armco maintained playgrounds for the benefit of the children of Armco employees, and the other children of the neighborhoods in which these play- grounds were located. The creation of the civic fund made it possible for the city to administer these playgrounds in a general recreation system, and they were thereupon turned over to the city in the summer of 192 1. In July 192 1 The American Rolling Mill Company opened a beautiful four hundred acre tract of woodland and meadow to the public for use as a park and great out- door playground. The company announced that as soon as the city was able to develop and support it the park would be turned over to the city. In the meantime Armco undertook the necessary work of immediate improvement. Roads were built, picnic camps were laid out, trails cut through, shelter houses built, signs posted, and the en- tire park enclosed by a high wire fence. In the center of the park, "Wildwood Camp," a perma- nent structure was built on what was designated as "Wild- wood Heights." This camp graces the highest knoll in the woods and the trees and the foliage were trimmed away to give a beautiful view of the blue streaked western hills across the Miami valley. A rustic dining hall with a capacity for fifty or sixty people, a recreation hall with a fireplace, and a porch overlooking a beautiful valley, and five tents on elevated platforms were erected in this camp, which is fenced off from the rest of the park. At the foot of the hill below the camp a large concrete swimming pool was built beneath forest trees which make the pool shady, cool, and inviting on hot summer days. This camp was imme- diately used by the Girl Scouts for their summer camp, and has since been in demand by various organizations. Until such time as the city is capable of taking it over, Armco is policing the park, maintaining it, and seeing that no vandalism, either thoughtless or otherwise, shall destroy [303] the many old, beautiful trees, or mar this pubHc pl^X" ground for tlie people of A-liddletown. While Armco has contributed what it could in material things, the greatest contribution is represented in the un- divided effort of its officers and a very large proportion of its working organization, in anything that has had to do with the city's civic progress. In this they are giving prac- tical expression of their "Armco Spirit," one phase of which is defined as being "simply an exemplification of the highest standard of real American citizenship." I304I Chapter XXXI ARMCO'S Pioneer Metallurgist .1 Tnbulc to Robert Brown Carnalian, Jr. OUTSIDE the little group who came to A-liddletown from Cincinnati in 1900, Robert B. Carnahan, later _ \ ice-President, was the first member of the new organization and Mr. \'erity's first associate in the working out of the prac- tical problems involved in the new venture. He was intro- duced to the new organiza- tion through First Vice-Presi- dent W. T. Simpson, who had known him for many years. Mr. Carna- han contributed so much to the early struggles of the then in- fant industry that was des- tined to become a giant, that no history of its first twenty years could be written without giving him a very special Robert B. Carnahan, Jr. plaCC in it. This [305] in spite of the fact that nowhere else in this history is any other man who had to do with its early upbuilding so described. Steel making by the open hearth process was new in 1900, as was evidenced by the fact that several of the largest steel companies were then experimenting with it. Men who had practical experience were scarce. Mr. Carnahan secured his early training with the W. De Wees Wood Co. and the Carnegie Steel Co., both of Pittsburgh. A metallurgist and scientist by nature and training and an indefatigable digger by habit, he assumed the task of designing, construction and operation of Armco's first open hearth furnace with the eagerness of a youth starting out on his first great adventure in life. He actually lived with that furnace and its successor during the first five years of the company's history. Dur- ing that period the foundation for the Armco of today was laid. It was under his personal supervision that the com- pany's commercially pure iron was developed, patents on the process and product secured, and the first large tonnages produced. He was first Superintendent of Open Hearth Depart- ment, then General Superintendent of Works, and finally Vice-President in Charge of Research and Development Work and Patent Interests. He was known and respected for his many unusual sterling characteristics. He was loved by all because of his great generous nature and his kindly and considerate attitude towards all. Robert Brown Carnahan, Jr., was a man of magnetic personality, of unusual metallurgical attainments, and of remarkable ability, perseverance and endurance. His memory will live forever in the hearts of Armco men. [306] Chapter XXXII Company Policies as Approved by Directors Report of President to Board of Directors, Dec. 12, igiQ — Trying New Ideals in Business — Critical Analysis of ARMCO Policies — Adoption and Operation of New Policies. To the Board of Directors: — ■ THERE are some resolutions that are never written, some reports made not recorded, in order to avoid the establishment of precedents or the unnecessary assumption of responsibility. I have reduced my version of Armco policies to writing so that I can more clearly visualize them to you, and with the further definite intention of thereby making of them a record that must stand or fall on their strength or weakness, on their soundness or impracticability, both now and throughout the future history of our company. In the early days of this enterprise, policies were established, based on our understanding of and belief in certain fixed principles, which, as time has gone on, have been amplified and broadened in their application, but have never been changed. We must confess that we have incorporated in these policies some ideals that may not have been tried before in a business of this character, but it has always been our constant endeavor to keep well within the practical in the working out of our plans. We have from period to period endeavored to secure and hold your support of heretofore untried policies long enough to give us opportunity to prove their value and to secure such a demonstration as would enable us to so fully analyze each proposition that you could pass intelli- gent judgment upon it. We were, unquestionably, pioneering in the adoption of certain policies having to do with development of organi- zation and the creation of such conditions as we felt would make for real civic and industrial stability. Many things in which we have believed have, in the progress of the times, been applied by other companies in [307I OfficeRvS ^^ Directors -"- 1 ■ Q • n ■ I -"- W.S.HOEKEfi Director F. H.5IMP50N Director J.M.I5EMINGER D/i