Industry

When the Village was incorporated in 1918, the community was attracting many industries. Some of the early operations at the time that located here were: Ferro Corporation, Ohio Crankshaft, Benjamin-Moore Paint Co., Apex Smelting, Universal Steel, Harris-Seybold Potter, Triplex Screw Co., Gary Lumber Co., Austin Powder Co., Angell Nail and Chaplet Co., Broadhead-Garrett Co., Cuyahoga Foundry, U.S. Air Compressor Co., Pittsburgh-Detroit Motor Freight, Swight-Hinckley Lumber, and others.

Early residents of the Village found employment at the area brickyards, pottery plants, and the old Cleveland city-owned garbage rendering plant on Canal Road near East 71st St. Huge gondola cars hauled the food/meat scraps from the West Third terminal to the plant, where giant percolators reclaimed the fatty acid and oils. The plant was self-sustaining as the oils and by-products were sold to soap manufacturers. The residue and tankage was used for mulching and fertilizing at the truck farms. The garbage plant was a source of irritating odors,which penetrated the neighborhoods. It was abandoned in the early 1930s when the City of Cleveland built a modern incinerator on West Third Street. Garbage and other trash was no longer collected separately. The burning process provided an efficient and economical method of disposal.

In 1917, when the Village was part of Newburgh Heights, the City of Cleveland entered into a contract with the Village to erect the first sewage waste disposal plant at the Canal Road site. Under the terms of the agreement, the villages would receive free sewage treatment services and employment opportunities for the village residents. The Village administration were given 50 percent of the job assignments for the area residents when the plant was started in the 1925-27 period.

The sewage contract became the subject of a lawsuit when the 30 communities in the county called for regionalization of the treatment plants owned by Cleveland. Although the original Newburgh Heights/Cleveland contract survived three Ohio Supreme Court tests, the two villages negotiated their rights and benefits for a cash settlement. Industries in both villages are now charged for sewage treatment.

The Cuyahoga Heights Manufacturers Association was formed ot assist in the development of the industrial sites. It also provided the financial support for various community events like the Home Days, Christmas Parties, Halloween events, school scholarships, and children's recreation and sports.

Today the Village business community consists of 107 industrial type companies, a Catholic cemetery, a BP gas station, one tavern, a florist shop, a Mr. Hero's sandwich shop, and the Cleveland Motor Vehicle Maintenance Shop, Cleveland Water Department, two major beer/pop beverage bottlers and recently became the home of the corporate offices for Third Federal Bank.

(THE ABOVE FROM THE 75TH ANNIVERSARY BOOK FOR CUYAHOGA HEIGHTS - 1918-1993)

Radway Farm on E. 49th

Austin Powder Co.

Workers at the brickyard

More workers at the brickyard

INDUSTRY ON THE CANAL AND RIVER

A. ALEXANDER STEAM GRISTMILL – exact location unknown.

PALMER ORGAN FACTORY AND STEAM GRISTMILL – Canal road where the service department is today. Appears in 1874 atlas and was still there in 1876. This property became the A.C. Currier Grindstone and Sickle Sharpener Company.

A.C. CURRIER GRINDSTONE AND SICKLE SHARPENER COMPANY – this business began operation in 1876 and became the Newburg Fertilizer Co.

NEWBURG FERTILIZER COMPANY, later NEWBURG REDUCTION CO. (founded 1898), later CLEVELAND RENDERING CO (founded 1917), later CLEVELAND GARBAGE PLANT (founded Jan. 27, 1917) – where the service department is today.

HARRY WOOD STEAM GRISTMILL – (Before 1867) Destroyed by fire and became the Cleveland Acid Rectifying Works. For location see Cleveland Acid Rectifying Works directly below.

CLEVELAND ACID RECTIFYING WORKS (founded 1867), later UNION ACID COMPANY, later UNION ACID RESTORING CO., later AMERICAN CHEMICAL AND MANUFACTURING CO., later GRASSELLI CHEMICAL CO., later NORTHEAST OHIO REGIONAL SEWER DISTRICT - This facility was located on what was called “Acid Hill,” located on Canal Road, just west of East 71^st Street, where the I-77 overpass is on Canal and East 71^st,, and part of the Sewer District now.

CLEVELAND ROLLING MILL aka U.S. STEEL – E. 49^th south of Grant Ave. – later became American Steel & Wire – Founded in Cuyahoga Heights in 1907.

CALIFORNIA POWDER COMPANY aka HERCULES POWDER CO. – founded 1877 closed 1897 and located on the east side of E. 49^th Street just south of Grant Ave. Elizabeth Knauff owned this property in 1892 and by 1898 the property was owned by Hercules Powder Co.

AUSTIN POWDER COMPANY – founded 1867 on the east side of Canal just north of Harvard, where Harvard Rd. descends down the hill to Jennings Rd.

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Chronology of the name and ownership of The Acid Works:

1867 – OPENING OF CLEVELAND ACID RECTIFYING WORKS OPENED BY SLOANE, ANDERSON, & CO.

1872 – CLEVELAND ACID RECTIFYING WORKS PURCHASED BY R.H. EMERSON

LATE 1870S – RENAMED UNION ACID COMPANY aka UNION ACID RESTORING CO. (officers were Grasselli and Marsh & Harwood)

1885-1888 RENAMED AMERICAN CHEMICAL AND MANUFACTURING COMPANY

This then became part of GRASSELLI CHEMICAL COMPANY

Remained open until at least 1896 and was shut down before 1909

FROM: The History of Cuyahoga County by Coates says the following in the Independence section:

Cabinet organs were made in the northern part of the township by Palmer Brothers for some years. In this section extensive acid works were operated at one time. Crossing the Cuyahoga from the south by the state road you came to Acid Hill as it was termed. These works were engaged in restoring to available form refuse matter from the oil refineries, and employed a large force of men. Spent acid was shipped to the works by canal when navigation was open. Refuse from these works was conducted into a large lake on the lower level and there burned. Practical chemists have now learned the secret of making use of practically all of the by-product of the refineries and the acid works have long since passed away, but the memory of those blighting fires remains. The great columns of smoke ascending by night and by day, the weird fires, typical of those once described as awaiting for the unbeliever, the blackened grass and trees are the setting, in memory, of Acid Hill.

FROM: History of Cuyahoga County, Ohio; Part Third: The Townships, compiled by Crisfield Johnson, Published by D. W. Ensign & Co., 1879; pages 460-466.

On the site of the acid works, Harry Wood had a steam gristmill, which was destroyed by fire; and near there the Palmer Brothers had a steam sawmill, which is still carried on. In the southeastern portion of the township A. Alexander erected a good gristmill, which is yet operated by him, and is the only gristmill in the township.

Cabinet organs were made in the northern part of Independence until 1876 by the Palmer Brothers. The building is now occupied for the manufacture of "Currier's Section Sharpener," a very simple contrivance for sharpening mowing-machine knives without removing them. The material used is Independence sandstone, which, it is claimed, will not become coated with gum on being used for sharpening purposes. The firm also manufactures oil stones.

THE CLEVELAND ACID WORKS.

This important establishment was put in operation in 1867 by W. R. Anderson, for the purpose of restoring to available form the sulphuric acid existing in the refuse matter of oil refineries. Since 1872 R. H. Emerson has been the proprietor of the works, which have been superintended by J. C. Burmaster. The establishment embraces a number of large and well-arranged buildings; it is capable of producing six thousand carboys of acid per month, and it employs about thirty men. The spent acid is brought to the works by canal when navigation permits. The restoring process requires the use of two thousand tons of coke and about double that amount of coal annually. Among the peculiar features of the place are one hundred and sixty glass retorts, holding fifty gallons each, and five storage tanks, the united capacity of which is six thousand barrels.

The Independence post office was established on the east side of the river, at the house of Nathan P. Fletcher, who was the first postmaster. Until about thirty years ago, when it was permanently established at the village, the office was kept in different parts of the township at the residences of the postmasters. Those, after Mr. Fletcher, have been William H. Knapp, Nathaniel Stafford, John Needham, B. F. Sharp, J. K. Brainard, George Green and Calvin Hannum. The latter has been postmaster since 1865. The office is on the route from Cleveland to Copley, and has a tri-weekly mail. At the acid works a post office has lately been established by the name of Willow.

FROM: Canal Fever by Lynn Metzger:

In 1867, Sloane, Anderson & Company opened the Cleveland Acid Rectifying Works in Independence Township about three miles south of present-day Harvard Avenue. Specifically, the site was on the north side of the canal at Lock 40, continuing westward for at least a thousand feet. The Acid Works collected the spent sulfuric acid used in Cleveland’s oil refineries, purified it, and returned it for reuse. The canal was used for transport three seasons of the year, with tens of thousands of carboys of acid shipped on canal boats, moving back and forth past the Austin Powder Company. In addition, the Acid Works diverted canal water through a section of their property and had a pipe connection from the canal directly to its facility.

The most prominent feature of the Acid Works was the fire visible for miles, created when the byproducts removed from the acid were burned in a large lake, known as a pitch pond, below the works at its west end. Almost immediately, Cleveland residents living northeast of the plant decried the “intolerable stench,” while other residents claimed that the river water had become “unfit for domestic use, being impregnated with the odor and taste of petroleum.” The company owner publicly responded, disputing the assertion about the source of the pollution. He further noted, “Our works solve a great difficulty in the very important interest of oil refineries,” wherein “8,000 gallons of acid sludge thrown formerly by the oil refineries, daily, into the river, is now turned into acid and oil.”

R.H. Emerson became the new owner of the Acid Works in 1872, and it appears that another change in ownership led to the company being renamed The Union Acid Company – also known as the Union Acid Restoring Company – in the late 1870s. By 1879, a number of buildings stood on the site, and the plant employed about thirty men, producing six thousand carboys of acid per month. The process to restore the acid required about two thousand tons of coke and about double that amount of coal annually. In terms of equipment, the facility included 160 glass retorts with a capacity of fifty gallons each and five storage tanks with a total holding capacity of six thousand barrels.

The officers of the Union Acid Company were officers of the Grasselli and Marsh & Harwood firms. This ownership relationship continued through the renaming of the company in 1885 as The American Chemical & Manufacturing Company. The company last appeared in the Cleveland City Directory in 1888, after which it became part of the Grasselli Chemical Company.

The Acid Works operated through at least 1896, and its demise occurred when the oil industry discovered how to use the byproducts that had previously been sent to the facility to be separated from the acid and burned. The exact date of its closing is not known, although it appears to have been shut before 1909.

FROM: "Guidebook for Tourists and Travelers Over the Valley Railway from Cleveland to Canton, 1880"

Willow - This was formerly called Eight Mile Lock on the canal, but recently a post office has been established near the acid works, and called Willow post office. There is no village here but only a small settlement back of the acid works. The long frame building you see to the left in the distance is the Acid Restoring Works. The process of restoring acid at these works is as follows: The Sulphuric acid after it has been used by the refineries at Cleveland for refining oil, is brought to the works in boats and is pumped out of the boats into separators, where the acid is separated from the tar by adding water; the separated acid, as it is called, is then put into lead pans and then concentrated up to about 63 degrees, when it is put into glass retorts and concentrated up to 66 degrees which is commercial acid. It is then sent back to the refinery and used again. The tar that is taken out of the acid is used as fuel for concentrating the acid up to 63 degrees. The works below the acid works on the south side of the covered bridge is the Grindstone and Sickle Sharpener factory of A.C. Currier & Son, of Independence. One mile and a half south, we pass another grindstone factory in the distance on the left. The grindstones made here are shipped by the canal which runs near it. The road now slides up close to the right side of the hill and runs this way for about half a mile and then we arrive at Independence. The Acid Restoring Works is the only object to mark Willow.

FROM: The Story of Independence by Grace Miller, 1979:

Independence shared in the growth of the oil industry in Cleveland after the Civil War with the opening of the Cleveland Acid Works in 1867 by W.R. Anderson. Located just north of the former David Skinner residence at the top of Schaaf Road Hill, the Acid Works utilized the canal to transport the acid. Fires were visible for miles, created when refuse was burned in the large lake below the works. In 1872, the owner was R.H. Emerson, and J.C. Burmaster was the superintendent. By 1879, a number of buildings stood on the site and the company employed 30 men. Unusual features were 160 glass retorts with the capacity of 50 gallons and five storage tanks holding 6,000 barrels.

In 1898, Ernie Peck and William Macafe started the Newburg Reduction Company on Canal Road in Willow. This became the Cleveland Rendering Co. in 1917. The company bought carcasses of dead animals and through a system of percolators, digesters, and dryers, they cooked, steamed, and baked them to extract usable substances. There were terrible odors. This later became the Cleveland Garbage Plant on January 27, 1917. An Independence Village council ordinance prohibited collecting, transporting, and disposal of garbage or the manufacture of fertilizer which creates offensive odors. But Willow continued to be a problem. In April of 1920 Independence and Cuyahoga Heights met to discuss action to force the Garbage and Rendering works to install fume machinery. In May 1923, an ordinance was passed saying “no business shall create noisesome or offensive odors. No garbage or foul substances shall be brought in for deposit.” There was a $500 fine for each offense. The Garbage Plant and incinerator moved shortly before new Brecksville Road opened.

FROM: October 19, 1867 Cleveland Plain Dealer:

THE STENCH FROM THE ACID WORKS – A CARD FROM SLOANE, ANDERSON & CO.

We find the following communication in the Herald of this morning, addressed to that paper. As it applies to one paper as well as another, we transfer it to our columns:

“THAT STENCH”

EDS. HERALD – For months past your columns have nearly steadily carried a paragraph with the above heading, which, since the occasion of it has been fixed on our works, has naturally more or less interested us. We do not refer to the style of these, in which our attempts to manufacture were likened to the deadly breath of a volcano, causing death and destruction to animal and vegetable life, & c., &c., but to the fact that we were in any way the cause of annoyance to our fellow citizens. The complaint in Wednesday’s paper, involving your excellent Board of Health, whose anxiety to do their duty, as their frequent visits to our works bear witness, makes it incumbent on us, in justice to them, to answer these and inform the public mind, which we are afraid has been misled, especially as to the unhealthy nature of our manufacture. In this regard out workmen enjoy good health and seem astonished to such statements made, and as for our neighbor’s children they do not “smell something that makes them sick,” and many of our neighbors have expressed surprise at your articles, and attribute them to interested motives, some saying that the paper mills, chlorine exhalations, the soap boilers, slaughter houses, or other acid works, or even our friends the oil refiners, are worse than ours. However that may be, we have done our best to do away with what odors may arise in our manufacture.

At first, having to rely on unskillful and sometimes careless workmen, some annoyance may have been caused. This we endeavored to prevent, by using steam as a deodorizer. Not being satisfied with this, we have gone to considerable expense to cover in and force all the gases generated into water (“the new perfume added by some chemical operation”) – which, by previous analysis of Professor Cassels, had been all shown to have a great affinity to, or readily soluble in water.

We now trust that the report of Professor Cassels, as also that of your Board of Health, will free us from any other blame. That we are not entirely at fault seems likely from the fact that the Health Officer visited us when we had been stopped about a fortnight, reporting continued complaints as bad as ever, and sometimes articles appeared when we believed there was no possibility of any smell coming from our works. In all large cities where manufacturing is carried on there will be more or less annoyance to very sensitive people.

We submit that your Board of Health acted wisely in trying to remedy the evil, without driving away manufacturers. Ours has even a stronger claim on the community than those which manufacture from raw material. In taking and paying for the acid refuse, the city is enriched about $100,000. Your citizens, the oil refiners, are placed upon an equal footing to compete with the other refining centres, and the river is freed from acid which might be more or less injurious to the iron works of your wharves and shipping, and we have heard even to the drinking water.

Any further explanation we shall be pleased to give and answer inquiries at our works.

Yours Respectfully,

Sloane, Anderson & Co.

Cleveland, Oct. 18^th, 1867.

The above is all very well, although the idea that the people of a portion of our city have made more of the stench than the facts warranted, is plainly expressed in the communication. This is certainly not true. We live in a section of the city directly in range of the acid vapors, and have had an ample experience of their nature and can truly say that they are overpoweringly nauseating. In very many instances sickness and vomiting have been caused by them. It is easy enough to say that manufacturing causes more or less annoyance to very sensitive people; in the case in point complaints have come from all classes of people in the infected district – from people who could not help being sensitive, in view of the intolerable odors that filled the air.

We visited the spent acid works of Messrs. Sloane, Anderson & Co., yesterday with the Health Officer. The peculiar onion smell was there – unmistakably pointing out their works as the source of the stench that has been so much complained of. It was not nearly so strong, however, as at times, when noticeable in the city; and this fact was undoubtedly owing to a contrivance that has been perfected within two or three days, that forces the noxious gases into the canal. We presume very likely this plan will succeed. A large number of our citizens will hope so; but if it does not, there will, of course, be more complaint.

FROM: Undated article in the Cleveland Plain Dealer:

THE WHY OF IT – A GOOD REASON WHY THE RIVER CURRENT IS UP STREAM - A CHOICE LOT OF RANK ODORS

Mr. C.O. Bartlett, One of the Thousands Compelled to do Business Enveloped in the Stinking Atmosphere Near the River, Enters His Plaint – A few of the Nuisances Enumerated

“Much has been said about the Cuyahoga River, and now may I have my say?” asked Mr. C.O. Bartlett, the mill machinery dealer on South Water Street, yesterday. “I am unfortunate in being located near this stream. When the wind blows from the south, I get the full benefit of the stench arising from it; when the wind blows from the west, I am still favored with that sickening, nauseating smell, and as the wind blows from that direction most of the time, I live in an atmosphere ten hours of every day, made disagreeable and unhealthy from the odors arising from this mess of corruption.

“I have hoped many years that the city officials would think the matter of enough importance to do something about it, but have about given up all hope. Of course, as the city grows larger, this nuisance becomes greater. Last year I had an attack of dysentery; the year before the same, and expect the same thing this year. In both cases one of the best physicians in this city told me that it was nothing more or less than staying down by this old rotten stream. I was talking with the head millwright of the Cleveland Mill Co. only yesterday, and he has been home sick for the last three weeks from no other cause under heaven, only living and breathing the air of this polluted river. Very many similar cases could I mention. Under such circumstances it does seem as though our city officials ought to do something about such a nuisance.

“There are but two ways to fix it; one is to keep the offal out of the river and the other to let water enough into the river to cause a continual current and wash it out. The proper thing to do by all means, is to keep it out and put it back on the land from whence it came, and someday the people will look back and wonder at the waste of this valuable fertilizer. All the water coming down the Cuyahoga River during the last season could run through a six-inch pipe under a pressure of fifty pounds. In fact, one could walk across the river in many places in his shoes without getting his feet wet. Nearly all the water coming down the river is turned into the canal and then drawn up and used by the Cleveland Rolling Mill Co. from its pump house, situated about one mile above the powder mills.

“So little water has there been during the last few months that more than half the time the current was up stream. In other words, more water was being used, by the manufacturers than came down the river. Now, I do not wish, nor do I think the city ought to refuse any manufacturer all the water he wants from the river. We must have the manufacturers, and the more we have the better for our city. What I object to is the dumping of nearly all the offal of the large city into a stream of this size.

“Let us go along it for a few miles. First commence at what is called eight-mile lock, where the Newburg Fertilizer Co.’s works are situated. There the dead animals are boiled in a large tank until the meat is separated from the bones, and then the water, or soup, as you might call it, is drawn off into the river. There are probably about 500 barrels of this delicious beverage coming in from that source every day. Then we will go down to the acid works, a little below, from there we will skip to the Cleveland Dryer Co.’s works, situated about half a mile above the powder mill. This firm dumps very little of its material into the river. Its object is to save the offal and sell it for $25 a ton, which can be and ought to be done by the city at a cost of about one-tenth of what it is now spending for parks.

We then come down to three or four rendering works, where they render bones and other similar refuse collected from meat markets, hotels, restaurants, etc. This material is taken out to their works and boiled in large tanks, similar to the Newburg fertilizer works, and the water, or soup, in which it is boiled is drawn off into the river. Then we come down to the Cleveland paper mills. We will hardly mention this, for the filth coming from old rotten rags is hardly worth considering. We will pass down to the Standard Oil Co.’s works, then the Cleveland Provision Co.’s works; there is a mess of blood and offal, in fact, it is hard to imagine how much is emptied into the river from this source every twenty-four hours.

“In addition to this, there are the sewers, carrying their deadly matters from all parts of the city and emptying it in at different places, and this mass of corruption gradually settled to the bottom of the stream and is allowed to remain there for months. Every time a vessel goes up or down, it stirs up this mass of corruption and causes a little extra dose. I have not the least doubt but what there is two or three feet of this filth in the bottom of the river, and, understand, it is getting worse every year. Every mechanic well knows that if he washes his greasy hands at night and allows the water to remain in the wash dish for twelve hours that it will stink, and that is the condition of the river. The only difference being that the water is allowed to remain in the river for months.

Is it not a matter that requires prompt action on the part of our city officials? Had we not better worry a little less about smoke consumers, city halls, million dollar parks, and do something about this river? The government owes protection to its citizens, and the thousands of citizens living and working near this polluted stream demand, and have a perfect right to demand, better protection from the city, and for one, I most emphatically do demand it.”

FROM: February 7, 1882 Cleveland Plain Dealer:

“The Union Acid Works, on the old canal bed and just outside the city limits, caught fire about ten o’clock last night and was burned to the ground, as the fire department, although called out, would render no aid, the fire being outside the limits. The loss is variously estimated at from $2,000 to $10,000.”

Miscellaneous Information:

Some of the old remaining abandoned buildings from this facility sat where the town’s Civil Defense met and stored their emergency response equipment (Army Ducks). Bob Mantell had an interest in this because his father was involved with the Civil Defense and drove the Army Duck. There was a lake there that they fished in. This property later became part of the Sewage Plant property.

Bob Mantell said that he was told that the Chemical Company built some employee houses and the Willow Church on E. 71^st for the company. Jody Hanousek’s house was one of the company houses. When the church became the Willow Church, it was leased by the company.

FROM: History of Cuyahoga County, Ohio; Part Third: The Townships, compiled by Crisfield Johnson, 1879; Pages 481-484.

THE AUSTIN POWDER COMPANY,

(an outgrowth of the firm of Austin & Sons, which was founded in Ohio in 1833), was incorporated in 1868, with a capital of $300,000 for the purpose of manufacturing all kinds of powder. The works are located near what is called five-mile-lock. Here the company owns one hundred and thirty acres of land, upon which are the mills, tenement houses, etc. Thirty men are employed, and about four hundred kegs of powder are produced daily; the product including blasting, mining, shipping, cannon, meal, and several grades of sporting powder. Mr. L. Austin, who was the secretary of the company until 1873, has been its president since that time.

THE CALIFORNIA POWDER COMPANY,

an association incorporated by the State of California, has branch factories in various parts of the country, and among them one in Newburg. This branch was established in 1877, for the purpose of manufacturing dynamite, or Hercules powder, for blasting. The business of these works aggregates $300,000 annually. Forty men are employed, being under the direction of William Wilson, the superintendent. The mills are located near the line of the Ohio canal, in a deep ravine upon an extensive farm owned by the company and comprise about a dozen different structures.

THE NEWBERG FERTILIZER COMPANY,

composed of J. R. Peck, J. H. Breck, Jr., and E. S. Peck, has a large establishment near the river devoted to the manufacture of bone-dust, super phosphate of lime and neatsfoot oil. The company was established about three years ago, as the successor of Davidson & Palmer.

FROM: May 1902 Article in the Cleveland Plain Dealer:

OLD COMPANY DISBANDS. NEWBURG FERTILIZER CO. PASSES OUT OF EXISTENCE

The Old Newburg Fertilizer Co. was officially dissolved yesterday at a meeting of the board of directors called for that purpose in the office of the Produce Exchange bank. The company has been practically out of business for the past four or five years, the property in Newburg formerly used by it having been purchased by the Newburg Reduction Co. some time ago, but the meeting yesterday was for the purpose of formally and legally turning back the charter of the company.

FROM: The Encyclopedia of Cleveland History

The U.S. STEEL CORP., a large producer of steel and a major manufacturer of wire and wire products, had 9 divisions of its American Steel & Wire subsidiary in Cleveland at one time. The Cleveland-based firms that eventually became part of U.S. Steel dated back to 1857 when founded the Jones & Co. in Newburgh, where they erected one of the first rolling mills in the area. When Henry Chisholm and Andros B. Stone bought into the firm in 1858, it became the Stone, Chisholm & Jones Co. and produced iron rails. The first blast furnace in Cleveland was built by the firm in 1861. In Nov. 1863 the company was reorganized as the Cleveland Rolling Mill Co. and 5 years later steel was produced at the Newburgh mill using the new Bessemer process. Various types of wire products were made in the 1870s, and in 1881 the company expanded its facilities with the erection of the Central Furnace near the Cuyahoga River.

In 1899 H.P. Nail Co., founded in 1877 by Henry Chisholm, the American Wire Co., incorporated by Chas. A. Otis in 1882, and the Baackes Wire Nail Co., started by Michael Baackes in 1889 all became part of American Steel & Wire Co. of New Jersey. When U.S. Steel was organized in 1901, American Steel & Wire became its subsidiary. The subsidiary's main Cleveland facilities were the American Works, Central Furnaces & Docks, and the Newburgh Works. These plants were joined by the Cuyahoga Works in Cuyahoga Heights in 1907 and the Cleveland Coal & Chemical Works in 1916. Under U.S. Steel, the Cleveland plants of American Steel & Wire continued to expand, producing a variety of wire and steel products for numerous customers. In 1924 the division's national headquarters were consolidated in the Rockefeller Building in Cleveland. The Depression highlighted the antiquated state of U.S. Steel's Cleveland plants, and much of the historic Newburgh plant, dating back to Jones & Co., was closed. Although the remaining plants were expanded and modernized in the 1940s and 1950s, U.S. Steel began to withdraw from Cleveland in the 1960s, closing the American Works and the rest of the Newburgh Works. In a reorganization move, the American Steel & Wire Division was dissolved in 1964 and the Cleveland offices were moved to Pittsburgh. When the parent company experienced financial problems, its closed the Central Furnace Docks & Cleveland Coke Works in 1978. Crippled by the 1980s recession, U.S. Steel closed the Cuyahoga Works in May 1984, its last major operation in Cleveland. In July 1986 the company sold the Cuyahoga Works to the American Steel & Wire Corp., and it reopened 2 months later, producing wire and rods from steel billets.

FROM: The Encyclopedia of Cleveland History:

AUSTIN POWDER CO. is the oldest manufacturing enterprise in Cleveland. Begun in 1833 by the 5 Austin brothers to produce explosives used in blasting rock to build the canals, the firm opened plants in Akron and Cleveland.

Its Cleveland factory, bought from the Cleveland Powder Co. in 1867, at the 5 Mile Lock of the Ohio Canal (under the later Harvard-Denison Bridge), blew up in 1907. Austin also built at Glenwillow, a rural community it developed in 1892, building homes for its employees, a town hall, a school, and a general store in the village. In the 19th century, Austin products were used in eastern coal fields, but its real periods of growth occurred in wartime. The government was the sole customer of the company's Glenwillow plant, where the workforce doubled to 200 to meet wartime demand. Because of the dangerous nature of the business, Austin powder manufacture was carried out in some 50 buildings at the Glenwillow site, and in other locations in 5 states. Headquarters were maintained in the Rockefeller Building in downtown Cleveland, then at 3735 Green Rd., and finally at 25800 Science Park Dr. in Beachwood. Though the company was safety-conscious, its history was marked by many explosions. As the isolation of Glenwillow ceased with the growth of neighboring suburbs, the company decided to close the plant and moved its Ohio manufacturing operations in 1972 to its plant in McArthur, OH. Beginning in 1985, Austin began a period of significant international expansion. In 1995 the company had operations in a dozen countries around the world, and over 1,400 employees. Almost all of Austin's products are sold to the mining and construction industries. David M. Gleason, a long-time Cleveland resident, was the company's president.

Miscellaneous information about the Austin Powder Co.:

There was a powerful explosion in March of 1875. Fourteen mills blew up that day. There was another explosion on March 16, 1872, and also in 1907.

From: The Brooklyn Daily Eagle, Brooklyn, NY, March 17, 1874:

"The Austin powder works, five miles from Cleveland, Ohio, blew up yesterday with a series of loud explosions, and the ten or twelve buildings were completely demolished, and three men killed. Windows in Cleveland were shattered, and houses shaken as if by an earthquake, and terrible excitement existed for a while."

From: The Diary and Letters of Rutherford B. Hayes:

"...the scene of the fearful catastrophe in [March]. Some thirty or forty tons of powder blew up, shattering windows and injuring walls from five to ten miles distant. It rung a farm bell forty miles off. Was plainly felt near Pittsburgh one hundred miles off, and yet some houses quite near to the disaster were not injured, and people not over two miles south did not hear or know it. The explanation is in the state of the wind and the situation of the mills. The mills are in a ravine, perhaps sixty to eighty feet below the general level of the country. The force of the explosion followed down the ravine to some extent as if fired in that direction. But probably the wind had the most to do with the result. It was a day of fearful wind, gusty and violent so as to make it dangerous to roofs and houses."

From: Elyria Independent Democrat, Elyria, OH, March 24, 1875:

TERRIFIC EXPLOSION IN CLEVELAND

Three Men Torn into Atoms

"At one o'clock on Tuesday afternoon of last week, the citizens of Cleveland were startled by a shock which caused the strongest buildings to tremble, followed by another, and another, in rapid succession, until four distinct shocks were felt. For a moment the terrified inmates of the buildings thought they were visited by an earthquake direct from Chili, and many rushed into the streets to avoid being crushed by the buildings. As most of the effect was visited upon the large windows, many of which were blown in, scattering fragments of broken glass upon the floors it was soon known to be caused by an explosion, which relieved their fears, and the next query was, what was it that exploded? Quite a number of Elyrians were in the city, and they describe the shock as terrible and startling.

In a few moments a cloud of white smoke that was seen in the direction of the Austin Powder Works, five miles away, on the canal, revealed the secret of the catastrophe. From the account given in the Herald we learn that of a dozen or fifteen men who were at work in and about the powder mills, that exploded, only three were killed, and they were blown into atoms. A few others were injured, but most of them miraculously escaped. Nearly a dozen buildings were demolished, some of them being so completely annihilated that only a deep hole in the ground marks the place where they stood.

The cause of the first explosion will forever remain a mystery, as the only person in that mill was killed. The other explosions were caused by the first, and it is estimated that the buildings destroyed contained about fifty tons of powder. The effect must have been powerful, to have caused such havoc in the city, five miles away. Some of the finest plate glass fronts in the city were smashed in, and nearer the scene of the explosion the damage was very great to all buildings. Mr. D. M. Fisher, who was in the city when it occurred, presented us with a specimen from Ryder's large plate glass window, which was seven sixteenths of an inch thick, showing the force of the explosion in breaking into atoms such strong glass. "

FROM: Elyria Republican, Elyria, OH, March 20, 1875

TERRIFIC EXPLOSION of the AUSTIN POWDER MILLS --- Cleveland Ohio.

Extracts taken from the account published in the Leader of Wednesday, the 17th.

"The city on yesterday passed through an experience the like of which she has never before known, and which for a few moments filled the minds of all with consternation and dread. It was the instantaneous and utter destruction of the Austin Powder works, which were blown to pieces without a moment's warning, and in which three men in the twinkling of an eye were hurled to a terrible and violent death.

The first thought of some people was that the giant powder brought here to be used in clearing the river of ice had escaped control, but a glance to the southward over University Heights showed a dense column of white smoke rising from the district where the Austin Powder works are located. Another but less violent explosion followed some minutes after the first ones, so that it was thought the destruction of the Company's works must be complete.

The shock felt in the city was terrific. Heavy brick buildings swayed and grated as though heaved by an earthquake. The plate glass windows of the new City Building, the superb front of Ryder's art gallery, E.I. Baldwin & Co.'s show windows those of Rice & Burnett and, doubtless, many others were shivered to atoms. The only windows left unbroken were those consisting of small panes of glass.

Throughout the city the damage was very large, and it will require some days before it can be fully estimated. Cleveland has heretofore been visited by one or two earthquakes, and has also passed through oil and powder explosions, but none of them have ever before caused so much damage or created such a commotion among the people.

How the explosion occurred is a mystery and always will remain so, although it is easy to guess that some slight disarrangement of machinery, or one of those unforeseen accidents that no human foresight could prevent, brought on the sudden and dread catastrophe and scatter ruin, where before had been only active industry and business prosperity.

At the time the accident occurred, only three or four of the mills were running, and the loss of life was much less than it otherwise might have been. Some eight or ten men were about the works, and it seems almost a miracle that so large a number of them escaped. The three who were killed were in the two mills that exploded first. One of them, David Lamson, was alone in the rifle corning mill, while the other two, August Radcliffe and Frederick Putnam, were in the rifle press. The three were literally blown to pieces, and fragments of their bodies scattered over the place for rods about.

The amount of damage done cannot be estimated, although it is the estimate of one of the Company that it will be in the region of from thirty to fifty thousand dollars. The loss in machinery, material and stores is not well attainable until after ascertaining how much can be made of use, and what percentage of the whole lot can be used in the future."