Blast Furnace L - Demolished

Only found this out today, may be old new to some or not matter to others.

But in January of last year, blast furnace L at Sparrows Point was explosively demolished.
Sparrows Point furnace implosion planned for Wednesday afternoon - Baltimore Sun

Drone fly over before L was taken down.
This drone video shows the disheveled remains of Sparrows Point steel mill - Technical.ly Baltimore

What introduced me to heavy industry was "The Model Railroader's Guide to Steel Mills", I bought the book just to try and copy track plans for models. I didn't expect the book to not really cover the model building stuff, instead it explained in a very clear, concise and organized manner, the history of iron and steel making, the processes involved and have TONS of wonderful pictures. About the best an introduction a 13 year old could get, first time I read it I was hooked, not long after I fell into machine tools.

Every time I hear of another mill getting taken down it's sobering, but reading about final demise of "The Beast of The East" is doubly touching. The aforementioned book made many references to Sparrows Point and blast furnace L specifically so it's always stuck in my mind.

And the final words of the article saying FedEx may be building a distribution hub on the site is upsetting because after being screwed many times by FedEx I have a deep hatred of them.

Anyhow, the march of progress I suppose.....

alskdjfhg said:

Only found this out today, may be old new to some or not matter to others.

But in January of last year, blast furnace L at Sparrows point was explosively demolished.
Sparrows Point furnace implosion planned for Wednesday afternoon - Baltimore Sun

Drone fly over before L was taken down.
This drone video shows the disheveled remains of Sparrows Point steel mill - Technical.ly Baltimore

What introduced me to heavy industry was "The Model Railroader's Guide to Steel Mills", I bought the book just to try and copy track plans for models. I didn't expect the book to not really cover the model building stuff, instead it explains in a very clear, concise and organized manner, the history of iron and steel making, the processes involved and have TONS of wonderful pictures. About the best an introduction a 13 year old could get, first time I read it I was hooked, not long after I fell into machine tools.

Every time I hear of another mill getting taken down it's sobering, but reading about final demise of "The Beast of The East" is doubly touching. The aforementioned book made many references to Sparrows Point and blast furnace L specifically so it's always stuck in my mind.

And the final words of the ad saying FedEx may be building a distribution hub on the site is upsetting because after being screwed many time by FedEx I have a deep hatred of them.

Anyhow, the march of progress I suppose.....

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That hit hard for a lot of people around here. My wife grew up in the shadows of that mill. Dundalk was a bedroom community fed by Bethlehem steel.

Sparrows Point buyers pay $11 million - Baltimore Sun


dee
;-D

Two great 98 year old books by J. E. Johnson, Jr.

The Principles, Operation and Products of the Blast Furnace

Blast Furnace Construction in America

It was normal by then to build them with a daily output of 500 tons of pig - kept the coke ovens hopping

Here is the guy that built it (Sparrows Point) - worked for Carnegie as a young man

"Bethleham Steel" - Google Search

One of their suppliers was likely Henry Clay Frick - the coke king

On Edit...

At the risk of telling folks what they already know....Blast Furnaces never made a drop of steel at steel plants such as Beth - all they ever did was turn iron ore into cast iron - pig iron - for further processing into steel - or simply for sale to any number of iron foundries. Thumbnail shows SP in the twenties when they were bringing in MAYARI ore from Cuba which came "stock" from the mines with some Nickel, Chromium and Vanadium.

Environmental remediation must have cost equal to the GDP of several nations

dcsipo said:

That hit hard for a lot of people around here. My wife grew up in the shadows of that mill. Dundalk was a bedroom community fed by Bethlehem steel.

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We lived in Laurel in the 50s and 60s and used to take family picnics out at Fort Smallwood, the 1812-period gun emplacement right across the water from Sparrows Point. Every once in a while you could see them dumping carloads of red-hot slag.

I always wondered why that magnificent-looking operation was allowed to decline, but years later I understand. Making the existing plant competitive would have been like trying to automate a shop full of lineshaft machine tools. You could do it after a fashion I suppose, but if your overseas competitor already has a machine with a 10-pallet pool it's kind of pointless. I'm sure that with the rise of mini-mills with continuous casting that plant was a dead man walking for the last 20 years of its life. You hate to see something emblematic of American industrial capability be demolished, but OTOH every few years we'd hear about a tapper getting enveloped in molten iron. Maybe not so bad to know your kids are going to be tapping keypads rather than crucibles...

I generally despise this town for tearing down so many beautiful structures, including our Art Deco railroad terminal, which is absolutely unforgivable, but I have to give them credit for saving Sloss. Amazing place to visit, if you are ever in the area.

Sloss Furnaces - Birmingham, Alabama Sloss Furnaces

I work next to the Rouge Steel Mill in Dearborn, Mi. I stand in awe at how much history and ingenuity that place represents. Not to mention the amount of energy it takes to fire the place for continuos operations.

The rail cars with molten steel roll within 15 ft. of the road. You can feel the heat, and are humbled.

The Mill keeps changing hands since Ford owned it.

Alhhdhhgxcgyh if you want to read more about Sparrows Point, there is a book called Roots of Steel.

johnoder said:

The Principles, Operation and Products of the Blast Furnace

Blast Furnace Construction in America

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E.F. Thumann said:

there is a book called Roots of Steel.

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Thanks, I'll see if I can get a hold of them easy.

E.F. Thumann said:

Alhhdhhgxcgyh

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Type it out, it's a simple pattern, just unpronounceable gibberish.

Here if no paper ones

Blast-furnace Construction in America : Joseph Esrey Johnson : Free Download & Streaming : Internet Archive

The principles, operation and products of the blast furnace : Johnson, J. E. (Joseph Esrey), b. 187 : Free Download & Streaming : Internet Archive

alskdjfhg said:

Thanks, I'll see if I can get a hold of them easy.




Type it out, it's a simple pattern, just unpronounceable gibberish.

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J.E. Johnson Jr. only made it to 49, but looks like he had one hell of a career

Proceedings of the Mining and Metallurgical Society of America - Mining and Metallurgical Society of America - Google Books