Wheeling-Pittsburgh Steel

Wheeling-Pittsburgh Steel was a steel manufacturer based in Wheeling, West Virginia.

Wheeling-Pittsburgh Corporation
Defunct
IndustryMetals
FateAcquired then liquidated
SuccessorRG Steel, LLC (bankrupt entity)
Founded1920
HeadquartersPittsburgh, Pennsylvania (1920-1986)
Wheeling, West Virginia (1986-2013)
Productsraw steel
galvanized steel
substrate steel
coils
bridge building
sheet metal
tin
coke
Number of employees
3,133 (2006)[1]
Websitewww.rg-steel.com 
Wheeling-Pittsburgh Steel Building, in downtown Wheeling, West Virginia.

Operations

The company owned the following factories, all of which are between Benwood, West Virginia and Steubenville, Ohio.

  • Ackermann Works at Wheeling, which produced pressed and drawn steel stampings used in the automotive and appliance industries.
  • Beech Bottom Works at Beech Bottom, West Virginia, which consisted of sheet mills for producing hot rolled electrical sheets used by electrical equipment manufacturers. It also had facilities for coating long terne sheets produced by the Yorkville Works.
  • Benwood Works at Benwood, West Virginia, which consisted of 2 pipe mills with slabs supplied from Steubenville Works.
  • LaBelle Works at Wheeling, which manufactured cut nails.
  • Martins Ferry Works at Martins Ferry, Ohio, which produced galvanized sheets, galvanized roofing and accessories, corrugated culverts, and hand-dipped items. It featured two continuous galvanizing lines where coils of steel strips were processed, galvanized, and treated and sold under the SofTite brand. A second galvanizing line went into operation in November 1953 at a cost of $3 million.
  • Steubenville Works, which consisted of three integrated operations:
    • Steubenville North at Steubenville, Ohio, which featured two blast furnaces, 11 open hearth furnaces, blooming mill, hot strip mill, pickle line, and cold reduction mills. It produced hot rolled sheets and plates and cold rolled sheets and coils.
    • Steubenville South at Mingo Junction, Ohio, which consisted of three blast furnaces, two Bessemer converters, blooming mill, rolling mill, continuous caster, slab yard, and auxiliary equipment. It supplied hot metal for the open hearth furnaces at Steubenville North and Bessemer slabs for Benwood Works.
    • Steubenville East in Follansbee, West Virginia, which featured 314 coking ovens for Steubenville North and South.
  • Steelcrete Works, adjacent to Beech Bottom Works, manufactured expanded metal, metal lath, and accessories. It also produced Steelcrete bank vaults, reinforced mesh for buildings, stair treads, partitions, and miscellaneous items.
  • Wheeling Works at Wheeling, which fabricated containers, stove pipe and furnace pipe, electric and gas dryers, roofing accessories, floor and roof decking, gasoline tanks for automobiles, and miscellaneous automobile parts.
  • Yorkville Works at Yorkville, Ohio, which consisted of the first cold reduced black plate for tinning. The first tandem mill of its kind was installed in 1928. The facility produced electrolytic and hot-dipped tinplate, black plate, and terneplate. It also had a metal decorating plant for coating and lithographing tin, terne, and black plate, and two electrolytic tin plate lines that produced tin plate at up to 1,000 feet per minute.

Wheeling Steel was acquired by Pittsburgh Steel to form the Wheeling-Pittsburgh Steel Corporation in December 1968. The merger added:

History

Wheeling Steel Corporation was organized on June 21, 1920.[1]

The company was slow to modernize its high-cost facilities and, in 1985, the company filed for bankruptcy protection.[2]

In 1986, the company closed a rail mill that employed 200 people.[3]

The company reduced its employee count from 8,500 in 1985 to 6,500 in 1990.[2]

In 2001, the company filed for bankruptcy protection again and in 2003, the company emerged from bankruptcy protection.[4]

Esmark acquired the company in November 2007 after a proxy battle.[5]

In August 2008, Severstal acquired Esmark’s Wheeling-Pittsburgh holdings for $1.25 billion.[6]

In 2011, Severstal sold the former Wheeling-Pitt steelmaking operations to RG Steel.[7]

In 2012, RG Steel filed for bankruptcy protection and initiated layoffs.[8][9]

As part of the Chapter 11 bankruptcy liquidation of RG Steel, the Yorkville, Ohio plant was sold back to Esmark, the Martins Ferry, Ohio plant was sold to a local businessman, and the Steubenville, Ohio plant was sold to the metal recycler Herman Strauss.[10] The Mingo Junction mill was purchased by a group of investors called Acero Junction and was refurbished.[11] In June 2018, the mill was purchased by JSW Steel Ltd for $80.81 million.[12]

The Follansbee, WV cokemaking facility was retained by Severstal until 2014, when it was sold to AK Steel[13]. The facility is currently operated as Mountain State Carbon, LLC, a subsidiary of AK Steel[14].

The former Beech Bottom Works site is being refurbished by aluminum producer Jupiter Aluminum to coat aluminum coils.[15]

References
  1. Wheeling-Pittsburgh Corporation 2006 Form 10-K Annual Report
  2. HICKS, JONATHAN P. (July 19, 1990). "Bankruptcy Helps a Steelmaker". The New York Times.
  3. "Wheeling To Close Rail Mill". The New York Times. December 25, 1986.
  4. "Wheeling-Pitt emerges from bankruptcy protection". American City Business Journals. August 1, 2003.
  5. "Wheeling-Pittsburgh Corporation and Esmark Incorporated Stockholders Approve Combination" (Press release). Business Wire. November 27, 2007.
  6. OLSON, THOMAS (May 31, 2012). "RG Steel files for Chapter 11 bankruptcy protection". Pittsburgh Tribune-Review.
  7. "Severstal selling Wheeling-Pitt mills and other assets". Pittsburgh Post-Gazette. March 3, 2011.
  8. "RG Steel to close Warren plant, laying off 1,000 employees". WFMJ-TV. May 30, 2012.
  9. "RG Steel files Ch 11; cites steel market deterioration". Reuters. May 31, 2012.
  10. Santo, Jamie (June 4, 2012). "RG Steel Secures $15M Stalking Horse Bid For Ohio Plant". Law360.
  11. "New life for Mingo Junction's zombie steel mill?". Pittsburgh Post-Gazette. December 12, 2016.
  12. "Mingo Junction Steel Mill Purchase Almost Complete". The Intelligencer and Wheeling News Register. June 18, 2018.
  13. "AK Steel Buys Old Coke Plant". The Intelligencer and Wheeling News Register. July 23, 2014.
  14. "Mountain State Carbon". AK Steel Corporation. Retrieved 20 September 2019.
  15. "Jupiter Aluminum making $12M investment at Beech Bottom". Weirton Daily Times. March 26, 2019.

Further reading
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