That Was Where? Mill Locations in Pittsburgh

Western Pennsylvania has long been viewed as the home of the steel industry but what happens when the landscape changes and mills close or move away?

Long before the dominance of Big Steel, the Pittsburgh Industrial District’s landscape was populated with a multitude of small iron and steel mills. For more than 150 years, iron and steel forged the landscape along the Three Rivers. Here, the works of smaller specialty mills joined forces with “Big Steel” to build the nation’s railroads, skyscrapers, bridges and homes–to serve in war and in peace.

This virtual storytelling episode focuses on the once intense concentration of mills in the region, and how the landscape has changed over the last half century as the mills closed or moved away. We will take a look at where mills were located along the Three Rivers, and what is there now.