Pennsylvania Steel Company
| Company type | Private (original company) |
|---|---|
| Industry | Steel manufacturing |
| Founded | 1865 |
| Founder | J. Edgar Thomson, Samuel Morse Felton Sr., Nathaniel Thayer III |
| Defunct | 1917 (original company acquired) |
| Fate | Acquired by Bethlehem Steel |
| Headquarters | Steelton , United States |
Area served | United States |
Key people | Samuel Morse Felton Sr. (President) |
| Products | Steel (including Bessemer process steel) |
| Parent | Bethlehem Steel (from 1917) |
The name Pennsylvania Steel Company applies to two separate steel enterprises located in Pennsylvania.
The first iteration of the company was established in late 1865 by J. Edgar Thomson, then-president of the Pennsylvania Railroad; Samuel Morse Felton Sr., who had recently stepped down as president of the Philadelphia, Wilmington and Baltimore Railroad; and Nathaniel Thayer III from the Baldwin Locomotive Works. In January 1866, Felton took on the role of president and chose a 100-acre tract in what is currently known as Steelton, Pennsylvania for constructing the initial steel mill. The land was purchased from Henry A. and Rudolph F. Kelker after obtaining the Bessemer patent rights from Burden Iron Works in Troy, New York. The mill's construction, along with Felton's residence, was supervised by Alexander Lyman Holley, a key figure who introduced the Bessemer technique to the United States. Both were completed in 1867 near the Susquehanna River adjacent to the Pennsylvania Canal. Operations commenced on May 15, 1868, with facilities including blast furnaces and a Bessemer process plant. The company was bought by Bethlehem Steel in 1917; blast furnace operations ceased by 1960, while open hearth furnaces continued until 1968 before being supplanted by electric arc furnace technology. A continuous casting machine was added in 1983. Following Bethlehem Steel's bankruptcy in 2001, ownership transferred to International Steel Group, which subsequently merged into Mittal, and later became part of ArcelorMittal.
The second entity originated as the Pennsylvania Steel & Aluminum Company in 1972, based in Huntingdon Valley, Pennsylvania. This company focuses on manufacturing machinery as well as steel and aluminum products but does not produce primary steel. It adopted the name Pennsylvania Steel Company in 1988 and moved its manufacturing operations from Huntingdon Valley to Bensalem Township, Pennsylvania in 1993.