2010 Year in Review

2010 proved to be the busiest year in our organization's history.  We started off the new year with a new name, since the "Tod Engine Foundation" name no longer adequately described our increased focus on preservation of all aspects of the Youngstown District's steel industry heritage. 

January

  Severstal Wheeling donates this 26" x 54" x 48" cross compound Corliss steam engine, built in 1905 by Westinghouse Machine Co. in Pittsburgh, PA. The removal of this engine will proceed throughout the entire year.

March

 Photographer Joseph Elliott photographed the Steubenville North plant for the Historic American Engineering Record.  The documentation project was paid for through sponsorships.

April

 

 

Drain lines for the enginehouse gutters and flywheel pit were installed.  The foundation wall for the east end of the building was also formed up and poured.

May

The YSHF purchased a set of William Tod Co. gauges at an estate sale.  These gauges once adorned the triple expansion water pumping engine at Lake Rockwell in Kent, Ohio.

 

June

The Regional Industrial Development Corporation of Southwest Pennsylvania donates a Kling type hot metal car and a 175 ton teeming ladle.  Both were built in Youngstown by the William B. Pollock Company. We spend the entire month cutting the ladle in half and building track at the Tod Engine Heritage Park for the car.

 Morgan Engineering in Alliance, OH donates an 1890s vintage Olsen tensile testing machine and a ladle hook. The tensile machine was moved from Morgan's power house and reassembled inside the Tod Enginehouse.

July

Grim's Crane Service moves the Kling type hot metal car and the teeming ladle to the Heritage Park.

Ellwood Engineered Castings contributed this 63,000 lb. ingot mold, originally made for Lukens Steel in Coatesville, PA.

August

 The first heavy lift was made in the dismantling of the Westinghouse Corliss engine as the top half of the generator stator was removed.  This is remarkable when considering that to make the lift we had to install 30 feet of overhead crane runway in the building and upgrade the existing crane to 20 ton capacity.

September

 

  Penn-Ohio Logistics in Austintown, OH donates this 1944 General Electric 80 ton diesel locomotive. The locomotive was last used in McDonald, OH and needs minor work to be made operational again.

October

 YSHF volunteers spent a few days down in Rankin, PA assisting our friends at Rivers of Steel National Heritage Area in securing the Carrie blast furnace site.  We installed a new set of drive gates and repaired several holes in the site's perimeter fence. 

November

 Our final "save" of the year was this rare 1930 Westinghouse diesel locomotive, one of the oldest and most historically significant diesels in existence.  Built in Pittsburgh, it was used at the Armco Butler Works until the 1960s.  We will be moving it to Youngstown from St. Paul, Minnesota in 2011. 

The construction of the Tod Enginehouse was finished with the completion of the front wall in November.  The steel siding used for the endwalls was donated by Severstal Wheeling.

During 2010 the YSHF's collection of historic steelmaking equipment increased by 360 tons, bringing the total amount of equipment under our care to about 750 tons.  2011 will prove to be just as exciting as 2010 as we complete the removal of the Westinghouse Corliss engine and move our two newest locomotives to new quarters.  With the enginehouse building completed, we intend to host a few open houses during the summer months.

We were extremely fortunate this year to raise the funding needed to save all of this equipment.  However, merely acquiring this equipment is only part of the battle.  We now have to properly house and restore these priceless pieces of our industrial heritage.  We are always looking for new volunteers to join in our efforts, as well as contributions to keep up the momentum.  If interested in becoming actively involved in the YSHF please contact me and I'll get you started.

Thank you for your support of our efforts to preserve steel history.

Rick Rowlands

President

Youngstown Invention Comes Back Home

This railroad car, designed to transport 70 tons of molten iron between the blast furnaces and steelmaking furnaces in an integrated steel mill, has been acquired by the Youngstown Steel Heritage Foundation and is to be moved to the Tod Engine Heritage Park very soon.  This type of car was invented in 1923 by Fred Kling, chief engineer of the US Steel Youngstown District plants.  Mr. Kling assigned the patent to William B. Pollock Co. in Youngstown, who built quite a few of these cars for the steel industry. at least three still exist, all in the Pittsburgh area. 

With the significance of this car to our local history, we were excited to have the opportunity to bring it home and properly exhibit it at the Heritage Park.  It will be blasted, painted and exhibited coupled to our 70 ton diesel locomotive from Ellwood Engineered Castings in Hubbard.

Westinghouse Corliss Steam Engine Removal

 

Work has begun on the preservation and removal of this 26" x 54" x 48" cross compound Corliss generating engine donated by Severstal Wheeling.  The engine is located in Steubenville, OH and over the next few months will be dismantled and moved to Youngstown for inclusion in the Tod Engine Heritage Park.  The engine was built around 1902 by the Westinghouse Machine Co. for the Labelle Iron Works and installed to generate 250 volts DC for the plant. Last operated probably in the late 1960s, the engine has been relatively untouched ever since and is a rare find.