STEELSTACKS ART & ARCHITECTURE TOUR Draft 05
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STEELSTACKS ART & ARCHITECTURE TOUR Draft 05-29-2013 Welcome and thank you for coming to our Art and Architecture Tour. My name is I am a guide with Historic Bethlehem Museums and Sites. Is this your first visit? Where are you from? Did you or any of your relatives work for Bethlehem Steel? INTRODUCTION Welcome to the former Bethlehem Plant of the former Bethlehem Steel Corporation. This plant of Bethlehem Steel Corporation covered 1,800 acres, stretching for over 4 miles along the Lehigh River. Having begun as the Saucona Iron Company in 1857, it became the Bethlehem Iron Company in 1861 and then Bethlehem Steel Corporation in 1904. Cheap foreign steel, the failure to revitalize aging plants, the cost of labor, management inefficiencies, and changing global circumstances finally brought the company to an end. Bethlehem Steel filed for bankruptcy in 2001 and was sold to International Steel Group in 2003. In the mid 2000s, the heart of the plant, app 124 acres, was sold to the Sands Corporation and other partners. After years of decline, this brown field is experiencing a renaissance … we will look at the early structures of the Steel and then at the new ArtsQuest Center, the PBS 39 facility, and the Sands Casino Resort Bethlehem. In part II of this tour, called the Rise and Fall of Bethlehem Steel offered this afternoon, you will learn about the history of the Steel. Now, we will learn about the architecture of the early industrial age and the new architecture and public art as this site is gaining new life as a center for the arts, culture and gaming. Let’s go back in time to the days before electricity, cars, phones, and computers. Before the Industrial Revolution, individual artisans and masters with their apprentices made goods mostly by hand or with the help of wind, water, or animal power. They worked in small shops and in relatively small buildings. With the Industrial Revolution, these small individual operations of hand-making goods mostly came to an end and were replaced with factories where the worker was part of a process and only made a piece of the end product. The iron worker in 1750s Bethlehem in our Blacksmith Shop forged the iron into finished products such as tools, door hardware, cooking pots. By the late 1800s, the iron worker here at Bethlehem Steel was working alongside hundreds of other men in large buildings transforming huge quantities of molten iron into many different products from steel rails for the railroad industry, wide flange beams for the new skyscrapers, to sheet metal for the burgeoning automobile business. It is postulated that industrial buildings led the way in architectural design in the second half of the 19th century and first half of the 20th century. Huge buildings were needed with lots of light and air circulation. As we walk around this plant, we will see how the buildings developed and you will see influences of classical Greek and Roman architecture. STOCK HOUSE VISITOR CENTER One of earliest buildings on the former Bethlehem Steel site and now the oldest – constructed circa 1863. It was designed by John Fritz, chief engineer of the Bethlehem Iron Company, forerunner of Bethlehem Steel Corporation. Many industrial building were designed by engineers rather than architects. Their design was based on function and had little ornamentation. Let’s take a close look at the building. Notice the materials used in its construction. John Fritz was keenly aware of the dangers of fire and made sure that all of his buildings were built of stone and brick, with iron roof trusses and cast iron columns. Why are the windows so large? This was decades before Thomas Edison invented the electric light bulb and over 50 years before air conditioning. The windows were made to open to allow for air circulation. Initially there were small panes of glass in wooden frames. Later the panes were enlarged and held in steel framed windows. They were trying to capture as much daylight as possible since they were struggling to see what they were doing. The type of glass also changed to lenticular or refraction glass which would allow daylight to penetrate without shadow or glare, both of which could be very dangerous. Let’s look at the architectural design of the stone walls and window openings. These are Roman-type arches with cut stones forming the arch around the top of the window openings. Notice also that the stone is laid in rows. The Stock House, as its name implies, was used as the place to store raw materials in the iron making process: iron ore, coal and limestone. It served this purpose when the earliest blast furnaces were much smaller and men used wheel barrows to cart raw materials to the top of the furnaces. Let’s walk around to west side of structure. Notice the architectural design element used in the restoration to provide a fire stair and elevator. Now look behind the building at the blast furnaces – see how reminiscent this element is of the large blast furnace pipes. The architects for the restoration wanted to be true to the site in the new addition. On the interior, the building has 6,000 square feet in size with a full second story added during restoration in 2011-12. The architects kept a portion of one of the crane runs. There were hundreds of overhead electrical cranes throughout the plant. The building now serves as a regional visitor center with offices on the second floor for ArtsQuest. The visitor center is operated by Discover Lehigh Valley and ArtsQuest. Feel free at the end of our tour to come back to this building and learn about all you can do here in Bethlehem and throughout the Lehigh Valley. TURN AND GRIND SHOP View the building from the entrance. Guests are not permitted inside the building due to liability issues. The Turn and Grind Shop was also built in the latter half of the 1800s with additions around 1909. It has 26,000 square feet of space. Notice the railroad tracks running through the floor. There were about 300 miles of track running throughout the plant. The trains brought in the steel shafts that were turned and ground to a fine polished surface. Bethlehem Steel had many contracts with the US Navy. This building was used to grind the shafts that drive the engines in their ships. This shop was a precursor to the big machine shops in the plant. There were about 900 electric overhead crane runs in the plant. This shop had multiple crane runs, again a necessity for working with heavy steel. Each crane run has a number painted on the side to let you know how much the crane could lift. However, back before electricity, mules were used to help move heavy objects along with chains and simple tools like wedges, ramps, block & tackle, ratchets. Plans call for renovation of the building as a center for events such as Christkindlmarkt, Oktoberfest, art and antiques shows and exhibits, markets, and community events. This building stands only a few feet from an active freight rail line (8 railroad tracks) moving freight through the New York/New Jersey metro areas. In addition to architecture, we will also be observing the public art designed for this area. Sculpture “Celebration of Life” by Salma Arastu Arastu, her husband, and children lived in Kuwait and Iran before emigrating to the United States in 1986. Arastu was born in India to a large family of 10 children and was also born with no fingers on her left hand. Arastu, a former Bethlehem resident, was a resident artist at the Banana Factory, Artsquest’s visual arts and education center. For those of you who are not from the area, the Banana Factory is about 6 blocks to the west on Third Street and houses 28 artist studios, a hot glass studio, and holds visual arts classes available to the community. (Need photo of Banana Factory- another perfect example of adaptive re-use … a former banana warehouse turned into a center for the arts). The artist now lives with her family in Berkley, CA. Arastu says she is building a body of work that “seeks to express joy in the universal spirit that unites humanity.” Her work is also influenced by her faith; Arastu was raised in the Hindu faith, but converted to Islam after her marriage. This influence can be seen in her in her work. She was also influenced by the flowing nature of Arabic calligraphy. Most of her work is painting and watercolor. This is her second piece of public sculpture. It was chosen for this site because it represents the joy of humanity and community. Made of steel and aluminum, this sculpture was fabricated locally and dedicated here July 2011. Background info on Banana Factory: The Banana Factory is a community art center and gallery. It recognizes the importance of the visual arts and sharing them with all. The Factory has 63,000 square feet of space and is an actual former factory. The space began life as the Lehigh Valley Hotel and stood for over a century. At various times it was home to a garment manufacturer, an auto parts store, and an automobile dealership. The business from which the Banana Factory draws its name was D. Theodoredis and sons, which processed, sold, and distributed bananas throughout the Northeast. The current Banana Factory was established in 1998. BLAST FURNACES These are the most powerful remaining symbols of Bethlehem Steel, standing at about 200 ft tall – about the height of a 20-story building.