Steel: The Diary of a Furnace Worker

A Yale graduate and former army lieutenant abandons a comfortable life to learn the steel trade from the ground up, taking a job as a clean‑up man on an open‑hearth furnace near Pittsburgh in the summer of 1919. Written as a series of evening entries, the diary captures the relentless heat, the clang of machinery, and the camaraderie forged during ten‑hour day shifts and fourteen‑hour night watches. The narrator’s raw observations bring the furnace’s rhythm to life, detailing the physical toll of the work and the small, often humorous moments that sustain the men through long hours.

Beyond the daily grind, the entries reveal a steel industry that is both the backbone of America’s growth and a battlefield of competing perspectives. The writer notes how workers, foremen, and distant shareholders each construct very different pictures of the same reality, especially as labor unrest looms on the horizon. His reflections offer a vivid snapshot of a pivotal moment when the furnace’s glow mirrors the simmering tensions of a nation on the brink of industrial upheaval.