Sloss Furnaces

by Karen R. Utz, Sloss Furnaces Foundation

Overview

Sloss Furnaces National Historic Landmark is currently the only 20th-century blast furnace in the nation being preserved and interpreted as an industrial museum. Since reopening in 1983, Sloss Furnaces has become an international model for similar preservation efforts and presents a remarkable perspective of the era when America grew to world industrial dominance. At the same time, Sloss is an important reminder of the dreams and struggles of the people who worked in the industries that made Birmingham the "Magic City." Today Sloss is not only dedicated to preservation and education but serves as a center for community and civic events. Site tours and public presentations provide insight into Sloss's industrial heritage as well as a rare glimpse of an early Birmingham that has all but disappeared.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780738566238
Publisher:	Arcadia Publishing SC
Publication date:	11/09/2009
Series:	Images of America Series
Pages:	128
Sales rank:	1,143,055
Product dimensions:	6.50(w) x 9.10(h) x 0.50(d)

About the Author

Karen Utz is the curator of Sloss Furnaces National Historic Landmark and an adjunct history instructor at the University of Alabama at Birmingham. She is a contributor to Work, Family, Faith: Women of the Twentieth Century South and Man Food: Recipes from the Iron Trade. Utz has served on various committees for the Southeastern Museums Conference, the Society for the History of Technology, the Alabama Academy of Sciences, and the American Association of Museums.

Table of Contents

Acknowledgments 6

Introduction 7

1 James W. Sloss and the Rise of Birmingham 11

2 Sloss "Quarters" and Birmingham's Industrial Housing 31

3 Sloss-Sheffield Steel and Iron 41

4 End of an Era 69

5 Saving Sloss 75

6 Preserving the Heritage 89

7 Sloss Metal Arts 111

Bibliography 127

Editorial Reviews

Title: Supporters' iron will keep Sloss Furnaces' past alive
Author: Jeremy Gray
Publisher: The Birmingham News
Date: 11/9/09

From its decades as a blast furnace that drove Birmingham's bus tling industrial economy to its rebirth as a museum preserving the memories of that bygone era, the history of Sloss Furnaces is captured in a new pictorial history being re leased Monday.

''Sloss Furnaces'' is the newest installment in the Images of America series of books from Arcadia Pub lishing, a nationwide line that includes 68 books de tailing different aspects of Alabama history and about 20 in the Birmingham area alone.

Past installments chroni cled, among other subjects, Birmingham's broadcast television history, the city of Leeds, and Alabama's contributions to the ad vancement of aviation.

Sloss Furnaces curator Karen Utz, who provided the text for the book, said she was approached about the project by Arcadia dur ing the Southeastern Mu seums Conference's annual meeting in Birmingham in October 2008.

Throughout the summer, her staff delved into the Bir mingham Public Archives to compile the book's roughly 200 pictures. 'It was extremely revealing. I saw pictures I'd never seen before. I learned a great deal from doing this," Utz said.

The images show men working in the heyday of the iron and steel industry from the late 1880s through the 1950s, the furnace's de cay as it stood dormant in the decade after it ceased operations in 1971, and the rallies of the late 1970s that led to its conversion into a museum in 1983.

"Everyone who lives here now very likely had a grandfather or uncle or someone in their families who worked at Sloss or one of the many other blast furnaces or steel mills in the area," Utz said.

The book, Utz said, con nects the dots from the era when Sloss was Birming ham's lead employer to its second life as a place of learning and host to social and cultural events.

Since 1981, when it was designated a National His toric Landmark, Sloss has held the distinction as the only 20th- century blast fur nace in the U.S. preserved as an industrial museum.

The pictures capture the push in the late 1970s by citizens eager to see Sloss preserved that led to the conversion. Their efforts, Utz said, kept the furnaces from being sold for scrap and the land sold as an in dustrial site, according to the book. Parades and pub lic rallies, many of which are pictured in the book, persuaded city leaders to maintain the site.

"This is the true story of concerned citizens that met in homes and restaurants and, through their hard work, managed to save Sloss," Utz said.

From the Publisher