• From the Library of Congress's online image catalog:
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GENERAL VIEW OF DURALOY COMPANY

OFFICE BUILDING LOOKING NORTHEAST

AT THE WEST FACADE




From 1885 until 1936, National Foundry & Pipe

Works Ltd. and its successor, United States Cast

Iron and Foundry Company manufactured cast

iron water and gas pipes and fittings.

The Duraloy Company took over the Scottdale

plant in 1937 after its West Virginia factory

burned. By 1945, it was one of the largest

producers of equipment for the manufacture

of magnesium, and a supplier for the

Manhattan Project.




(Library of Congress, Prints and Photographs

Division, Washington, D.C. [HAER PA,

65-SCOTT,1-]).

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By the time I was born, my grandfather was no longer mining but had taken a job pouring steel at Duraloy in Scottdale, where he lived. I remember that he used to come home with burn holes in his work clothes. One day he also came home with presents for my sister and me: two giant steel pennies that he'd poured for us. I have no idea where the penny mold came from--I suppose someone must have made it--but he told us that the men all had fun pouring pennies on their lunch hour. My big penny has been sitting on my desk for 40 years now.

You'll notice that I haven't said anything yet about the Manhattan Project. That would be because I can't find anything corroborating this involvement anywhere else online. It does give me the horrors, of course. My granddad himself could not have been involved: in the 1940s he was still mining. In fact, though he'd been drafted into the army and even had his suitcase packed, the government changed its mind and sent him back into the pit.

Still, to think that there was a vibrating link between Scottdale and Hiroshima is appalling. On the other hand, why should this surpise me? The story of coal and steel is all about evil.

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