Early History
In 1929, General Steel Castings Corp. acquired the Commonwealth Steel Company, a Granite City, Illinois based maker of steel, steel castings, and railroad supplies that had been founded in 1901 and had become a supplier to railroad companies. Commonwealth Steel had manufactured large cast steel bolsters for passenger cars for exhibit at the 1904 St. Louis World's Fair and designed and produced a one-piece locomotive bed in 1926. By 1928 "practically all locomotives and passenger cars built in the United States" were using Commonwealth products. General Steel's purchase of Commonwealth included Commonwealth's foundry and its new General Office Building, completed in 1926, both located at 1417 State Street, Granite City, Illinois. After the Commonwealth Steel acquisition, General Steel had two divisions, the Eddystone Division in Pennsylvania and the Commonwealth Division in Illinois. Only the Commonwealth Division was operational, the Eddystone Division's plant would not be completed until 1930. The Illinois operation was commonly referred to as the "Commonwealth" and was located at 1417 State Street in Granite City. During World War II, the Commonwealth plant manufactured steel for armor and cast steel tank hulls and turrets and employed approximately 5,200 people. After the war, the company returned to manufacturing locomotive castings in Granite City and earth-moving equipment in Eddystone.
Fortune magazine ranked the company 464, 481, and 441 in the magazine's Fortune 500 listing in 1962, 1963, and 1964, respectively. Employees numbered 3,650 in 1962, 4,200 in 1963, and 4,400 in 1964.
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“Yet poetry, though the last and finest result, is a natural fruit. As naturally as the oak bears an acorn, and the vine a gourd, man bears a poem, either spoken or done. It is the chief and most memorable success, for history is but a prose narrative of poetic deeds.”
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)