These maps are amazingly detailed snapshots of the Ellwood City in 1894, they were donated to us by Jan Williams of Wayne Avenue. As you can see, there are many things in the picture that have not only disappeared from the skyline, but there are not many people left that remember what these places looked like outside of the few exterior pictures we have.
    Almost at the center of the picture is the Ellwood Shafting & Tube Company (later to be known as “Mill B” of the National Tube Company a subsidiary of United States Steel Corporation). The picture gives a general idea of the structure, but is detailed enough to show each of the different departments inside of the building. The other industrial building shown is the Hartman Manufacturing Company (on both sides of the railroad tracks). Again, all of the various departments like drawing and weaving department are broken out. Additional items on the first map include the freight house off of Sixth Street and a Railroad turn table behind it. On the North side of Lawrence Avenue between Sixth Street and Seventh Street is the Ellwood City Opera House. Again, so detailed are these maps that it shows the billiards room on the west side of the first floor and a bakery on the east side. It even shows where the stage on the second floor was located. Also on the corner of Seventh Street and Lawrence Avenue, you can clearly see the Honorable Henry S. Blatt’s and Captain A.C. Grove’s hardware store buildings.
    The second map is more of a collage of the more prominent buildings in the town in 1894 than a map. The detailed map includes the Derwent Foundary and Peerless Glass Lead Works, the Ellwood Enamel Company and Ellwood Gas Stove and Stamping Company on Tenth Street, the Ellwood Tin Plate Company and Northwood Glass Company on Factory Avenue, and the layout of the Ellwood Brick Company Limited and G.W. Wallace. Notice in the drawing of the Ellwood Brick Company Limited, there is a foundation laid out for a proposed forge but not yet built.
    In the zoomed in picture of the Hotel Oliver, you get a clearer picture of the layout of the Hotel. In 1894, there were two separate cottages on the grounds and the saloon was also a separate building in the courtyard. You can also see just how large the legendary dining hall and kitchen were as they took up almost the entire first floor of the south wing of the Hotel.   
    At the time of this survey, the population of Ellwood City was approximately eight hundred people. The buildings with a large ‘D’ are “dwellings” or residential houses. If you would like to leave any comments please feel free below or email us by CLICKING HERE.

    The Northwood Glass Company was founded by English-born Harry Northwood, the son of a talented glass manufacturer. Harry left England at the age of twenty to work in America in 1880 and founded his own factory in 1887 in Martins Ferry, Ohio. Only five years later, Harry closed his plant in Martins Ferry and moved to Ellwood City where he opened a new plant. The move to Ellwood City was not a coincidence, but rather the result of the influence of Mr. Northwood’s uncle Thomas Dugan, who was heavily invested in the new town of Ellwood City.
    Many people who have left their mark on Ellwood City came to town with the Northwood Glass Company. Those that purchased lots and built houses in the new town along with Mr. Northwood include Henry E. Helling, Adam Eiselen, George Beaumont (Northwood’s father-in-law), George Pownall, John G. Anderson, Thomas A.E. Dugan, and Samuel Dugan – both were nephews of Mr. Dugan and Mr. Northwood’s cousins. When Northwood closed his Ellwood City plant in 1896 and left for Indiana, PA, the Englishmen left with him and the Germans (Eiselens and Hellings) stayed.
    The Northwood Glass plant in Ellwood City was located at the end of Eleventh Street along Factory Avenue. After Northwood closed its Ellwood City facility, the plant sat empty for a couple of years until 1898 when the American Lamp & Brass Company moved in. American became Clark Brothers Glass Company, and again in 1905 it changed hands becoming Ellwood City Glass Company.
    After leaving Ellwood City, Harry Northwood at one time leased the Dugan Glass Company (then under a different name) in Indiana PA, and Thomas Dugan became one of the managers. When Harry left, the name was changed to Dugan Glass, and in 1910 the company began to produce Carnival Glass, often using old Northwood moulds. Dugan Glass Company marked the bottom of its pieces with a diamond shape with a ‘D’ inside. In 1913, when the company again changed its name, it became the Diamond Glass Company and kept the insignia. The Diamond Glass Company produced great pieces until 1931, when the Indiana, PA factory was destroyed by a disastrous fire.
    After leaving Indiana, the Northwood Glass Company eventually moved to Wheeling, West Virginia and produced glassware that is still highly sought after today. The Northwood Company marked their products with a letter ‘N’ inside a circle on the bottom of their pieces. The company was the top company in production of Carnival Glass until Harry contracted a fatal disease and passed away in 1918. The company continued but without Harry, the company and its products steadily declined until finally closing in 1925.

    One of our favorite pictures of Ellwood City is the picture taken from 196 feet above the town sometime between 1909 and 1915. It is amazing how much has changed from then to today. There is so much in the picture it is easy to miss some of the more interesting things. We have added yellow numbers to some of the points we would like to draw your attention to in this picture, of course there is more than the twelve things we mention here and would love to hear about something we missed.
    The first point of interest we see when we look at this picture is the grand Hotel Lawrence surrounded by the majestic Oliver Park. Though it is difficult to get your bearings with this picture, we are actually looking at the side of the Hotel. The front of the Hotel formally called Hotel Oliver is the side with the large white peaks and faces down Fifth Street.
    Secondly, in almost the center of the page we see the Central School building built in 1902 on the corner of Lawrence Avenue and Sixth Street. Today the Ellwood City Municipal Building is located on that lot of land with a number of memorials displayed in the front lawn. The large World War II memorial in front of the Municipal building was purchased with the extra money that was raised for Ellwood City’s anniversary.
    Number three in the picture is the Park Hotel, built 1895 and located on the North side of the Ellwood City Short Line. Today, most people don’t remember the Park Hotel and we have had a difficult time uncovering the fate of the old Hotel. Did it catch on fire from the sparks of a passing train, or was it simply torn down due to dilapidation? The fact remains that the building is no longer there but if you look the next time you drive past, one of the walls from its foundation is still standing today.
    Four and Five go together, almost. Point number four is the old train station that is no longer there today and number five points to something that is actually missing from the picture, the Fifth Street Subway. The railroad you see in the picture beside the train station was the Pennsylvania Railroad, who owned Rock Point Park. The railroad through Ellwood City was known more as the Ellwood Short Line and replaced the B&O railroad that was built along the Northern bank of the Connoquenessing Creek in 1876. After the Ellwood Tunnel was completed in 1892 the railroad connecting North Sewickley & Rock Point ran through the natural plain which Ellwood City was built upon and the hilly B&O railroad was abandoned.
    Ellwood City owes its birth more to the Ellwood City railroad tunnel and Beaver Falls then the more common misconception of New Castle. Ellwood’s founder H.W. Hartman was dissatisfied with the conditions in Beaver Falls where he was the head of the Beaver Falls Water Company and Hartman Steel Company.  He heard the railroad was planning to build the tunnel to bypass the slower line through Hazel Dell and put his plan for an industrial resort town into action.
    The passenger station in the picture, known as the Union Station, served Ellwood City until the mid 1950’s. One text says the station was torn down as late as 1957, while another says it was torn down as early as 1955. Today, a parking lot is all that remains beside what is now the Buffalo & Pittsburgh Rail line.
    Just west of the Union Station is number Six, the freight yards of Ellwood City. The large structure on the Northern side of the tracks is the B.O. Freight Station. The station was located just West of Sixth Street which was a main road at the time of the picture as the bridge connecting Ellwood City to Hazel Dell was the Sixth Street Bridge, not the Fifth as it is today. The “Hazel Dell Bridge” as it was known then connected Sixth Street and College Street. The original Fifth Street Bridge was not erected until 1915.
    The B.O. Freight Station was demolished in 1982 and the property was sold to the Ellwood City Forge Group.
    Our number seven point of interest is one of the few things in the picture still standing today. Point seven is the Stiefel Building on the corner of Lawrence Avenue and Fifth Street. We have yet to discover if the building was named after one of Ellwood City’s most prominent citizens, Mr. R.C. Stiefel, if he actually had the building built, or maybe he even had his offices there.
    Number eight is the old tube mill more commonly known to the folks of Ellwood as “Mill B”. Originally the mill was the home of the Ellwood Shafting & Tubing Company, the first manufacturing institution to establish itself in Ellwood City as early as 1891. “Mill B” was dismantled in 1923 and the property was sold to Pittsburgh and Lake Erie Railroad for a freight station and yard. It is hard to see it today but from Sixth Street to Blanks Concrete and Supply was nothing but P&LE spurs. Five or six lines of empty railroad lines loading and unloading freight coming into and out of Ellwood City all day long. August 25th 1981 marked the last day P&LE took a loaded boxcar, cargo from Airway Industries out of Ellwood City.
    Nine is less of a specific point as it is a general area. As you can see from the picture, the West End of town was the direction of the growth in the early days of the town. The mills and businesses were more congregated at that end and most Ellwoodians thought that the town would continue to grow in that direction. In fact the first school built in Ellwood City after its founding was the West End School and the first hospitals were all located in that direction of town. It wasn’t until Ralph C. Stiefel and J.H. Nicholson left the Shelby Seamless Tube Company in 1899 and erected the Standard Seamless Tube Company (later called “Mill A”) that the town began spreading east also.
    Ten is the beautiful picnic grounds of Oliver Park and the site of Ellwood City’s first murder. According to “A History of Ellwood City, Pennsylvania” James Bell was found in the park next to a tree murdered. The victim, who had carried the mail from Ellwood City to the Belton Post Office, was also robbed as his pockets were all turned inside out. The park was a popular picnic destination (if you got permission from the Hotel) and how Park Avenue got its name. 
    Eleven simply points out the large farms and spread out residences that still existed in Hazel Dell. Hazel Dell originally was on both sides of the Connoquenessing until Merrit Green and Henry Hartman purchased all the farms on the South side of the creek to build Ellwood City. The roads through Hazel Dell were the old Indian trading paths from when the Shawnee & Delaware Indian tribes occupied the area. It was these tribes that actually named the Connoquenessing, which means “can’t canoe”. Hazel Dell was cut in half by the Connoquenessing and connected by the covered bridge known as the Jones Mill Bridge or White Bridge (built 1858 and razed 1898) located at the present site of the Fifth Street Bridge.
    Hazel Dell did not become a borough until 1901, almost ten years after Ellwood City. The borough of Hazel Dell officially consolidated with the borough of Ellwood City in 1914.
    Finally, point number twelve reminds you of the time period that the picture was taken. The buildings with no windows behind the houses are not garages, but barns. Henry Ford introduced the Model T in 1908 but didn’t begin the moving assembly lines in his factory until 1913, so there were not very many cars in the town when this picture was taken.

    If you noticed something we missed or if you feel that we got something wrong, please leave a comment below or email us by CLICKING HERE.

    Ellwood Shafting & Tubing Company was the first manufacturing institution to establish itself in Ellwood City in 1891 and the first to manufacture seamless tubing in the United States. Just three years later in October of 1894, the Ellwood Shafting & Tube Company was sold to H.A. Lozier the “Bicycle King of America” and the name of the company was changed to Ellwood Weldless Tube Company. The founder of Ellwood City, Henry W. Hartman was appointed vice president of the new company. The Ellwood plant was only the second seamless tube plant in America. Also in 1894, Ralph C. Stiefel came to the Ellwood City from England for the company. Along with becoming a stockholder in the company, Stiefel accepted the position of general manager and introduced his own patented process for making seamless tubing. Ellwood Weldless became the first company in the United States to make tubing by the Stiefel method making it one of the leaders in the tubing industry.
     In the early part of 1897, The Weldless Tubing Co. built a new plant located between Sixth and Eighth Street stretching from Beaver to Factory Streets. By the fall of the same year, the new plant was absorbed by the Shelby Steel Tube Company and would become known as Mill “B”. Ellwood Weldless Tube Co.’s name was also changed to the Shelby Steel Tube Company. The newly formed Shelby Steel Tube Co. was actually a merger of plants in Shelby Ohio, Greenville PA, and the Ellwood Weldless Tube Company. Mr. Emsworth of Ellwood City was named the first Superintendent and R.C. Stiefel was appointed manager.
    From the time Ralph C. Stiefel accepted the position of Superintendent at Ellwood Seamless Tube Co. straight from England, he was connected with the Shelby Seamless Tube Company until 1899. At that time along with J.H. Nicholson, he left the Shelby Company and erected the Standard Seamless Tube Company with some friends in Ellwood City and was in direct competition with Shelby Seamless. The National Steel Tube Co. bought the Standard Company in 1901.
   Soon after National purchased Standard, the United States Steel Corporation absorbed National Tube and at the end of June 1901, it also absorbed the Shelby Steel Tube Company and Mr. Stiefel was made General Superintendent of all the plants in the country. Now all the seamless tube works were now conducted under the name of the Shelby Steel Tube Company.
    In 1905, the U.S. Steel Ellwood plant consolidated Shelby Steel Tube Company (Mill A) and National Steel Tube Company (Mill B) and became National Tube Company (a subsidiary of United States Steel Corporation). After a fire destroyed the Shelby Ohio Works plant in 1908, all the seamless tube works was produced in Ellwood City. Due to the growth, the Ellwood City Works of the National Tube Company expanded to 127 total acres with 23 acres under a roof.  The plants were served by direct connection with the Baltimore & Ohio Railroad and by the Pittsburgh & Lake Erie Railroad.  The Ellwood Works had an annual capacity of 350,000 gross tons of tubular goods in 1942. Employment during World War II reached 4,000 employees.
    August 1,1946 an announcement was made that operations at the Ellwood Works would be phased out over a three year period. The closing was avoided and 1959 saw major expansion adding two new structures for stainless steel adding 40,000 more square feet. In 1974, U.S. Steel closed its doors in Ellwood City and the last seamless tube was produced at the National Tube Company. When the plant closed employment had dipped down to a little over one thousand people.
    Please share your memories of these mills or of Mr. Stiefel by leaving a comment below or email us by CLICKING HERE.

     In 1917, the National Tube Company (a subsidiary of United States Steel Corporation) opened a massive facility on the corner of Pittsburgh Circle and First Street that would bring recreational activities never even thought of in Ellwood City a reality. Designed as a clubhouse for the employees of National Tube, it became a recreational center for virtually all of the citizens of Ellwood City. The Shelby Social Club was home to an Olympic size swimming pool, a meeting room, a gymnasium, a six lane bowling alley, billiards, an auditorium, a soda grill, lounge room, cafeteria and a basketball court among other things.
     It did not take long after construction that the basketball program became one of the finest in the area. The first team to play on the basketball court was the Shelby Social Club’s semi-pro team. In 1918, the court became home to the Ellwood City High School basketball team also. Ellwood City was without a high school team before that because the school did not have anywhere to play or practice. The high school played at the Shelby until they got a gym of their own in 1926 at the newly constructed Lincoln High School. Today that gym is known as the “old” gym or “little” gym. 
    Basketball continued to grow in popularity in the predominately baseball minded community but public interest truly gained at the start of the city wide church league in 1920. First Baptist dominated the church league with their only loss in the first two years was to Bell Memorial (First Baptist had to forfeit the game). The 1921-22 all-star team consisted of Merit Book, Chief Parillo, Dewey Cunningham, Ralph Adams, Sing MacDonald, Ray Johnston, Jimmy Guy, Cooper, Fike, & Dip McDaniel.
    In 1925 the sport got another boost when National Tube started an Inter-Departmental League. Teams included Hot Mills, Mechanicals, Office, Specialty, Finishing, Cold Draw, Hot Finish, Inspection, and consisted of All-Stars Dip McDaniel, Sing MacDonald, Joe Latiano, Joe Reilly, and Earl McCandless). The league expanded in 1936 with the additions of Lincoln High Faculty and Italo Balbo. The Inter-Departmental League ended in 1940.
    1930 marked the return of the Semi-Pro league at the Shelby Clubhouse. The Ellwood City Manhattans began play in the Allegheny County League playing the best teams in Western Pennsylvania and posting an 11-11 record. In the clubhouse’s last ten years other basketball leagues played at the Shelby including Junior & Intermediate leagues, an Industrial League, and a Municipal League. The Municipal League included teams such as Moose, Catholic Center, SOI, North Side, Eagles, Chippy’s, and Oasis.
    The same year the Inter-Departmental league ended (1940), the Shelby Social Club put a team in the Beaver County Basketball League. The Socials lost its first two games against Slippery Rock University & the University of Pittsburgh, then the Socials went on to win their next nineteen games in a row finishing the season 30-4. 
    Basketball was not the only thing people remember about the Shelby Clubhouse. Beginning in 1918, the day school let out for Christmas vacation, the clubhouse was open to all children in grade school in Ellwood City & surrounding townships. Children not yet old enough to be in kindergarten were also invited but required a ticket that was available with a donation. The kids would climb the stairs to the third floor auditorium to see a huge decorated tree, view a Christmas themed film, sing carols, & see Santa come down the fake chimney. After Santa appeared, each kid got a brown bag treat which during the Great Depression may have been more than some of the children got for Christmas.
    Then, during the summer of 1950 without any big announcements, a small article appeared stating that the Shelby Clubhouse facilities had been sold to Aetna-Standard for an engineering and office building. The small announcement was the end to the recreational center that meant a whole lot to Ellwood City.
    After U.S. Steel closed the clubhouse, the club moved to the office space in the old hospital building on the mill grounds. The final Christmas party was Dec 23, 1960. It was estimated that 6,000 children gathered for their Christmas treat that year though in previous years the number reached as many as 8,000. 

    We are pretty sure that more than a couple of people have memories (good or bad) about the great clubhouse that was available to them for more than 33 years. If you would like to share yours, please leave a comment below or email us by CLICKING HERE.

    Late Wednesday evening on April 29th in 1959, the Keystone Die Factory burst into flames on the grounds currently occupied by Allied Auto Parts and Blank Concrete & Supply. A lot of people may remember this building more as “The Box Factory”. Do you remember the Keystones Die Factory or the Box factory? Please share your memories by leaving a comment below or email us by CLICKING HERE.

   The National Plumbing fire on top of the hill was a very memorable fire. The building itself was on the main road in and out of Ellwood City as the four lane highway wasn’t even a thought yet. These pictures were taken the next day and as you can see there are still pockets of smoke smoldering from a very hot fire. You can see how hot the fire was by what the heat did to the steel beams that held the building up. If you remember this fire or National Plumbing itself, please share your memories by leaving a comment below or CLICK HERE to email us.

National Tube Company

The Standard Tube Company, was started when R.C. Stiefel & J.H. Nicholson left Shelby & started Standard Seamless Tube Co. The Standard Tube Co. was the largest seamless tube plant in the world when it was purchased by the National Tube Company in 1901. Shortly after this, the National Tube Company was incorporated as a part of the United States Steel Corporation and be known to locals as Mill A. The various seamless tube manufacturing plants are operated under the Shelby Steel Tube Company.

National Tube Works

National Tube Works

Standard Mill Shelby Tube Company

The core of Ellwood City was the development of a strong industrial base fostered in large part by the invention and development of the seamless tube industry here. The first seamless steel tubes in America were pierced in Ellwood City in June of 1895 by the inventor and engineer Ralph C. Stiefel.

Shelby Tube Mill

    The Ellwood Weldless Tube Company was the very first seamless tube company in the world and was later acquired by the Shelby Tube Company. The Shelby Tube Mill was the center of the tube division of U.S. Steel.