#11 The Last Men of Steel
This one's going to be a little different.
My grandfather used to say that there isn't anything common about common sense.
When World War II broke out, the draft board told my grandpa, Big Joe Rosenberger, that he (all 6'6" and 265 lbs of him) was too chubby to join the Marines. To not go to war would have brought some serious shame to the family, so at 21 he travelled to Warren, Ohio to work in the Republic Steel steel plant, which was a short drive from his house on Maplewood Avenue in the mill town of Ambridge, named after the company that created it-American Bridge. It's also my hometown. My great-grandfather Anton worked in the American Bridge fabrication plant in World War I after he travelled to the US at the turn of the 20th century from Slovenia. This is all to say that my grandparents sweat in the mills and fought wars so that I wouldn't need to.
If there is a bridge in your hometown, chances are it was made in mine. The workers of companies like Republic and American Bridge built the Golden Gate. They provided the landing craft for D-Day. These were some of the biggest manufacturing companies on the planet for some time. If the body politic of American muscle in the mid 20th century was our ability to make great big things, then the steel companies of the Ohio, Monongahela, and Mahoning Valleys: Carnegie, US Steel, Bethlehem, American Bridge, were our iron-smelted skeleton.
The work was dangerous, and the most dangerous labor-intensive work was done by what came to be known as "mill hunkies". This was a derogatory term used by earlier waves of German and Irish immigrants reserved for the rough men who's family's came from the rough parts of Hungary, Yugoslavia, Poland, and Austria. These are my people.
At the time, most of the jobs in the mill connected steel pieces with hot rivets so that they could be assembled into bridges and ships all over the world. Back then this was a three person job. A "heater" would heat a rivet (about the size of a small wrench) in a forge until they were red hot, they would toss the hot rivet to a "catcher" who would place it into a pre drilled hole for the man wielding a hammer, which weighed somewhere between 8 and 16 lbs. He then pounded the rivet into place to connect the pieces of steel in whatever it was they were building.
The family story goes that Big Joe swung a 10-lb hammer, and that he swung ten times with one hand, and ten times with the other for six months, 12 hours a day. He lost 40 lbs, grew his frame to the size of a small tank, joined the Marines where he served as a crew chief in the South Pacific, married my grandma Jennie, and then came home and started the Iron City Beer Distributor, which served the men and women coming home from their own shifts in the mills over the next 40 years. He and countless others in my family were able to build their own lives because the workers of American Bridge built everybody else's. Steel put food on the table. It put us through Catholic school, and more than anything it forged and tempered an idea: if we build things made of steel, if we eat because of steel...then that's the stuff we're made of as well. I think a lot of folks where I'm from feel this way.
There's a big kerfuffle going on with steel back home. US Steel, which bought American Bridge in 1901, has been slowly losing it's grip on the region. Japan's Nippon has offered to buy US Steel and invest in local infrastructure. In a move that was weird to me, President Biden shut the deal down this week. Trump is pledging to do the same. It's an odd place to agree for two men who seemingly disagree on everything. The unions are (rightly) nervous about renegotiating deals with a foreign owner and want the best for their membership, but it's gotten complicated. US Steel pledged a billion dollars in investments and jobs a few years back and cancelled it in 2019. Now Japan, one of America's biggest strategic allies and foils to our largest rival in China, is coming along and pledging $2.7 billion in investments, part of which to directly modernize machinery and clean up the environment from steel works still operating on 20th century technology-all in an area plagued by some of the worst air quality in the United States. Residents who live in the Monongahela Valley have a 14% higher mortality rate compared to the national average because of the pollution from the mills. And now the muck-ity mucks are poo-poo-ing it and saying it's bad for national security and they'd rather hold out for something better? There isn't anything common about common sense.
Here's who loses when all this stuff happens. Every Big Joe, who's job today is keeping food on the table and their kids in school. There are 3000 people who went to work this morning at the Edgar Thomson, Irvin, and Clairton plants in the Mon Valley, and my guess is most of them don't give a hoot who owns the plant. Most of them give a hoot that the paycheck cashes so they can buy groceries. Most of them give a hoot about their kids getting a decent shot at getting a good, safe job. Most of them give a hoot about not getting cancer or dying early because of the air they breathe at or near their jobs.
But listen, I get getting the heebee-geebes about a foreign company, even if it's an important strategic ally, owning a piece of America's critical infrastructure, particularly when its so important to defense. So, if we're going to block a sale on national security grounds, then let's partner with the unions and push US steel to invest the $2.7 billion themselves. The government can make it easier. While they can't force investment directly, they could easily offer tax benefits to modernize and retain/create jobs. Representatives Summer Lee and Ro Khanna introduced a bill last year called the Steel Modernization Act. Among other things, it offers $10 billion to support the construction of new, modern steel facilities and the upgrading of existing ones. The bill aims to promote the production of near-zero emissions intensity steel, encouraging the adoption of advanced technologies to reduce greenhouse gas emissions in the steel industry, AND it emphasizes strong labor standards, including fair wages and safe working conditions, and prioritizes projects in legacy steel, iron, coke, and coal communities to revitalize de-industrialized towns. It's even backed by the steelworkers union. If you're an incoming Republican politician in the majority and you profess to work for working men and women, this is your chance to put your money where your mouths are. US Congress, pass a bill that does some good.
If the incoming president is going to beat his chest and talk about strengthening foreign tariffs on behalf of American working people, but block deals (domestic or otherwise) that save and create American working people's jobs while making our air cleaner and our critical industries stronger, I'm pretty sure that leaves us nowhere. If we do nothing, and the last steel plants leave Western PA forever, know that it's because old men held out for a better deal that was never coming, and they could have done something about it.
Day Owl started as a supply chain company. We pulled trash out of landfill and waste collection communities all over the world, turned it into fabric, and eventually decided to turn that fabric into backpacks. We've worked with thousands of people who's lives pivot and change directly based on how leaders make (or don't make) decisions. I've seen lives destroyed because somebody pulled the rug out from underneath a community just trying to get through their days. It makes them tough, but it also makes them bitter. Nobody deserves it.
It's pretty difficult to destroy a people made of steel, but damn if I don't see the people in the rooms where it happens (incoming and outgoing) doing their best. Jagoffs.
This blog is about business mistakes, failures, and lessons learned in business. I don't speak up enough, and this one hits close to home.
This one is definitely for the birds,
Ian
PS-Each week I look at the mistakes I’ve made and the lessons I’ve learned at Day Owl so hopefully, you don't have to. I also do an Instagram reel to go with this note @hellodayowls. This is all rather embarrassing for me and hopefully entertaining for you. We’re calling it all "For the Birds", and this is installment #11. Comment (it makes it so much more fun), ask whatever you want, and if this reminds you of something YOU want to share, text me...724.312.1012.
