POHC line industries, McKees Rocks to Washington

Pressed Steel, Kirwan Heights, Canonsburg, and Washington plants · September 2026

From McKees Rocks and Neville Island south along Chartiers Creek to the Washington, Pennsylvania, area, today’s Pittsburgh & Ohio Central (POHC) is a short-line remnant of two older railroads: the Pittsburgh, Chartiers & Youghiogheny (PC&Y) on the island and McKees Rocks end, and the Pennsylvania Railroad Chartiers Branch through Bridgeville, Canonsburg, and Washington. The plants below are the ones that put cars on those rails.

Related pages: Neville Island coke, cement, and chemical history · Railroads of the Chartiers Valley · The Kirwan Heights Industrial District

The corridor

C. P. Mayer’s Kirwan Heights industrial park, just north of Bridgeville on the Chartiers Branch, packed several plants onto one stretch of PRR: glass, staybolts, vanadium, specialty steel, brick. Farther south, Canonsburg and Washington added pottery, bridge steel, transformers, stainless sheet, and glass bottles. McKees Rocks, on the Ohio, was a freight-car city of its own.

McKees Rocks — Pressed Steel Car

Pressed Steel Car Company of Pittsburgh was formed 17 February 1899 from Schoen Pressed Steel (Pittsburgh) and Fox Solid Pressed Steel (Joliet). Its principal Pennsylvania plant was at McKees Rocks. By 1916 it was among the largest car builders in the country. The 1909 Pressed Steel Car strike — thousands of immigrant workers, IWW involvement, and deadly street fighting in August — is the plant’s most documented labor history.

The New Jersey parent filed under Bankruptcy Act §77B in July 1936. A new Pressed Steel Car Company, Inc. was incorporated 24 July 1936. After World War II the firm diversified and took the name U.S. Industries in 1954. U.S. Steel bought remaining assets in 1956 and used the property as a warehouse.

Forging on the site continued. Former managers leased the axle plant from U.S. Steel in 1986 as Standard Forged Products and restarted crane-wheel work. Trinity Industries bought the operation in 1989. Trinity spun the component businesses to Arcosa in 2018. In 2024 Stellex Capital acquired Standard Forged Products (with McConway & Torley) and launched FerroWorks. The plant at 75 Nichol Avenue still forges railcar axles and related wheels.

The Pittsburgh, Allegheny & McKees Rocks Railroad (PAM) switched this complex. Pressed Steel’s sternwheel Steel Queen (1901) worked the Ohio here until she burned at Woods Run on 16 October 1926.

Kirwan Heights / Bridgeville

C. P. Mayer’s Bridgeville Land Improvement Company sold sites along the Chartiers Branch in Collier Township (Bridgeville postal addresses) in the first decade of the 1900s.

J. B. Higbee Glass → GE Lighting

J. B. Higbee Glass Company opened in 1907 (named for John B. Higbee; his son Orlando built the Kirwan Heights works after the Homestead flood ruined Bryce, Higbee & Co.). Tableware lasted until 1918, when General Electric bought the plant and converted it to lighting glass — later machine-drawn tubing for lamps. GE closed the Bridgeville glass plant on 11 August 2017 (about 60 jobs; 540 Mayer Street).

Universal Rolling Mill → Universal Stainless → Aperam

Universal Rolling Mill Company incorporated 1908, in production 1909 (used equipment from Waynesburg; first product included sheet for shovels). The firm became Universal Steel Company in 1918 as specialty steels grew. In 1936 it merged with Cyclops of Titusville to form Universal-Cyclops. Alleghany Corporation bought Cyclops in 1987. Armco acquired the specialty mills in 1992, then all but shut Bridgeville in late 1993. Former managers formed Universal Stainless & Alloy Products in 1994 and bought the Bridgeville (and later Titusville) works. Aperam completed its acquisition of Universal Stainless on 23 January 2025. The mill remains in Kirwan Heights.

Flannery Bolt, American Vanadium, Standard Chemical

The Flannery brothers (James J. and Joseph M.) incorporated Flannery Bolt Company in 1904 on a Tate staybolt patent and built in Kirwan Heights. Vanadium steel staybolts for locomotive boilers were the product. In 1906 they incorporated American Vanadium Company next door, refining Peruvian ore (Minas Ragra) into ferrovanadium. Bridgeville local history records a 1919 sale of the vanadium business. During World War II Flannery Bolt earned an Army-Navy “E” for machine-gun barrels.

Standard Chemical Company (incorporated April 1911) was a separate Flannery venture: the first large-scale commercial radium producer in the United States. Colorado carnotite went to a mill in Canonsburg; final refining was in Oakland, Pittsburgh. Marie Curie visited the Pennsylvania plants in May 1921.

E. R. Shaw / Small Arms Manufacturing makes gun barrels in Collier Township (Thoms Run Road / Bridgeville). NRA reporting dates the barrel firm to the 1950s. Staybolt and barrel work use similar deep-hole drilling; Flannery had already made wartime barrels a few miles from today’s Shaw shops.

Silhol Builders Supply

Silhol Builders Supply, 100 Union Street, Bridgeville, is a family hardware and lumber yard in business since the 1890s. It is still open (lumber, hardware, ready-mix). The Pennsylvania Trolley Museum notes that Silhol’s warehouse is built around the old Bridgeville freight station.

Canonsburg

Canonsburg Pottery

Canonsburg China Company (1900, John George / George family) became Canonsburg Pottery Company in 1909. Dinnerware, later promotional ware and crockpot inserts. A serious fire is usually dated 1975. Production of dinnerware stopped in mid-January 1977; assets went at a 1978 bankruptcy sale. Clay came in by rail over a spur through the Fort Pitt Bridge Works property.

Fort Pitt Bridge Works

Fort Pitt Bridge Works dates from 1896 (structural steel, bridges, mill buildings). The large Canonsburg works — on the order of 25 acres and hundreds of jobs at mid-century — was acquired by Spang & Company in 1963. Colonial Steel bought what remained in 1986 and kept reduced fabrication on the site until 2006, when the grounds were redeveloped as Fort Pitt Industrial Park.

Pennsylvania Transformer

Pennsylvania Transformer Company was founded 1929 in Pittsburgh (W.E. Kerr and Samuel Horelick). The firm moved to Canonsburg in 1946. EPA’s site history puts Pennsylvania Transformer on the Curry Avenue property in 1947, after a Defense Plant Corporation warhead plant. Address today: 30 Curry Avenue.

McGraw Electric took the company in 1952; McGraw-Edison followed in 1957. Cooper (Cooper Power Systems) bought McGraw-Edison in 1985. Cooper announced closure in 1994 unless a buyer appeared; the plant shut that November. Ravindra Rahangdale bought the assets in 1996 and formed Pennsylvania Transformer Technology (PTT), which still builds power transformers there (now under Quanta Services).

Washington

Washington Steel

T. S. Fitch founded Washington Steel Corporation in 1945. Production began 1947 on a wide Sendzimir (Z-mill) for thin, accurate stainless sheet. Atlas / Mercury-program stainless (AISI 301 for Atlas) is part of the company’s own story.

Blount, Inc. (via subsidiary WS-B) tendered for Washington Steel in 1979 (New York Times, 12 March 1979: $40 a share, about $57.6 million). Lukens agreed to buy the company in March 1992. Bethlehem Steel acquired Lukens in 1998. Bethlehem closed Washington’s stainless sheet and strip operations in 1999.

Hazel-Atlas / Brockway glass (Canton Township)

Glass on this Washington County site started as Hazel-Atlas in 1907. Brockway later operated the plant; it closed in the 1980s. The Brockway name came from the company’s hometown in Jefferson County, Pennsylvania. Owens-Illinois combined with Brockway in 1988, after this plant had already shut. The brownfield has since been redeveloped as Brockway Commerce Center.

Stations along the Chartiers Branch

Glenn, Woodville, Bower Hill, Kirwan, Bridgeville, Mayview, Boyce, Hills, Canonsburg, Houston, Arden, Washington. PC&Y joined at Glenn and Woodville. The Montour Railroad joined at Hills (about MP 8.6). Rook Yard (P&WV, later N&W / today’s W&LE) is the Carnegie-area yard for that railroad.

Scully Yard, next to Duffs Junction, is the former PRR Panhandle yard where POHC still sorts cars for the NS interchange. The railroad chronology page covers how Duff and POV Junctions work.

Sources

  1. In re Pressed Steel Car Co. of New Jersey, 16 F. Supp. 329 (W.D. Pa. 1936) (77B; McKees Rocks and Hegewisch plants).
  2. ExplorePAHistory, McKees Rocks / Pressed Steel Car strike of 1909.
  3. Mid-Continent Railway Museum, Pressed Steel Car builder notes (U.S. Industries 1954; U.S. Steel 1956).
  4. McKees Rocks Forgings / Standard Forged Products company history (1986 lease; Trinity 1989; Arcosa 2018); FerroWorks / Stellex 2024.
  5. Bridgeville Area Historical Society, “The Kirwan Heights Industrial District”; “The J. B. Higbee Glass Company”; “The Flannery Brothers.” https://bridgevillehistory.org/the-kirwan-heights-industrial-district/
  6. LampTech / GE Bridgeville plant (Higbee 1907; GE 1918; closed 11 August 2017).
  7. Universal Stainless 8-K / press, 23 January 2025 (Aperam close); Encyclopedia.com and company history (Universal Stainless 1994 from Armco Bridgeville).
  8. Historic marker / Cytemp notes: Universal Steel of Bridgeville merged with Cyclops (Titusville) 1936 as Universal-Cyclops.
  9. Pennsylvania Heritage, “Radium City, U.S.A.” (Standard Chemical 1911; Canonsburg mill; Curie 1921).
  10. American Rifleman, 13 Sep 2018 (E.R. Shaw barrels, Bridgeville, 1950s founding).
  11. William Metzger, Pennsylvania Trolley Museum, 6 Sep 2023 (Silhol warehouse around Bridgeville freight station; Chartiers stations and connections). https://pa-trolley.org/a-short-history-of-the-chartiers-valley-rr-line/
  12. James T. Herron / Canonsburg pottery histories (China 1900; Pottery 1909; production stopped January 1977; bankruptcy sale 1978). Fire commonly dated 1975.
  13. Heinz History Center, Guide to the Fort Pitt Bridge Works Records (1896; Spang 1963; Colonial Steel 1986–2006).
  14. Industry Today / PTT company history (founded 1929; Canonsburg 1946). U.S. EPA, Pennsylvania Transformer Technology, Canonsburg (DPC then Pennsylvania Transformer 1947; Cooper 1985; PTT 1996). https://www.epa.gov/hwcorrectiveactioncleanups/hazardous-waste-cleanup-pennsylvania-transformer-technology-formerly
  15. New York Times, 12 Mar 1979 (Blount / WS-B tender for Washington Steel). UPI, 30 Mar 1992 (Lukens). Smithsonian / Bethlehem acquisition of Lukens; 1999 sheet-and-strip closure.
  16. Observer-Reporter (Hazel-Atlas 1907 on the Canton Township site; Brockway later; closed 1980s).
  17. Peter’s Model Railroading, Chartiers Branch stops (Kirwan industries; stations). https://pmrr.org/Prototype/Stops/index.php
  18. UW-Madison / Howard Shipyards notes: Steel Queen, Pressed Steel Car, burned Woods Run 16 Oct 1926.
  19. STB / Federal Register, 17 Feb 2023 (McKees Rocks Railroad LLC; PAM trackage, MRIE land).