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| wuwm, Courtesy of Ron Winkler "In 1867, Eber Brock Ward chose an area south of Milwaukee to open his newest rolling mill. That area is now known as Milwaukee’s Bay View neighborhood." |
I knew that Brock Ward had a mill on Goose Island. I did not know he had a mill in Wisconsin. This was his third mill.
"Many small manufacturers had sparked considerable industrial energy in Milwaukee by the end of the Civil War. But Eber Brock Ward, a wealthy Detroit industrialist and former Great Lakes shipping magnate, sparked new area growth when he opened the Milwaukee Iron Company in 1868 with 185 employees on twenty-seven acres in Bay View. Brock owned iron companies in Detroit and Chicago, was a pioneer manufacturer of steel rails, and was lured to Milwaukee by easy access to rich iron ore deposits in Michigan and nearby Iron Ridge in Dodge County. He built homes and boarding houses, donated lots for churches, and recruited skilled English puddlers and other artisans. The company produced re-rolled iron rails; metal bars called fish plates, which joined two rails together; merchant bar, which customers reshaped for other products; horse shoes; nails; and pig iron, a durable product made from smelting iron ore with coke and limestone in blast furnaces. By 1870, the company produced half of Wisconsin’s pig iron. By the early 1870s, Milwaukee Iron employed one thousand workers and was a national leader in iron production." [uwm]
David Nelson posted six images with the comment:Near this site in Bay View stood the Milwaukee Iron Company rolling mill, the first major heavy industry in the region and an important producer of iron and steel for the Midwest. The mill, which opened in 1868, transformed ore from Dodge County and Lake Superior area mines into iron products including thousands of tons of rail for the region’s growing railroads.By 1885, more than 1500 people were employed at the plant, some recruited from the iron-producing districts of the British Isles, and the village of Bay View grew from a rural crossroads to an industrial community surrounding the rolling mill.On May 5, 1886, the mill was the scene of a major labor disturbance. Nearly 1500 strikers from around Milwaukee marched on the Bay View mill to dramatize their demand for an eight-hour work day. The local militia, called to the scene by Governor Jeremiah Rusk, fired on the crowd, killing seven people.The mill closed in 1929, and the buildings were demolished a decade later. But the community of Bay View remains: a neighborhood of mill workers houses, shops and churches.[hmdb]
A few more things about the Bay View rolling mill. I am repeating some already posted photos, some lesser quality ones not previously posted, an October 1985 aerial view from my (former) condo at Bay View Terrace of the general area. and a Sanborn map.
For those that know the area, notice that it is the rolling mill's own trackage that explains the "dog leg" in S Superior Street!
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| 1 [A Wisconsin Memories post provides a date of 1938.] |
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| 2 [This looks like just a cropped version of Photo 1.] |
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| 6 [The historical marker is out-of-frame in the lower-left corner.] |
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| LinksToThePast "Milwaukee Iron Company rolling mill (also known as the Bay View Rolling Mill, North Chicago Rolling Mill, and United States Steel) located in Bay View operated the first major heavy industry in the region, iron and steel production. The rolling mill which opened in 1868, was first built to re-roll railroad rails, but then started to manufacture new rails transforming ore from Dodge County and Lake Superior area mines. In 1883 the furnaces were operated by the North Chicago Rollowing Mills. By 1885, more than 1500 people were employed at the plant, some recruited from the iron-producing districts of the British Isles. The village of Bay View grew from a rural crossroads into an industrial community surrounding the rolling mill." [The remainder of the article concerns the Bay View Massacre on May 5, 1886, during a strike for an 8-hour work day.] |
Wisconsin’s most historic and bloody labor incident occurred on May 5, 1886 on the shores of Lake Michigan in the Bay View area of Milwaukee. That day dawned after four days of massive worker demonstrations throughout Milwaukee on behalf of the creation of eight-hour day laws..As some 1,500 workers marched toward the Bay View Rolling Mills (then the area’s biggest manufacturer) urging the workers thereto join the marches, the State Militia lined up on a hill, guns poised. The marchers were ordered to stop form some 200 yards away; when they didn’t, the militiamen fired into the crowd, killing seven persons.The marchers dispersed and the eight-hour days marches ended. The incident, in spite of its immediate end to eight-hour day efforts, spurred workers and their families to look forward to build a more progressive society in Milwaukee and Wisconsin.
This is one of the homes that was built for the puddlers to help entice them to leave England and work here. [UrbanMilwaukee]
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| Street View, Mar 2025 |
