Carnegie vs. Frick Pt. 2

            If it were a movie it would have been obvious to anyone that Carnegie and Frick would always have a rocky relationship.  Frick felt he had accomplished all he could in coke.  The future, he knew, lay in steel.  In 1885 Frick had a plan.  He sold the majority of his shares in the H. C. Frick Coke Co. with the intention of buying his way into Carnegie Steel.  When Andrew Carnegie heard of this plan he wrote to Frick counseling him to remain in Coke.  As he argued even if Frick were to become the Chairmen of Carnegie Steel, Frick would never be as satisfied as if he stayed with the company that he had build from the ground up and bore is name.  Frick politely thanked Carnegie for his advice and quietly bided his time.  

Frick knew what he wanted and he would get it too, if not today then tomorrow.

            Frick may not have had as long a wait as he expected.  In 1886 while Andrew Carnegie lay in bed sick with typhoid his brother Tom Carnegie, developed pneumonia and just 5 days later died.  Henry Phipps was moved to Chairman but everyone understood that it was only a temporary assignment.  Frick’s time was about to arrive.  By November 1 of that year Carnegie offered Frick a partnership.  He took Tom’s position as Principal Firm Manager while also remaining Chairmen of his Coke Company.  Once again conflict of interest was not a concept these men were familiar with.  It was not too long before there was a small inkling of what was to come.  In 1887 a Labor Strike at one of Frick’s Coke plant threatened the coke supply to Carnegie’s mills.  Carnegie, as majority share holder at in H.C. Coke Co. demanded that Frick settle with the workers and reestablish the supply of coke to his steal mills.  At the same time the other coke manufacturers were demanding that he hold firm less they have to match what ever terms he agreed to or face similar issues.  Unable to handle the situation as he wanted to Frick set out upon a novel solution.  He quit.  Carnegie was in Scotland, where he seemed to always be in times of difficulty, so Frick wrote to Phipps telling him that he could no longer handle the Company as he wished when the majority Stock holder, i.e. Carnegie, was making demands and not letting Frick run his company has he saw fit so they could have the company and he was going on vacation.  And he did.  He took Adelaide and his two children and sailed for Europe for several months while Phipps struggled to settle the labor strike and run a company he knew nothing about.  After a few months of basically ignoring a rain storm of telegrams and letters begging him to return to Pittsburgh from a number of company officers and share holders Frick finally accepted an invitation to come to Scotland and spend a few days with Carnegie.  The two men came to an understanding and shortly thereafter Frick returned to Pittsburgh and resumed control of H.C. Frick Coke Company probably to Phipps great relief.  The following year Henry Phipps had and enough.  He was ready to enjoy retirement.  Carnegie made David Stewart the Chairmen but almost immediately Stewart died.  Now there really was no other candidate, Carnegie turned to Frick. 

            Carnegie felt that now he really did have a managerial genius at the head of Carnegie Steel and in Frick he did.  Carnegie and Frick worked well together.  Both were obsessed with controlling costs while willing to use a certain amount of duplicity to make things work out the way they wanted.  When they learned a rival company was using a new way of making railroad rails that would be able to severely cut costs and thereby reducing prices which would allow the owners of the process to undercut Carnegie Steel, Carnegie wrote to the rail road companies warning that the new process was dangerous and could lead to failure of the rail line.  Almost immediately orders dried up and the company’s investors become desperate to sell.  Enter Frick with a very generous offer to take their plant and new process off their hands for basically cost.  Almost immediately the new process was put into place at all the Carnage steel mills.  Questions about the safety of the new processes seemed to evaporate into thin air.  Things were going well and then the Labor contract a Homestead expired….

The Beginning: Carnegie v. Frick pt 1

            The images of Andrew Carnegie and Henry Clay Frick are some of the most iconic representations of the Gilded Age, that period of industrial progress when everything seemed possible in America.  For the average immigrant the streets were not paved with gold but for these two men they may as well been.  As ruthless as they were wealthy, Andrew Carnegie in particular was the Bill Gates of his day; they represent what was possible in the time of limited regulation and, let’s not forget, no personal income tax.  It is well know that these two men began as friends and ended up as bitter enemies.  Perhaps it was destiny that two such strong willed men could no co exist peacefully in the same enterprise for ever.  It you take a look at their early interaction, with of course the benefit of hind site, it is almost impossible to miss the warning signs of what was to come.

            Andrew Carnegie, the elder of the two, immigrated to Allegheny City, what is today Pittsburgh’s North Side, at the age of 12 yrs with his parents and siblings from Scotland in 1848.  He had some schooling but formal education was impossible for the young boy whose priority now was to help provide for his family.  He got a job as a bobbin boy working 12 hours a day 6 days a week for $1.20 a week.  He moved on from there to become a clerk, then a delivery boy for a telegraph company in Pittsburgh.  By the time he was 18 years old he had become the assistant to the Assistant Superintendent of the Western Division of the Pennsylvania Railroad, Thomas Scott.  It was through this partnership that Carnegie would learn the value of investment which he built into one of the largest personal fortunes of any one individual in history.  He persuaded his employer Scott to loan him $500 so he could invest in Adams Express.  The company Scott had just told Carnegie was about to land a large contract with the railroad, the idea of insider trading was not something Carnegie or his friends were familiar with.  The $10 check Carnegie received shortly after his purchase of the company shares was the first time he ever made money with out personally working for it and it changed his life and the country.

            Henry Clay Frick grew up on a farm near Mount Pleasant Pennsylvania.  The son of a farmer, his early years, like much of his later life, were plagued by illness.  Because of his poor health his formal schooling was sporadic at best.  He was sent to collage by one of his maternal uncles but was soon back home having decided that collage was not for him.  In 1868 he moved to Pittsburgh and got a job as a clerk in a department store.  Impressed with his grandson, Abraham Overholt soon offered Frick a job as the book keeper for the family’s distillery business.  Unfortunately not long after taking the position Abraham died leaving Frick with out a job.  He again turned to family and got a position with his cousin Abraham Tinstman, who was in the coke making business.  Tinstman was looking for investors to provide and infusion of cash into his struggling business.  Frick, using the inheritance his mother received from his father’s estate as collateral, borrowed enough to buy at 20% stake in the new company.  This proved to be the first step in what would eventually make him the King of Coke.  By 1873 Frick and company were running 200 coke ovens, the largest operation in the region, and then came the economic collapse. 

            Both Carnegie and Frick were affected by the economic down turn and both met it with the same determination to succeed.  Frick used it as an opportunity to purchase the failing businesses of is rivals as each collapsed.  Carnegie had founded the Edgar Thomson Works, his first entry into the steel making business, just as the economic collapse began.  Carnegie had gotten out of the Railroad business and decided that the nation’s future lay in Steel.  His intense devotion to cost management helped his steel mill weather the storm and continue to show a profit even as other mills were shutting down.  Carnegie continued to expand and soon his own coke mills could not keep pace with his steel mills.  He needed Henry Clay Frick’s coke and he knew it.  Tom, Andrew’s brother, first approached Frick with the idea of selling the Carnegie Coke holdings near Latrobe, about 100 ovens in all, to Frick.  Frick was interested but it wasn’t a good time to be talking business, he was about to marry Adelaide Childs.  After the wedding however the couple began a 6 week honeymoon starting in New York City.  Carnegie, who was living in NYC at the time, invited the newlyweds to lunch and together Carnegie and Frick agreed upon a deal where Frick’s company would become the exclusive supplier of coke to Carnegie’s steel mills, setting the price at the beginning of the year per ton of coke.  After setting through the entire meeting Margaret Carnegie famously remarked to her son “ah, Andra, that’s a verra good thing for Mr. Freek, but what to we get out of it?”  What they got was a constant supply of coke at a set price, which would help insulate Carnegie from variations in the coke market, and in the long run the talents of one of the most gifted managers the world has ever seen.  The seeds were sown for a rocky relationship between the two very strong willed men. 

            Next week I will continue their story looking at the partnership years.

Weather In All Its Forms

            As a girl from Southern California weather is not something I used to spend much time thinking about.  I have frequently had people point out that this is because there is no weather in So. Cal.  Not so, is my usually response.  We have June Gloom, in you guessed it June, summer is hot but as I grew up less than 15 min from the beach not overly so.  The fire season is in October, I have been told this does not count but I can assure you it does, and the season of mud is in February when the rein causes the hillsides that burned in October to turn into mud and slide down into people’s living rooms.  In general however the area where I grew up usually keeps temps in a 40˚ range between a very cold 55˚ to a very warm 90˚ so coming to Pittsburgh one would expect quite a shock.

The lack of weather was my husbands biggest complaint about CA; followed closely by traffic which we wont discuss, lets just say the Pittsburghers idea of traffic is laughable.  Now I did come to Pittsburgh after spending 3 years in Kalamazoo Michigan which falls directly in the Snow Belt getting the lake effect off Lake Michigan so, I wasn’t as completely ignorant as some who saw my shinny red mustang with CA plates might have assumed.  However moving to western PA has definitely opened up the weather possibilities.  I had always thought that the three month division of seasons was just for convenience but here is a place where the seasons really do stick to being around for 3 months.  So by the time you are ready to move on to the next one it’s already here.  There are of course exceptions to every rule, the heaviest single day snow fall was in March 1993 when 23.6” were recorded, and I believe this was an actual blizzard.  Now in full swing and today and tomorrow are going to see 100˚ temps.  I feel kind of bad for my mom who is landing in Pittsburgh in a few hours leaving behind 60˚ temps but oh well it is going to cool off.

My uncle, when he was studying in Madison Wisconsin, once said in the summer he didn’t care how cold it got as long as it was cooler than this and in the winter he didn’t care how hot it got as long as it was warmer than this.  Pittsburgh can be like this too but extreme 100˚ heat and sub zero temps don’t usually last too long so just staying inside in a temperature controlled space is pretty easy to accomplish.  If there is something I find amazing is the precipitation.  The amount of water, in all its possible forms, is simply staggering.  I grow up in a desert remember.  The act that my lawn doesn’t have and doesn’t need sprinkles is not often believed by my family in CA.  I can remember my mom diligently going out at night to turn the sprinklers on and off in the dark, sometimes as much as three times a week.  My parent’s yard is quite large for their neighborhood so he had to water the lawn in sections.  But you have to shovel snow I can hear them say.  Yes this is true, however I think all last winter my husband had to shovel less than 10 times and I only shoveled once.  I try to help out but mostly he does it.  The fact is regardless of season we get some kind of H2O falling from the sky every week.  Some times there are light gentle soaking rains that water your plants nicely and other times we get violent thunder storms with rain so hard you can’t see across the street and thunder so loud it shakes the house.  I confess I still can not sleep through a loud thunder storm.  When lightning momentarily turns a dark night into day and thunder cracks so loud it sounds like a gun went off by you ear there is not sleeping, for me that is my husband usually only knows there was a storm because I told him about it he next day.  There is one real weather situation we have that truly frightens me and that is Ice.  Now I fully acknowledge that this is because at the end of last winter I hit a patch of lack ice going down a hill and around a curve, it’s Pittsburgh if you are not going up you are going down the flat strait road is rare, and slid into an oncoming car.  But these things happen and you can’t let that stop you.  Everyone was ok except of course my believed mustang that that is what matters, so I am told.  I do like my new car.

            We even get some truly weird weather like thunder and lightning while it’s snowing or poring rain in the sunshine.  These are the types of weather I describe to people in CA and I am pretty sure they don’t believe me but I promos I have personally experienced these events.  They do happen.  The nice thing about Pittsburgh is no matter the weather it won’t stay too long so you don’t get bored with it.  We don’t still have piles of snow in May or endless days of 100˚ temps.  If you like variety Pittsburgh is the place for you. 

I Would Like an H Please

            Founded in 1758 by General John Forbes Pittsburgh is listed as one of the most frequently miss spelled American cities.  General Forbes named the new settlement after the English leader William Pitt the Elder 1^st Earl of Chatham.  Forbes simply added the Scottish –burgh to Pitt’s name and most likely pronounced it in the Scottish fashion Pitts-burro, think Edinburgh in Scotland, burgh being a common ending meaning town.  When the town was formerly created in the 1794 Acts of Legislature the h was included in the spelling.  Again in 1804 when Pittsburgh was incorporated as a borough the h was maintained.  (The distinction between a Town and a Borough is extremely confusing and convoluted so we will just move on.)  In 1816 when Pittsburgh was finally incorporated as a city a printing error caused the h to be left off though we are told the original charter did include the h.  This caused serious ramifications for the spelling of Pittsburgh later made even more difficult because the original charter was destroyed in the 1882 Court house fire and could not be used for confirmation of the correct city spelling.  Thanks to a real lack of spelling consistency among the populous during the 19^th century it was not uncommon to find the h left off Pittsburgh in various publications such as news papers and directories.  The h however was always included in municipal documents.  It wasn’t until the United States Board on Geographical names decided in 1890, in an effort to standardize the spelling of city names, that any city or town using the Scottish ending –burgh would drop the h, this helped end the confusion between towns using the German spelling of –burg and those using the Scottish –burgh.  The Board went even further than simply making a blanket statement regarding all cities and towns ending in –burgh however when it singled out Pittsburgh citing the 1816 printed charter which spelled the name Pittsburg.  The board claimed that it was in fact an error with the Post Office that caused it to be spelled Pittsburgh in the first place and the city had always been Pittsburg.  The Boards decision was only compulsory for government agencies.  Many citizens, institutions and the city its self rejected the loss of the h.  There was considerable pressure from the citizens for the board to change the spelling back.  Finally in 1911 the renamed United States Geographic Board bowed to political pressure from Senator George T. Oliver and reversed its decision giving the h back to Pittsburgh.  The h is something that has become beloved in Pittsburgh.  The name simply looks wrong to anyone from the area spelled Pittsburg, and in fact I find it quite difficult to type it that way.  To Pittsburghers the city is frequently simply PGH and most of us are confused to discover our air port code is PIT.  Even the Pittsburgh Water and Sewer Authority’s brand of bottled water is PGH²O.  To those cities and towns who lost their h and never got it back we sympathize and say fight for your h. 

To Give the Lady the Wall

            A hundred years ago good manners were a sign of wealth and breeding.  Probably hundreds of books were written on the subject.  These gave advice on every situation one could possible encounter and were indispensable for the newly rich who wanted to enter into High Society.  Demonstrating proper etiquette was a good way to indicate that you belonged.  Having the right amount of money was not enough.  In a lot of ways High Society in America was even more conscious of their behavior than their European counterparts.  Europeans used the age of their family lineage as the determining factor in deciding who belonged to the “in” crowd.  For Americans this was not really a very viable option.  With the country only 100 years old bragging of their long familial lineage was not that impressive. Organizations like The Daughters of the America Revolution certainly tried, and continue to do so today, but with mostly limited success.  Money and lots of it was, and continues to be, the first factor in considering who are “the best people.”   Once this primary consideration met then families could move onto establishing their identities as members of High Society.  Good Breeding was identified with good manners.  Someone who was ill bread would demonstrate this through their lack of knowledge regarding proper etiquette.  Frequently fathers who founded great family fortunes employed tutors to educate their children in the etiquette of High Society.  Gaining entry for their offspring into a club they themselves could never really hope to belong. 

            Good Etiquette dictated every situation and every action of someone’s life.  Nothing would so quickly mark an individual as a member of the best people as their conversation.  The art of conversation was considered one of the most important skills one could possess.  To be able to properly carry on a conversation required one to be witty, intelligent and demonstrate some knowledge of what is going on in the world.  Even expressions of strong emotions whether it be anger, boredom or even passion were strongly discouraged.  Presenting the appearance of being pleasantly cheerful regardless of ones true feelings was absolutely essential.

            Even greeting someone on the street was fought with possible pit falls for the uninitiated.  For example when greeting a gentleman with whom a lady is acquainted, regardless of the level of intimacy, a lady would give a small bow which the gentleman would return.  Failing to return the greeting was the height of rudeness.  If a gentleman wishes to speak with a lady with whom he is acquainted, because of course he would never venture to speak to a lady whom he has never been introduced, when he encounters her on the street he would not detain her but turn and accompany her in the direction in which she is headed for the duration of their conversation then return to his own destination.  A lady should never stand on the street to converse with a gentleman.  To be seen doing so could lead to speculation regarding her character.  When walking with a lady the gentleman should always “give the lady the wall” thus placing his person between the anything that may be splashed up from the street by passing vehicles and the lady.  It is easy to forget in our day of modern sewer systems and storm drains just how truly disgusting the streets could be.

            When one thinks of complicated etiquette noting strikes fear into modern society quite like being seated at an extremely formal dinner which seems to be include every possible version of silverware and dishware available.   This was no less true at eh turn of the 20^th century when an average small family dinner, among those who could afford it, included a minimum of five courses and a large formal dinner could last for several hours and include dozens of courses.  Using the wrong fork with the wrong dish or even holding the utensil incorrectly could mark a person as one who didn’t belong.  It was considered essential that this be part of the educational curriculum for children of high society. 

            Although we like to think of ourselves has having moved beyond these measures of breading and on to the more enlightened idea of judging a person for themselves we have not.  Etiquette is still a powerful indicator of who belongs and who does not.  Those who forget this do so at their peril. 

The Neighborhoods of Pgh

            The Neighborhoods of Pittsburgh are one if the city’s most beloved characteristics.  Ask a Pittsburgher where they are from and you are just as likely to get Polish Hill, Brighton Heights, Lawrenceville, Squirrel Hill, Observatory Hill, (we do like our hills here) as you are to get Pittsburgh.  If you are physically in the city in fact you are almost guaranteed to get a neighborhood.  Each neighborhood is unique and has its own characteristics and feel.  This mostly comes from the early period of immigration when these neighborhoods were towns in their own right.  As Pittsburgh grew in population it expanded by annexing its neighboring towns with an unstoppable appetite.  Originally Pittsburgh existed solely on the land between the Allegheny and Monongahela Rivers but as it grew the borders spread across both rivers.  Some of these neighboring towns accepted their fate while others fought for their rights to exist all the way to the US Supreme Court as Allegheny City did finally loosing its case and being absorbed into Pittsburgh in 1907. 

            As one might expect the neighborhoods have changed to varying degrees over time. Perhaps none so much as the area known as The Point which today forms the tip of the Golden Triangle as the Downtown area is commonly called.  This area is traditionally the very tip where the Allegheny and Monongahela Rivers meet to form the Ohio River.  It was the location for the first settlement in Pittsburgh.  The French Fort Duquesne then when it was captured by the English it became Fort Pitt.  Over time as the city grew it became one of the most crowded slum areas.  Eventually it was so bad the city counsel brought in Frank Lloyd Wright to give reconditions on how the city could change and begin the process of beautification for the Golden Triangle.  His recommendation was to tear down the entire area and start over.  Since this wasn’t a very practical suggestion, as one can’t simply destroy the entire center of an established city, the city counsel released Wright and moved on.  What eventually was created was the demolition of the point and the creation of Point State Park.  This is perhaps one of the most well know areas of Pittsburgh even if people don’t know its name it is prominent in any picture of the Down town Pittsburgh skyline.

            Other neighborhoods haven’t experienced quite the range of blighted area to beautiful state park.  The area of Shadyside began as a single farm out side of Pittsburgh that was broken up and pieces sold creating a very trendy suburb of Pittsburgh for its wealthy industrial leaders to be able to get out of the grit of Pittsburgh and into a beautiful rural feeling area.  Shadyside still maintains its suburban feeling with its large houses on beautifully manicured lawns despite the fact that it is only a few minutes away from the Golden Triangle. 

            While Shadyside was able to maintain its upper class neighborhood status some areas like the South Side are just beginning to experience this type of growth in the last 15ish years.  The South Side began as an area for the workers of the mills to live.  Situated side by side with these mills this area was often crowded, extremely hot in the summer and thanks to the soot produced by the mills extremely dirty.  When water pipes were laid in the area the residents shared these lines with those same mills and it was quite usual for here to be absolutely no water available during the hours the mills were running.  Women used to fill tubs, buckets and even pans with the water they needed for the day very early in the morning before the mills began their work day.  The South Side struggled through the rust belt years and has come out now as one of the trendiest hot spots in the city.

            The area of East Liberty is perhaps 10 years behind the South Side in terms of rebirth and development.  This neighborhood is located in the area originally set aside as a free liberty where the residents of Pittsburgh could let their animals out to graze on the communal land.  Like much of Pittsburgh it too eventually supported its own mills and working class neighborhood.  It to has struggled through the rust belt years and now because of the low rents is quickly becoming a great place for new restaurants and art galleries to open, which will of course raise property values in the area.

            These are just a very few of the neighborhoods Pittsburgh has to offer.  Entire books can and have been written about Pittsburgh’s neighborhoods.  I would encourage everyone to come and experience them for your self.  Next week etiquette in the 1890’s.  What exactly does it mean to “give the Lady the wall” anyway?

Filling Holes - Schenley Park

            I have given my self deadline in which to have my book ready.  Whether it is possible or not remains to be seen.  I am shooting for the end of August.  Three months may not be enough time but if I am going to ever finish my book a tighter deadline is demanded.   I have always worked better under tight deadlines than the when ever you finish is fine type.  This is the single largest reason, I think, that people don’t finish their masters and PhD degrees.  But I digress.  I have described the current state of my book as a block of Swiss cheese.  It is recognizable as cheese but full of holes.  I do have a recognizable storey but the historical detail I am striving for is mostly missing.

            In an effort to fill in some of the larges holes I spend a good part of my time researching the parks in Pittsburgh.  I was pleasantly surprised to discover that the beautiful green spaces Pittsburghers now take for granted were just becoming a reality in the 1890’s.  The view of Pittsburgh in this period was once famously described as looking like hell with the lid off.  The fires from the Iron, Steel and Glass factories put so much smoke into the air that it was not always possible to see probably one of the most famous views of the city looking down on the Golden Triangle and North shore area from Mt. Washington.  The creation of Green Space, much like Central Park in New York, was intended to give the residents of Pgh a peaceful place to get away from the factories and crowded inner city.  It is highly unlikely that the people who would have benefited the most from these garden spots actually had time for such frivolous activates.  Most mills ran 24 hours a day and many other supporting businesses kept similar hours. 

            Never the less the parks created at this time remain.  Probably Pittsburgh’s largest Schenley Park was a gift to the city from Mary Schenley.  Although she lived primarily in England, having defied her father and created an international scandal at the age of 15 when she ran away and married 43 year old Captain Edward Wyndham Harrington Schenley.  She never forgot her home and in 1889 she gave the city 300 acres and sold the city a further 120 acres at a greatly reduced rate.  Schenley Park started out mostly as a baron space.  Today it is so completely filled with trees and wide open grassy spaces that it is difficult to imagine the area as anything other than the lush green space it appears today.  William Falconer the fist landscaper supervised the planting of thousands of trees and probably millions of flowers.  Given the natural feel of the park it is hard to see his original design but it must have been a stunning effort to transform the completely baron land he started with.  One can almost see the middle and upper class families enjoying the space for taking the air and holding picnics.  The park even hosted the city’s first automobile race.  The park returns to that heritage in mid July when it hosts the Pittsburgh Vantage Grand prix.  The park is also home to the Phipps Conservatory as well as the Main Carnegie Library. 

            I plan to spend next week researching the neighborhoods of Pgh.  More to come.