The Chester Pipe and Tube Company was a company incorporated in 1877 in

Chester, Pennsylvania Chester is a city in Delaware County, Pennsylvania, United States. It is located in the Philadelphia metropolitan area (also known as the Delaware Valley) on the western bank of the Delaware River between Philadelphia and Wilmington, Delaware. ...

, by shipbuilder John Roach for the manufacture of iron pipes and

boiler A boiler is a closed vessel in which fluid (generally water) is heated. The fluid does not necessarily boil. The heated or vaporized fluid exits the boiler for use in various processes or heating applications, including water heating, centra ...

tubes for the

steamship A steamship, often referred to as a steamer, is a type of steam-powered vessel, typically ocean-faring and seaworthy, that is propelled by one or more steam engines that typically move (turn) propellers or paddlewheels. The first steamships ...

s built at his Chester shipyard, the

Delaware River Iron Ship Building and Engine Works The Delaware River Iron Ship Building and Engine Works (founded in 1871) was a major late-19th-century American shipyard located on the Delaware River in Chester, Pennsylvania. It was founded by the industrialist John Roach (shipbuilder), John Roac ...

. Incorporated for a sum of $300,000, the Chester Pipe and Tube Company was located on of land at the intersection of Front and West Streets in Chester, adjacent to another Roach company, the Chester Rolling Mill, and close to Roach's shipyard. Two large brick buildings and a number of smaller ones were erected onsite, and a workforce of approximately 200 was employed there. By the early 1880s, the company was manufacturing about 18,000 tons of

wrought iron Wrought iron is an iron alloy with a very low carbon content (less than 0.05%) in contrast to that of cast iron (2.1% to 4.5%), or 0.25 for low carbon "mild" steel. Wrought iron is manufactured by heating and melting high carbon cast iron in an ...

pipes annually from 20,000 tons of

skelp Skelp (sometimes spelled scelp) is wrought iron or steel that is rolled or forged into narrow strips and ready to be made into pipe or tubing by being bent (into a cylindrical shape) and welded. The word is most commonly used in the traditiona ...

iron. In 1880, Potts Brothers Iron Company Ltd., which owned a

rolling mill In metalworking, rolling is a metal forming process in which metal stock is passed through one or more pairs of rolls to reduce the thickness, to make the thickness uniform, and/or to impart a desired mechanical property. The concept is simi ...

Pottstown, Pennsylvania Pottstown is a Borough (Pennsylvania), borough in Montgomery County, Pennsylvania, United States. Pottstown was laid out in 1752–53 and named Pottsgrove in honor of its founder, John Potts (Pennsylvanian), John Potts. The old name was abando ...

, acquired a controlling interest in the Chester Pipe and Tube Company. Colonel Joseph D. Potts, a prominent figure in the transportation business, purchased the Potts Brothers Iron Company in 1890, and thereafter became President of the Chester Pipe and Tube Company, a position he retained until his death in 1893. In June 1899, the Chester Pipe and Tube Company was consolidated with twenty other pipemaking firms in the northeastern United States to form the National Tube Company. In 1901, the National Tube Company and nine other major American steel companies merged to form the world's first billion dollar company,

U.S. Steel The United States Steel Corporation is an American steel company based in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. It maintains production facilities at several additional locations in the U.S. and Central Europe. The company produces and sells steel products, ...

. The National Tube Company was a subsidiary of U.S. Steel until 31 December 1951 and together with a number of other wholly-owned subsidiaries in an internal corporate restructuring became a division of the United States Steel Company (a subsidiary of the U.S. Steel Corporation).

Footnotes

References

*Ashmead, Graham Henry (1884): ''History of Delaware County, Pennsylvania'', L. H. Everts & Co., Pennsylvania. *Swann, Leonard Alexander Jr. (1965): ''John Roach, Maritime Entrepreneur: the Years as Naval Contractor 1862–1886'' — United States Naval Institute (reprinted 1980 by Ayer Publishing, ). *Warren, Kenneth (2001): ''Big Steel: the First Century of the United States Steel Corporation, 1901-2001'', University of Pittsburgh Press, . *Wilson, William Bender (1902): ''From the Hudson to the Ohio: A Region of Historic, Romantic and Scenic Interest, and Other Sketches'', Kensington Press, Philadelphia. {{DEFAULTSORT:Chester Pipe And Tube Company American companies established in 1877 Chester, Pennsylvania Manufacturing companies established in 1877 John Roach & Sons Companies based in Delaware County, Pennsylvania Defunct manufacturing companies based in Pennsylvania