326 Items Tagged

Industrial

Vacant, crumbling buildings line the streets of Brownsville, Pennsylvania. A slump in the steel and coal industries hit the town hard, but property hoarding by two investors drove Brownsville to decay.

Raising a Ghost Town From the Dead

Two investors bought most of the buildings in downtown Brownsville, then let them fall into ruin. Now, the Rust Belt town's residents are fighting to bring it back to life.

Matthew Christopher April 8, 2025

Gdańsk, Poland

Crane M3

A relic of Poland's shipbuilding past, reborn as a sky-high lookout.

Bethlehem Steel was once among the largest steel-producing companies in the world. Though the company dissolved in 2003, the blast furnaces at its flagship mill in Pennsylvania remain a local landmark.

The Steel Mill That Built America

Bethlehem Steel was the birthplace of skyscrapers, bridges, and battleships. What happened after the plant's furnaces went cold?

Matthew Christopher February 25, 2025

Denver, Colorado

Allen Tupper True Murals at the Mountain States Telephone Building

These murals from the 1920s beautifully depict America’s industrial age.

Östra Torp, Sweden

Kalkugnarna

Preserved 19th-century lime kilns sit in southern Sweden.

Newark, Delaware

Curtis Mill Park

This wildflower meadow was once the site of America's oldest operating paper mill and a symbol of Newark's manufacturing past.

Bradford-on-Avon, England

The Iron Duke

This restored 19th-century calender, a machine used in rubber manufacturing, commemorates the town's local industry.

Inside Memorial Auditorium in Gary, Indiana. The auditorium was one of several landmarks damaged by fires set in the late 1990s.

What Can We Learn From the Ruins of Gary, Indiana?

Exploring deindustrialization.

Matthew Christopher May 3, 2024

St. Louis Park, Minnesota

Peavey-Haglin Experimental Concrete Grain Elevator

This unassuimng grain elevator, commonly confused for a smokestack, helped inspire the modern architecture movement.

Neodesha, Kansas

Norman No. 1 Replica Oil Well

This replica oil derrick stands where a tiny Kansas town struck big in 1852, kicking off America's biggest oil boom.

The old gasification plant in Gas Works Park, Seattle

25 Places to See the History of American Industry

From factories turned into parks to the preserved remains of mills and furnaces.

Jonathan Carey September 1, 2023

Fireflies glow along Japan's Hino River some 450 miles west of Tokyo.

How A ‘Firefly Course’ Is Saving Japan’s Favorite Glowing Insect

At the Moriyama City Firefly Forest Museum, nurturing Genji fireflies comes with homework.

Shoshi Parks July 25, 2023

Giant Wool Wagon

Kojonup, Australia

Giant Wool Wagon

This large replica wagon tells the story of the booming wool industry in this small Australian town.

Souther Tide Mill with Neponset River view

Quincy, Massachusetts

Souther Tide Mill

This mill played a key role in the region’s development and it is just one of ten along the east coast of the United States.

Nivea tins

Heidelberg, Germany

Deutsches Verpackungs-Museum

A small museum dedicated to the history and design of German packaging.

Hope Furnace

New Plymouth, Ohio

Hope Iron Furnace

The remains of a massive blast furnace in what was once one of the country's largest iron-producing regions.

The still-operating Durango & Silverton Narrow Gauge Railroad in Colorado is part of one of America's longest-lived narrow gauge networks.

The Historians Saving America’s Pint-Sized Railroads

From Maine to Alaska, narrow gauge is all the rage, including one of the most historic, Pennsylvania’s East Broad Top.

Justin Franz June 21, 2022

Wanlockhead Beam Engine

Wanlockhead, Scotland

Wanlockhead Beam Engine

The last water-powered beam pumping engine in Britain.