Acclaim for Making Steel
Excerpts of reviews of 1988 edition of the book
“Brilliant … makes
a convincing case that real people, specifically the top executives at
the biggest steel corporations, helped bring their industry to ruin. Reutter
pored over a century’s worth of documents, interviewed more than
a hundred former managers and workers and then organized this mass of
material into a gripping, tragic story.” – Chicago Tribune
“This is not just another book about the decline of steel or of
American industry, but rather a journalist’s attempt to piece together
nearly a hundred years of history of a major U.S. industrial firm …
Mr. Reutter weaves his story with great skill [and] has captured a version
of ‘the way it was’ during an earlier, poorer time in the
American industrial experience.” — The Wall Street Journal
“The strength of this book is Reutter’s wonderful social and
economic history of the community that had the Sparrows Point works at
its heart. This is another side of the story of American steel, the human
side, and it has much to teach.” —Fortune
“An exceptionally fine example of the best of history: thorough,
lively, carefully documented, and with a breadth and depth of scope that
will excite readers… Reutter’s use of oral histories to document
the experiences of many different kinds of steelworkers sets a standard
for other historians of Maryland institutions. With similar proficiency,
his account of a local industry places the story of American steelmaking
firmly within the context of a larger national history of Latin American
diplomacy, two world wars, and the Depression and the New Deal. In addition,
Reutter unflinchingly reveals the complicity of Maryland’s political
and academic luminaries in advancing the interests of Bethlehem Steel
at the expense of workers, taxpayers, and the environment of the area.”
— Maryland Historical Magazine
“Reutter makes a telling case for the argument that, as long as
things were going well, Big Steel had no interest in remaining competitive.”
— Barron's
"Solid research is what stands out about this book. It offers an
important insight into ‘The Rise and Ruin of American Industrial
Might,’ as the cover promises.” — The Baltimore
Sun
“When steel mills were closing in Youngstown in
1977-1980, protestors carried signs that said ‘Profits Before People.’ The
words encapsulate the message of this remarkable book …
"In telling his story of profits and people, Reutter uses the papers
of the engineer who built the plant in the 1880s, Frederick Wood, as well
as interviews with an extraordinary array of workers, past and present
... The 10-hour day established in the Baltimore area since 1836 was abandoned
as Wood insisted on 12-hour shifts with a 24- hour 'long turn' once each
week. There were no vacations and two unpaid holidays a year.
“The rigor required of the men contrasted with the institutionalized
opulence of company executives … the pattern revealed is a caricature
of conspicuous consumption, passed on from generation to generation, regardless
of the circumstances of the firm or the well-being of its workers.
“Underneath all this were people like Charlie Parrish, who fought
to become the first black millwright at Sparrows Point; Mike Howard, a
communist and chairman of the grievance committee, who at the height of
the Cold War was forgiven for his politics by his fellow workers because
'No spy would be taking a job like this!’; or Elizabeth Alexander,
forelady of the tin inspectors, who ruled with a heavy hand until Marian
Wilson and her friends refused to wear the prescribed blue uniforms. Reutter
has not only interviewed them but understood their lives from the inside.”
—Washington Post Book World (Page 1 review)
“What is striking about Mr. Reutter’s account is that the decision at Bethlehem Steel and elsewhere seems to have been … a curious result of hubris, bureaucratic caution, and a provincial timidity.” — New York Times Book Review