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The Worgul home is the one in the center. The house on the left belonged to the Steers, and the one on the right was the Swan home |
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A Selected History of Chartiers Valley
"On the bank of Chartiers Creek...there lies a valley
of unusual beauty. The creek meanders in a graceful curve
along its western bounds, and precipitous hills, rising on
the east, and stretching for a short distance to the north
and south, at length change their course at each extremity
of the range, and slope gradually to the margin of the water." The name "Chartiers" is that of half-bred Indian, Pierre Chartiers, an Indian trader, who in 1743 came to the territory from Philadelphia and established a trading post on the stream now known as Chartiers Creek. The name was originally pronounced "Shirtee" in the Indian language, but gradually drifted to Chartiers. When Pierre Chartiers' mission as a French spy became known, he was obliged to leave the territory. The stream naturally took his name because his trading post was near the mouth of Chartiers Creek (Neighborhood History: Chartiers City, 1977). PRONE TO FLOODING. Just about every spring. We would stand on the Jefferson Ave. Bridge and waatch the water go by--tree trunks--yellow with sulfur from the mines, and also from the radium plant upstresm. When we lived there, the creek always ran a sulfurous yellow which we attributed to the the coal mines up stream. Now I wonder if the radium ore tailings were the cause of the yellow water. We waded in that creek. I even saw young negro boys swim in it because they weren't allowed in the pool at Town Park. |
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The radium plant in Canonsburg was one of those things I did not know about when I was a kid. Not too many people knew about the radium processing plant in town. There was an article about it in the New York Times that appeared after WWII. At the plant they separated radium and put the tailings in Chartres Creek. Just up Chartiers Creek, the plant that had been Standard Chemical when Madame Curie visited, Vitro Chemical Works, was engaged in secret work involving uranium for the Manhattan Project, research that would culminate in the production of the atomic bomb. |
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The Fort Pitt Bridge Works was first
organized in 1896. During the company's first thirty-five
years, it fabricated and erected bridges and buildings for the
country's expanding industrial economy. In World War I,
the company cooperated with the Submarine Boat Corporation in
building prefabricated cargo ships, as well as fabricating large
numbers of airplane hangars for the United States and France.
In 1930, a new company was formed, combining the Fort Pitt Bridge
Works with the Massilon Bridge and Structural Company of Massilon,
Ohio, and known as the Fort Pitt Bridge Works. During the
1930's, the new company fabricated structural steel for many
Federal Aid buildings, post offices, schools, hospitals, highway
work, as well as industrial work. During the recent war,
the Fort Pitt fabricated steel for the Army, Navy, Marine Corps,
Panama Canal, and other government agencies. A huge press was built for forming plates, and thousands of tons of ship plates for tankers were turned out. In 1947 the works were still fabricating structural steel for the nation's buildings and bridges. Fort Pitt Bridge Works played an important part in building Pennsylvania's "Dream" Highway and in supplying steel for Pittsburgh's great bridges and buildings. The Fort Pitt Bridge Works maintain their general offices in Pittsburgh and their plant and purchasing department in Canonsburg. |
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The Standard Tinplate plant on the east side of town was taken over by Alcoa to produce aircraft forgings. |
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TOWN PARK |
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W.S. GEORGE POTTERY |
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Continental Can |
Perry Como--Celebrity |
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