Published Saturday, January 4, 2003
plant is being
demolished
a possibility at site
Herald Business Editor
Another grand old lady of the steel industry has fallen victim to the wrecking ball.
Demolition of SQP Industries' plant in Sharpsville is under way in hopes of eventually creating an industrial park at the 50-acre site. The plant's owner, Pittsburgh-based Snyder Group, expects the demolition to be completed in February.
Sections of the 275,000-square-foot plant date back 100 years, and over its lifetime the foundry has had a storied history.
Initially known as Shenango Furnace, the foundry produced ingot molds used in the steel industry and employed more than 500. As the American steelmaking industry declined in the latter part of the 20th century, demand for molds waned and the plant was sold in the 1980s to Pittsburgh-based Shenango Group, which renamed the plant Shenango Inc.
Shenango operated the plant for a time, but soon found itself mired in bankruptcy and briefly closed the foundry in early 1993.
The plant's employees garnered national attention after cobbling together a patchwork of public and private loans to buy the plant for $1.32 million. They reopened the plant later that year and renamed the foundry Sharpsville Quality Products Industries. Dozens of local churches invested in the plant as part of a grassroots campaign to revitalize the local economy. During the early 1990s, the area was clawing its way out of a decade-long recession in which 5,000 local manufacturing jobs were lost.
From the start, though, the foundry faced overwhelming odds. As steelmakers shifted to continuous casters, which streamlined steel production, they had less need for SQP molds.
Attempting to diversify, the company began manufacturing counterweights used in lifting equipment such as fork lifts. But a declining economy hit that industry, and SQP had to seek refuge in Chapter 11 bankruptcy in July 2000.
Unable to reorganize under employee ownership, the company was sold in February 2001 to Assad Metals Inc., a Pittsburgh scrap and metals company owned by the Snyder family, for $1.05 million.
The Snyder Group was credited with giving the plant its best shot at keeping afloat, but a decimated steel industry vaporized sales volume and the plant was forced to close its doors for good around Thanksgiving 2001.
Snyder Group has since embarked on extracting slag that was dumped around the plant throughout its history. A byproduct of steelmaking, slag is used in highway construction. The company believes it will be mining slag at the site for up to 20 years.