Networks of capital: Creating and maintaining a regional industrial economy in Pittsburgh, 1865-1919

This dissertation illustrates the industrial growth and decline of the Pittburgh region. The convergence of technological and financial forces, which were harnessed by local entrepreneurs such as Andrew Carnegie, Andrew Mellon, George Westinghouse, and Joseph Newton Pew, combined with natural regional advantages to create one of the most crucial centers of heavy industry in the United States. Heretofore, the character of Pittsburgh industry between 1865 and 1919 has been largely stylized; scholars have not had a full appreciation of the region's industrial experience. Pittsburgh did not just lead in iron, steel, and coal production, nor did it nuture only mass producers; the majority of its metalworking production was spurred by demand from the railroad industry, and most of its manufacturing firms were concentrated in spatial agglomerations of interdependent production. Unfortunately for Pittsburgh, the railroad market dried up at the same time other external forces conspired to extinguish the entrepreneurial spark of the region.;My argument derives from longitudinal analysis of economic data, case studies of leading entrepreneurs, detailed reconstruction of a national and local financial crisis and its impact on leading economic institutions, and a comprehensive analysis of economic revitalization efforts by public and private partnerships in the first decade of the twentieth century. Revitalization was necessary at this time because the technological capital of the region was becoming obsolete and because the Panic of 1907 sent Pittsburgh into the throes of economic depression until World War I. Prior to these unfortunate events Pittsburgh developed a pioneering system of financial and manufacturing alliances that rapidly spurred its economy and helped it compete nationally and internationally. The leading proponents of this system--the entrepreneurs who established the industrial power of the region--created a tightly woven network of management and financial control; it was an agglomeration of capital (and production technology). Their difficulty in sustaining this growth during adverse times suggests that Schumpeter's framework of creative destruction is an appropriate lens for viewing a region's rise and decline.