Bethlehem steel stock price history

On June 14, 1860, the board of directors of the fledgling company elected Alfred Hunt president.

On May 1, 1861, the company's title was changed again, this time to the Bethlehem Iron Company. Forerunners to supertankers, the new ships produced by Bethlehem cost less per unit, carried more tonnage, and were able to cruise at speeds 30 percent faster than their prewar predecessors.

During World War II, from 1940 to 1945, Bethlehem produced more than 73 million tons of steel. Antitrust and price fixing suits against several U.S. steel giants including Bethlehem followed. In turn Bethlehem sold its existing stainless steel production facilities to Allegheny Teledyne, which would continue to operate some of these facilities and sell a portion of the completed products to Bethlehem.

With the capacity to produce 16 million tons of steel annually, Bethlehem produced only eight million tons in 1991. The company also boasted thoroughly modern, world-class facilities for producing steel--especially high quality flat rolled sheets, a product that held great future promise and accounted for 80 percent of the company's sales.

After acquiring Lukens, Bethlehem merged it into its own plate operations and created the new Bethlehem Lukens Plate Division, which began to concentrate on alloy steel and carbon products.

Restructuring continued as Bethlehem sold its Freight Car Division and most of its coal properties. The Bethlehem Iron Company and the Bethlehem Steel Company were separate companies under the same ownership.

The leaner, more streamlined company weathered the storm, just as it had in previous and even more severe economic downturns.

In 2003, the company was dissolved and its remaining assets, including the six plants, were acquired by the International Steel Group. At its incorporation the company included Bethlehem Steel, a Cuban iron ore mine, and several shipbuilding concerns in California and Delaware. Together, the two men became the team that built Bethlehem from a small producer with an ingot capacity of less that one percent of the national total in 1905 to the world's second-largest producer in fewer than 35 years.

McQueen, Rod, "U.S. Charges Likely Against Canada's Steel," Financial Post,June 30, 1992.

Principal Subsidiaries: Pennsylvania Steel Technologies, Inc.

Principal Divisions: Bethlehem Lukens Plate Division; Burns Harbor Division; Sparrows Point Division. Bethlehem became a global giant in the steel industry.

Bethlehem planned major improvements to this division's facilities in order to keep the division profitable. Eventually, the organization was completed, the site moved elsewhere in the Borough of South Bethlehem, and the company's name was changed to the Bethlehem Rolling Mill and Iron Company. For the six months ended 6/30/01, revenues decreased 20% to $1.79 billion.

The iron made in Bethlehem Steel's blast furnaces was responsible for the world's largest single piece of cast iron that had ever been made up to that time.

In 1898, Frederick Taylor joined Bethlehem Steel as a management consultant in order to solve an expensive machine shop capacity problem. Lighter construction styles, in part due to lower-height construction styles (i.e., low-rise buildings), did not require the heavy structural grades produced at the Bethlehem plant.

In 1991, Bethlehem Steel Corporation discontinued coal mining (under the name BethEnergy).