West Virginia Rail Co.

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An early view of the West Virginia Rail Co., on the Ohio River at the foot of 17th. Street

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HUNTINGTON -- The beginning of the West Virginia Rail Co. can be traced to 1902 when the
Huntington Tin and Finished Plate Co. was organized and erected a small mill. The company
 failed, and the mill was acquired by Al Baumgarten of Pittsburgh, who
organized the Huntington Rail Co. and operated it until 1907.

In that year, the company was taken over by new investors and re-named the West Virginia Rail Co.
 E.N. Huggins of Columbus was the new company's president. The company bought the old plant,
 which had fewer than 30 employees at work in a small wooden building
 on a three-acre plot on the Ohio River at the foot of 17th Street.

In 1909, Joseph Schonthal of Columbus purchased the company. The Schonthal family would
go on to operate it for nearly 50 years, continually enlarging it and turning it into
 one of Huntington's best-known and most successful industrial employers.

The company added a bar mill in 1918 and began producing steel reinforcing rods in 1924
 and fence posts in the 1930s. By that time the name of the company wasn't comprehensive
enough to describe its wide array of products, and so in 1943 its name was changed
 to the West Virginia Steel and Manufacturing Co. In 1952 the company built a
 $2.75 million addition housing an electric furnace for production
 of carbon and alloy ingots from scrap steel.

In 1956, H.K. Porter Inc. purchased the company and operated it as the West Virginia Works
 of its Connors Steel Division until closing the plant in 1982. In response, Plant Manager
Bob Bunting Jr. organized a group of local investors who bought the plant,
 reopened it and renamed it Steel of West Virginia.

In 1988, Roanoke Electric Steel Corp, purchased the plant and operated it as a
 subsidiary until 2006 when Steel Dynamics Inc. purchased Ronanoke Steel.

Today, Steel of West Virginia is a wholly owned subsidiary of Steel Dynamics. It occupies
more than 500,000 square feet of industrial and office buildings and employs more
 than 500 people, making it one of Cabell County's largest employers.
 It is the only carbon steel producer in West Virginia.

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Note:  This Article and picture appeared in the Herald-Dispatch Newspaper on Sept. 19, 207.5

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