The Romance of Iron and Steel

How it feels

This 1938 documentary shows the process of making sheet steel and stainless steel. It follows the work from mining ore through the rolling mill plants. The film also highlights the company's research lab and shares a message about the workers and company culture.

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What happens

The Romance of Iron and Steel (1938) is a sponsored film by the American Rolling Mill Company (ARMCO). The film is the earliest surviving work by Cinécraft Productions, the longest-standing sponsored film and video production house in the U.S. The black-and-white, sound, 21-minute documentary opens with an overview of the ARMCO Middletown, Ohio, Research Lab, opened in 1937. It then follows the sheet steel and stainless steel manufacturing processes from mining ore through the company's rolling mill plants. The film concludes with a message about “ARMCO men” and company culture, with an address by ARMCO founder George M. Verity. The film is thought to take its name, “The Romance of Iron and Steel,” from the unofficial theme of the 1936-37 Great Lakes Exposition held in Cleveland the year before the film was released. In 2022, the National Film Preservation Foundation, an organization created by the U.S. Congress to help save America's film heritage, awarded the Hagley Museum and Library a grant to preserve a print of the film discovered in the Cinecraft studio basement in 2021. (from Wikipedia, CC BY-SA)

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