Feature Article

The original plant was a wooden structure and it produced hand-molded, high quality brick in regular rectangular forms and in special shapes. Although destroyed by fire three times between 1872 and 1903, the plant continued to produce regular refractory brick until its production ceased in the early 1940s.⁴ In spite of major technological changes in the surrounding industrial complexes the techniques for making refractory bricks changed little from the end of the nineteenth century through the end of World War II.

In 1905 company management, faced with a growing demand as well as the need for a new type of refractory brick made of silica, built a second plant on East Park Avenue. The operation of this plant doubled the size of the work force and the amount of product manufactured. The owners modernized the plant during the 1940s by electrifying plant operations and switching from coal to natural gas to fire the kilns. The innovations and changes through the years resulted in a growth in production from 500,000 hand-made bricks per year in 1872 to 25,000,000 in 1953.⁵ The company remained family owned and operated until the late 1940s when it was sold to Mexico Refractories of Mexico, Missouri. In 1953, Kaiser Refractories purchased the operation. In that year Kaiser completely closed the Number One Plant on Langley Street which had been used for storage since the 1940s; it was demolished in 1961. The Number Two works continued to operate in a limited capacity through the late 1960s but it gradually became obsolete. The owners eventually turned the property over to the city and it was torn down in 1972.⁶ At this juncture the developing technologies for the manufacturing of steel finally caught up with the NFB. Oxygen-induced furnaces called for a new type of refractory material, periclase ceramics, and the Niles facilities lacked the space for the necessary conversions.

The NFB, however, flourished for nearly one hundred years because of the effectiveness of its leadership and the abilities of its work force. The company's labor pool grew from between seventeen to twenty employees during the 1870s and 1880s to an all time high of nearly three hundred during World War II.⁷ This growth occurred in stages and reflected the expansion of the company's markets. The first major growth of the work force occurred during the late 1890s, culminating with the construction of the Number Two Plant in 1905. The development of the local steel industry and the move to open-hearth furnaces created the demand that spurred this growth. A slower expansion of the labor pool reflected the company's increasing production of silica brick during World War I. A second period of rapid growth occurred in conjunction with the steel boom of the 1920s. Unlike most other industrial concerns, the NFB generally maintained its work force through the Great Depression. With the demands of World War II, the work force grew to its largest. Ultimately it was changes in the larger steel industry that caused the decline in the size of the labor force engaged in firebrick manufacturing at the NFB. As the steel industry switched to oxygen-induction furnaces in the 1950s, the demand for regular and silica fire bricks decreased. In order to withstand the increased temperature produced during this process, the steel manufacturers switched to periclase brick, a new type of refractory material. A lack of space at the two existing Niles sites resulted in the construction of a new plant located in Columbiana County.⁸

Three divisions of workers existed at the Niles Fire Brick Company. These categories included management, skilled labor, and unskilled labor.From its foundation the Niles Fire Brick Company acted as a magnet for labor. The owners and the management actively recruited workers that came from at least three areas: the Thomases' native Wales (1872-1899), the Italian province of Avelino (1895-1924), and the Appalachian regions surrounding Olive Hill, Kentucky (1924-1949). Added to the lures cast by the company were the reports of earlier recruits of relatively high pay and stable employment.⁹ These workers came seeking job security, general prosperity and greater opportunities for their families.

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