ALEXANDER McBURNEY BYERS
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In reply to:
Re: JAMES E. BYERS son of SAMUEL and ELIZABETH BYERS
Brock Ayers 12/11/10
Brock,
I am not related to either family,I just post online information on the different families that I come across. I can only give you information that I found on the family name.
Genealogical and Personal History of Western Pennsylvania Vol. 3
Editor: John W. Jordan
Author: Jordan, John W. (John Woolf), 1840-1921.
Pg. 117
BYERS – Pittsburgh, in this Age of Iron, is the seat of an empire more substantial than that of Greece or Rome, and Titans in very truth were the men who laid deep and strong its mighty foundations.Masterful and impressive figures were these sires of the present-day autocracies, and none among them, seen through the gathering mists of the fast-receding years, looms larger or more commanding than does the late ALEXANDER McBURNEY BYERS, head of the celebrated firm of A. M. BYERS & Company, iron manufacturers, and for more than half a century one of the makers of the history of the Iron City.
ALEXANDER McBURNEY BYERS was born September 6, 1827, at Greenfield, Mercer County, Pa., and was one of the ten children of DANIEL CANNON and MARIA (McBURNEY) BYERS.The boy received his education in the public schools of the neighborhood, meanwhile assisting his father in the labors of the farm.Very early in life he entered upon his long and memorable connection with the iron industry by associating himself with the Henry Clay Furnace Company, an organization which operated one of the oldest blast furnaces in Pennsylvania.When only sixteen years of age MR. BYERS was intrusted with the superintendency of a blast furnace, thus enjoying, perhaps, greater advantages for gaining a thorough knowledge of the manufacturer of pig-iron from the raw material than furnace men of the present day possess.At that primitive period, in the iron industry furnace companies west of the mountain dug their ores from the surrounding (pg. 118) hills, usually having to strip from fifteen to twenty feet of earth for a ten or twelve-inch vein of ore, which would yield only twenty-five to thirty-five percent of iron in a blast furnace.They chopped their own wood, made their own charcoal for the smelting of the ore and mined the coal which was subsequently used in the furnace.Noteworthy, indeed, is the fact that the furnace of which MR. BYERS was the youthful superintendent was the first west of the mountains to practically demonstrate the successful use of raw bituminous coal for the smelting of the ores in blast furnaces, without first coking it.Moreover, it is recorded in the annals of the iron industry that at this same furnace, in 1848 to 1849, the first Lake Superior iron ores were smelted, under the supervision of ALEXANDER McBURNEY BYERS.Thus early did the future iron magnate begin to gather his laurels.
In 1854 MR. BYERS went to Cleveland, Ohio, to assume charge of the iron interests of the firm of Spang & Company, and three years later came to Pittsburgh as the representative of that house.In 1858 he became a partner in the firm of Spang, Chalfant & Company, manufacturers of iron in all its branches.In the spring of 1864, when the partnership expired by limitation, MR. BYERS disposed of his interests to his partners, and the same year founded the house of Graff, BYERS & Company, erecting a puddle mill, rolling mill and a mill for the manufacture of wrought iron pipe on the south bank of the Monongahela River, being the only firm but one in the United States to manufacture their own iron for the production of wrought iron tubes.In 1870, the style of the firm was changed to BYERS, McCullough & Company, and in 1886 became A. M. BYERS & Company, under which title it was incorporated in September, 1893, with a capital stock of half a million dollars.As originally established in 1854, this enterprise was a modest one, but from the very outset it was successful, as, indeed, it was destined to be, having for its leader a man of the type of MR. BYERS.The firm at once made a place for its wares in competition with the output of rival concerns, and from time to time increased the capacity of its mills, the plant now covering several acres on the line of the Pittsburgh and Lake Erie Railroad, from Sixth Street to Bingham Street.Also the largest puddle mill in America at Girard, Ohio.The mills now give employment to twenty-five hundred men, and have an annual capacity of 96,000 tons of wrought iron water, gas, steam and oil-well pipe.
In 1870 MR. BYERS became the sole owner and operator of an extensive furnace, puddle and rolling mills at Girard, Ohio.He was one of the organizers of the Philadelphia Company, and was one of its board of directors, and its largest individual stockholder until the company was purchased by Alexander Brown & Sons, of Baltimore.One of his associates in the establishment of this company was George Westinghouse, with whom he was later allied in other and greater enterprises.MR. BYERS had been a director in the Westinghouse Air Brake Company, the Westinghouse Electric Manufacturing Company, and the Union Switch and Signal Company.He was president of the Union Bridge Company, and in different ways fostered many other manufactures, the number of which it would be impossible to (pg. 119) enumerate.He did not ally himself with the National Tube Company at its inception, but conducted the business of A. M. BYERS & Company.As a business man, it may without exaggeration be asserted that MR. BYERS was in many respects a model.The goal of his ambition was success, but he would succeed only on the basis of truth and honor.Duplicity and false representations he would not palliate, either in his own service or among his customers or correspondents, and no amount of gain could lure him from the undeviating line of rectitude.The justice and kindliness which ever marked his dealings with his employees were beyond all praise and secured for him their loyal service and hearty cooperation.
Not only was MR. BYERS for many years prominently identified with the manufacturing interests of Pittsburgh, and with the commercial element in her business life, but he was also a leader in the realm of finance, holding the office of president of the Iron City National Bank.He was a director in the Merchant's and Manufacturers' Insurance Company, the American Surety Company, and many other concerns.As a citizen with exalted ideas of good government and civic virtue he stood in the front rank, ever ready to lend his influence and support to any project which, in his judgment, tended to further the best interest of Pittsburgh.Widely but unostentatiously charitable, the full extent of his good deeds was known only to the beneficiaries.He affiliated with the Republican party.
In his countenance MR. BYERS plainly depicted all the tremendous energy and indomitable resolution so strikingly manifested throughout his career.His finely-cut features and keen, searching eyes indicated at once the thinker and the man of action, while the kindliness of his expression and the geniality of his manner showed that he combined the qualities of a leader in the arena of business with those of a philanthropist – that he possessed those beautiful elements of character which win and hold friends.
MR. BYERS married, December 22, 1864, at Allegheny, Pa., MARTHA, daughter of COCKRAN and SARAH FLEMING, of Pittsburgh, and the following children were born to them: MAUDE, wife of J. DENNISTON LYON; ALEXANDER McBURNEY, deceased; DALLAS CANNON, also deceased; EBEN M., president and director A. M. BYERS Company, director Bank of Pittsburgh National Association, director Bessemer Coke Company; and J. FREDERICK, vice-president and director A. M. BYERS Company, director Union Union National Bank, director Hay Walker Brick Company, vice-president and director Girard Iron Company, member Board of Managers, Allegheny General Hospital.J. FREDERICK BYERS married, December 6, 1905, at Ardmore, Pa., CAROLINE MITCHELL, daughter of E. B. MORRIS, of Philadelphia, and has children: ALEXANDER McBURNEY III, and JOHN FREDERICK, JR.
MRS. BYERS, a thoughtful, clever woman of culture and character, was endeared to all who knew her by the beauty and sweetness of her nature no less than by her personal charm.Her husband ever found in her an ideal helpmate and his happiness hours were passed in the sanctuary of his home.MR. BYERS was a man of notable social gifts and an effective conversationalist – a delightful host, as all who were ever privileged to enjoy his (pg. 120) hospitality could abundantly testify.A lover of literature and a patron of art, his beautiful resident in Pittsburgh was adorned with many works of celebrated painters of the Old World and the New, his collection being considered one of the finest in the United States.MRS. BYERS survived her husband a number of years, passing away in August, 1912.Throughout her widowhood MRS. BYERS had continued the benevolent and charitable work in which she and her husband were so long united.The surviving descendants of MR. BYERS are recognized leaders in the business and social circles of Pittsburgh, in both upholding with ability and brilliancy the family traditions of distinction in public and private life.
The news of the death of MR. BYERS, which occurred September 19, 1900, in New York City, was received in Pittsburgh with demonstrations of sorrow by all classes of the community.It was felt that our city had lost one whose life, in all its relations, constituted one rounded whole – two perfect parts of a symmetrical sphere.Sincere and true in his friendships, honorable and generous in business, he stood for more than two score years as one of the men constituting the bulwark of the strength and development of the Iron City.
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