A piece of Youngstown's steel history has a new home on the city's East Side.
For the past 10 years, volunteers have been piecing together a 1913 Tod Engine, which was used to drive a rolling mill at Youngstown Sheet and Tube's Brier Hill Works.
But the preservation is truly a work in progress. Northstar Steel donated the engine to Rick Rowlands back in 1995. He then turned this property on Youngstown's East Side into the Tod Engine Heritage Park in 2000, and finally numerous volunteers spent the last nine years putting it together.
"One of the project's main goals is to highlight just how larger than life the steel making process actually was," said Rowlands.
That's why Rowlands this past summer decided to build a 300,000-square-foot structure to house the historic piece of equipment at the Tod Engine Heritage Park.
"Our idea with this is to have a facility that as a close approximation to what the interior to a steel mill would look like with the actual equipment and overhead crane we acquired," Rowlands said.
So far the project has cost $150,000, but close to $200,000 more is needed to complete it. But while it's not even finished yet, it's quickly becoming a destination spot for those who live near and far.
"I'll be working here during the summer, and every day at least one or two people will just pull in and say I'm from Texas or from California visiting relatvies here and you know I saw it on the Internet and I want to see the Tod Engine," Rowlands said.
