Bethlehem Steel Mill

The photos in this gallery were taken during visits to an abandoned steel mill in June and July 2005. The Bethlehem Steel site is located just outside Buffalo, New York in the town of Lackawanna. The location was enormous but the two visits yielded a number of shots I'm happy with. The buildings holding the steel rolling mills seem to have been long since dismantled so primarily what remained were the support buildings.

Specific areas which were rewarding for me were the chaotic interiors (with nice light) of the Pump House, the discarded personal possessions in the Employee Welfare Building and the repeating elements of the coke ovens.

Unfortunately the second visit was during an overcast and rainy day and I thought most of the shots would be unusable. However I ended up processing many of these as high-contrast black & white photos and for the most part I'm happy with the results. So that explains why perhaps half of the shots appear this way -- it was an attempt to salvage something from a terrible day.