<P> The history of the modern steel industry began in the late 1850s, but since then, steel has been basic to the world's industrial economy . This article is intended only to address the business, economic and social dimensions of the industry, since the bulk production of steel began as a result of Henry Bessemer's development of the Bessemer converter in 1857 . Previously steel was very expensive to produce and only used in small expensive items such as knives, swords and armour . </P> <P> Steel is an alloy composed of between 0.2% and 2.0% carbon, and the balance of iron . From prehistory through the creation of the blast furnace, iron was produced from iron ore as wrought iron, 99.82% - 100% Fe, and the process of making steel involved adding carbon to the iron, usually via serendipity in the forge or via the cementation process . The introduction of the blast furnace reversed the problem . A blast furnace produces pig iron, which is an alloy of approximately 90% iron and 10% carbon . If the process of steelmaking begins with pig iron instead of wrought iron, the challenge is to remove a sufficient amount of carbon to get it to the 0.2 to 2 percent for steel . </P> <P> Before about 1860 steel was an expensive product, made in small quantities and used mostly for swords, tools and cutlery; all large metal structures were made of wrought or cast iron . Steelmaking was centered in Sheffield, Britain, which supplied the European and the American markets . The introduction of cheap steel was due to the Bessemer and the open hearth processes, two technological advances made in England . In the Bessemer process, molten pig iron is converted to steel by blowing air through it after it was removed from the furnace . The air blast burned the carbon and silicon out of the pig iron, releasing heat and causing the temperature of the molten metal to rise . Henry Bessemer demonstrated the process in 1856 and had a successful operation going by 1864 . By 1870 Bessemer steel was widely used for ship plate . By the 1850s, the speed, weight, and quantity of railway traffic was limited by the strength of the wrought iron rails in use . The solution was to turn to steel rails, which the Bessemer process made competitive in price . Experience quickly proved steel had much greater strength and durability and could handle the increasingly heavy and faster engines and cars . </P>

Why did the production of iron and steel decline in mid nineteenth century