This color educational/promotional film is about the Ford company making steel at its River Rouge plant. This film was made in 1968.
A ship that carries ore sits on the River Rouge. The River Rouge is a 127-mile river in the Metro Detroit area. It flows into the Detroit River at Zug Island, which is the boundary between the cities of River Rouge and Detroit. The ship passes under a draw bridge. Ford company rouge plant. Opening titles: Steel On The Rouge, presented by Ford (:08-1:39). Giant cranes near the Rouge. Demolition explosives blow up hillsides in Minnesota for high grade iron ore. Ore is ground up in a machine. Exterior of a Ford ship on the Rouge. A crane carries the ore and puts it into storage bins. Coke, formed from coal, almost pure carbon, is made, then placed into railcars. The coke is then cooled with water. It produces a cloud of steam. Elevator cars carry the ores up to dump into the furnace (1:40-4:39). Temperatures in the furnace rise. Sparks fly as molten iron is poured out. Molten iron flows through a lining in the floor as workers look on. Workers observe the molten iron. Some of the ore is poured and taken to be analyzed. Workers stand near the sparks. A river of iron goes into a torpedo shaped railroad car. The railroad cars go slowly down the track. Two giant oxygen containers (4:40-7:16). 95 tons of scrap metal pours into the mouth of the furnace. The vessel is righted. One of the torpedo cars is rotated to get it ready to pour the molten iron. Iron is poured into the furnace where the scrap metal is. Flames within the furnace. Molten mix roars and churns. As carbon and other impurities are removed, iron becomes steel. Workers move in. They take a sample to review. The exact chemical composition is critical (7:17-10:04). A measuring device is plunged into the steel to check it’s temperature. The metal is ready. 250 tons of molten steel pour out of the furnace, it’s enough for 400 automobiles. Men in the control room. The ladle moves and from a nozzle in the bottom comes the molten steel. The steel is placed into waiting molds (10:05-12:07). The steel cools in the molds on a railcar. The molds are then placed into a gas fired soaking pit. 2400 degrees when they are pulled out. The molded molten steel is moved and put into another machine to make its shape. Hands maneuver controls. A slab of the steel moves along (12:08-14:24). The outer layer of the slab is burned off to remove impurities. Steel is then cut and reheated. The slab moves along a conveyor belt (14:25-15:33). High pressure jets of water remove surface scale and prepare the steel for the finish. A worker looks on. The steel is cooled, sprayed with water. It now looks like the steel we know. Coils of steel are lowered. A worker removes sheets of the coiled steel. Workers use controls. A machine takes in steel sheets. A foreman walks through the plant. The final product is a five foot coil of steel. Steel coils are rolled and picked up by a truck. Cars are taken down a railway (15:34-18:32). A Ford car drives down a road in a city and on suburban streets and then along a dirt road (18:33-18:53). End credits (18:54-19:06).
The Ford River Rouge Complex (commonly known as the Rouge Complex or just The Rouge) is a Ford Motor Company automobile factory complex located in Dearborn, Michigan, along the River Rouge, upstream from its confluence with the Detroit River at Zug Island. Construction began in 1917, and when it was completed in 1928, it was the largest integrated factory in the world.
It inspired the GAZ factory built in the 1930s in the Soviet Union, and the later Hyundai factory complex in Ulsan, South Korea, which was developed beginning in the late 1960s. Designed by Albert Kahn, the Rouge was designated as a National Historic Landmark District in 1978 for its architecture and historical importance to the industry and economy of the United States.
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This film is part of the Periscope Film LLC archive, one of the largest historic military, transportation, and aviation stock footage collections in the USA. Entirely film backed, this material is available for licensing in 24p HD, 2k and 4k. For more information visit http://www.PeriscopeFilm.com
