Worth Steel Company.

Sheshbazzar B. Worth was born in Marshallton, Chester County, Pa., in 1807 and worked as a storekeeper and blacksmith at Embreeville. He later formed a partnership with his friend, Hugh E. Steele (1815-1874), to operate the Laurel Iron Works near Mortonville. Between 1847 and 1852, Worth managed the Elk Iron Works in Cecil County, Md., for the Park family. He then reunited with Steele to purchase the Triadelphia Iron Works at Coatesville, Pa., in 1852. It was later renamed the Viaduct Iron Works. In the late 1870s, the enterprise was taken over by Andrew Williams of Plattsburgh, N.Y., who reorganized it as the Coatesville Iron Company, a manufacturer of pipes and plates.

William Penn Worth (1856-1923) and J. Sharpless Worth (1851-1922), the sons of S. B. Worth, built their own plate mills, the Brandywine Rolling Mills, near Coatesville in 1881-1882. They then purchased the Viaduct Works in 1887.

The Viaduct Works was incorporatred as the Coatesville Rolling Mill Company, and the Brandywine Rolling Mills were incorporated as the Worth Brothers Company in 1896. A tube works was constructed in 1900. The firms specialized in the manufacture of high-grade boiler, tank and ship plate at the Brandywine Works and boiler tubes at the Viaduct Works. They were able to roll the widest plates then produced in America. The Worth brothers sold both facilities to the Midvale Steel & Ordnance Company in October 1915, and they became part of Bethlehem Steel in 1923.

In 1917 the two brothers and three valued employees formed the Worth Steel Company and constructed a new plant on the Delaware River at Claymont, Del. Two sons of William P. Worth followed their father in the business: Edward H. Worth (1880-1952) and William A. Worth (b. 1892). The new company also specialized in ship, tank, and boiler plate. The company continued to be operated by the Worth family until 1951, when it was sold to the Colorado Fuel & Iron Company.