The Brown & White

A new trend of exploring abandoned factories, sewers and tunnels provides a sense of validation to the industrial employees who dedicated their lives work to the companies, said Canada research chair and associate professor of public history at Concordia University in Montreal.

Steven High discussed the draw "industrial ruins" have on today's youth in his lecture "North American Post-Industrial Sublime: A Comparative Study" on March 11 in Linderman Library.

The awe a person felt as a young child growing up in the shadows of monstrous structures, such as the Southside's Bethlehem Steel site, never disappears, he said.

"Youth culture has been profoundly shaped by urban crisis and industrial collapse," High said.

One effect of this is the urge to humanize the sites. Urban explorers believe their trespassing has a higher purpose. By chronicling their explorations, urban explorers attempt to find a deeper meaning within the apparent ruins. There is a political message to be found in each abandoned site, High said.

High said urban explorers do little research of the sites they explore. This creates an inability to connect the history with the present. This flaw makes it impossible for the explorers to understand the complete significance of the sites, he said.

"Economic changers are lamented, not questioned," High said.

The social effects of an industrial site are crucial to understanding the site's importance. However, urban explorers seldom think of this aspect, High said.

"What happens to a mill town when the mill is taken out?" High said. "What happens to steel workers when the steel is taken out?"

Unlike the urban explorers, High has conducted countless interviews of former industrial workers. This allows him to gain an another additional level of understanding of the sites he investigates.

"There is so much that escapes the urban explorer's camera," High said.

Merely exploring an area will not provide the complete meaning of an industrial ruin, High said.

In talking to former workers, High said he found one common characteristic between all industrial workers - the workplace was like a home and co-workers were like family.

The jobs the industrial workers performed, molded their sense of self.

If the old industrial sites are forgotten, the enormous emotional investments each of these workers placed into the area will also disappear from the public memory, and would, in turn, rob these workers of the identity that they had formed while working for these companies, High said.

High's lecture, as part of the lecture series "New Bethlehem: Urban Utopias, Dystopias and Transformations," incorporated the past and future of the Bethlehem Steel site.

The steel mill defined the city of Bethlehem, and even after its closing, continues to have an impact on the residents of Bethlehem.

Plans for the Bethlehem landmark, placed on the 2004 list of America's 11 Most Endangered Historic Places by the National Trust for Historic Preservation, include a large-scale casino.

John Pettegrew, associate professor of history, said completely eliminating the site would take away part of the steel workers' personal history.

"We have to retain some of it," Pettegrew said. "The workers gave pretty much everything they had to Bethlehem Steel."

Jen Nieuwkerk, '10, said a balance must be created between old and new.

"We need to stay true to the history of the steel mill, while moving forward," she said.