[Congressional Record (Bound Edition), Volume 153 (2007), Part 13]
[Senate]
[Pages 18272-18273]
[From the U.S. Government Publishing Office, www.gpo.gov]




                     FOLLANSBEE'S 101ST ANNIVERSARY

 Mr. ROCKEFELLER. Mr. President, I wish to commemorate the 
101st anniversary of Follansbee, WV--a great community with great 
people and an important part of our State.
  Follansbee is a town whose legacy was forged in steel. Its 3,000 
residents are descendants of history and carry with them a proud 
tradition of tenacity and pride. While Follansbee sits in the northern 
panhandle of West Virginia, squeezed between Ohio and Pennsylvania on 
the banks of the Ohio River, it plays an integral role in West 
Virginia's economy.
  Follansbee Steel was the first company to locate in this small Brooke 
County town, joining steel makers throughout the Ohio River Valley in 
firing the industrial revolution and feeding the Nation's voracious 
appetite for steel as it grew. Follansbee Steel's state-of-the-art 
roofing products also appeared in the early 19th century and played a 
major role in post-Civil War Reconstruction. Later, these materials 
became the products of choice for Frank Lloyd Wright, one of the 
world's most prominent architects.
  In fact, when brothers John and Robert Follansbee bought the steel 
mill near the turn of the 20th century, not only did they rename the 
mill, they were the catalyst for forming what is now the city of 
Follansbee. Before that anyone traveling north of Wellsburg along the 
river would refer to Mahan's Junction--the name of the owners of the 
large orchard formerly on the site of Follansbee.
  On this day, the 101st anniversary of its founding, it is appropriate 
to look to the future which, I am happy to note, looks bright for 
Follansbee, WV. As the years have passed, the tradition of Follansbee 
Steel remains through the town's reservoir of high-quality labor. 
Wheeling-Pittsburgh Steel, a successor of Follansbee Steel, continues 
to run one of the busiest coke plants in the country, feeding both its 
blast furnace and its electric arc furnace, while Wheeling-Nisshin is 
now one of the largest hot-dip coating mills in the world.
  Wheeling Nisshin came to West Virginia in the early 1980s as our very 
first Japanese business. Since that time we have seen Japanese 
companies embrace West Virginia throughout the State. This joint 
venture between a Japanese steel company and Wheeling Pitt was years 
ahead of its time, taking advantage of the increasing globalization of 
the steel industry and using it to West Virginia's advantage.
  With its large industry and its small businesses and local 
professionals, Follansbee is just the type of small American town we 
think of and in which we take pride. It is a community with strong 
roots and a tremendous sense of local pride. Each summer its residents 
gather for Follansbee Community Days, bringing residents, their 
families, and former residents together from far and wide to celebrate 
their shared sense of community.
  Mr. President, I hope my colleagues in the Senate will join me in 
marking this 101st anniversary of the founding of Follansbee. The 
legacy of that town is long, its history rich--but it is the service it 
has provided the country that will be felt for a long, long time. To 
mayor Tony Paesano and the people

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of Follansbee, may the next 101 years be as successful and peaceful as 
the first.

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