City Foundry St. Louis: The Backstory
Date Posted: January 23, 2017
Posted In: Ideas, Projects,
From Lawrence Group Blog: by Christina Clagett
The City Foundry St. Louis project is prominently located within the central corridor in the former Century Electric Foundry complex. The redevelopment will bring new life to the old foundry; a striking industrial building that features a butterfly monitor pond truss roof structure, giant sand hoppers, cupola melting furnaces, pipes, cranes, soaring factory spaces, massive divided-lite windows, mezzanines, catwalks and offices. Plans by previous owners called for the foundry’s demolition as recently as 2014, which would have forever severed St. Louis’s primary remaining connection to a homegrown and locally significant company, Century Electric.
Century Electric Co. was once one of the “big three” electrical manufacturers based in St. Louis along with Wagner and Emerson. Electrical manufacturing was a major industry in the local economy from the advent of electricity, and St. Louis was the site of early innovation in the field. In fact, Charles Heisler of St. Louis is credited with the first local use of commercial lighting, incorporating alternating current to operate arc lamps in Conrad’s Brewery in 1878 — a year prior to Thomas Edison’s famed demonstration of the incandescent lamp.
Century Electric carried on that local tradition of innovation by selling custom hand built motors beginning in 1900, and they expanded rapidly from there, soon producing a variety of electric motors and generators sold internationally. Their motors ranged from the fractional horsepower type that power small appliances to those with enough horsepower to run entire factories. The company consistently pioneered new technologies to improve their products and were renowned for their high quality. Their most significant breakthrough was achieved in 1914, when they were the first manufacturer to engineer repulsion type motors in small sizes. Century’s innovations made the development of early household appliances possible, and, as a matter of fact, the first automatic electric home refrigerator was equipped with a Century Electric motor.