Rust and Renewal: Philly's Industrial Rise, Fall, and Rebirth by Kyree Yates

Exhibit 1 A

ky1064a — 2025-04-22 16:27:55 UTC

This small clay pipe, created by the Lenape people who lived alongside the Delaware Rover, shows us the very first human footprints on what eventually became Philly. The Lenape cultivated wild tobacco and managed riverine forests through landscape alterations. These practices set the scene for centuries of escalating environmental modifications. In this photo, the pipe reminds us that the Anthropocene roots extend before factories and fossil fuels, and begin with humans learning to use resources from their surroundings. I believe this early

tobacco pipe can be traced to industrial complexes and imprints.

https://americanindian.si.edu/collections-search/object/NMAI_99680

Exhibit 1 B

ky1064a — 2025-04-22 16:35:05 UTC

Wissahickon Valley Park is the stone of a colonial gristmill, powered by water wheels to grind local grain into flour. Built around the 1800s these mills were Philadelphia’s first “factories,” using river energy to transform raw materials. Though small in scale, they exemplify the human energy partnerships that would explode during the Industrial Revolution. Each turned wheel altered stream flows and local ecology precursors to the massive hydropower dams and steam driven mills to come. Including this mill’s stones in the photo essay shows that long before towering steel and smoke, Philadelphians were already forging engineered landscapes.

https://fow.org/virtual-valley/trails-to-the-past/mills-homesteads-and-villages/

Exhibit 1 C

ky1064a — 2025-04-23 01:06:45 UTC

This dual composite image shows detail from Thomas Gill's 1827 map of the Schuylkill navigation map at mile 98 with its lock chambers cutting through Montgomery County and with the modern Schuylkill River Water Trail Section P map (Flat Rock Park to Manayunk). Gill's chart shows how early industrial ambitions used river flow to move coal and lumber into Philly. 200 years later, the same engineered corridors have been repurposed for ecological restoration and community recreation. We can see the Anthropocene in a small way in how human-built waterways served as an extraction industry and serve now as leisure and conservation. We can all see the difference in shape it created on Earth due to the blasting bedrock, rerouting streams, and deforesting of riverbanks to speed up industrial transport. This foreshadows the Anthropocene’s large‑scale infrastructure projects that reshape both economies and ecosystems.

Thomas Gill’s original Schuylkill Navigation maps (1827), WaterHistoryPHL

Schuylkill River Water Trail – Section P map, Schuylkill River Greenways

Exhibit 1 D

ky1064a — 2025-04-23 01:54:36 UTC

This 1683 map engraved by Thomas Holme and issued alongside William Penn's foundational letter lays out Philly on a precise rectangular grid between the Delaware and Schuylkill Rivers. Holme's design cleared out woodland, imposed wide streets and public squares, and parceled lots for settlers that represented one of the earliest large-scale land and use transformations reshaping terrain long before steam engines or steel mills. This map is a precursor to the Anthropocene and human-driven environmental change. I like to think of it as the arc before the factories that will come to define the region.

Stanford University, Barry Lawrence Ruderman Map Collection: [A Portraiture of the City of Philadelphia (1683)]

Exhibit 2 A

ky1064a — 2025-04-23 03:15:28 UTC

This 1950 photograph shows a plethora of seamstresses operating mechanical sewing machines across a factory in Center City Philadelphia. At the peak, the floor housed over 200 workers, mostly women, turning fabric into garments for regional distribution. The steady job-powered families, local shops, schools, and churches. By the 1970s, overseas competition and automation began hollowing out the garment trade, leaving storefronts dark and corridors silent. This image captures both the promise of mid-century industrial prosperity and the fragile foundations on which it kept the dynamic of Philadelphia’s Anthropocene story.

https://philadelphiaencyclopedia.org/essays/garment-work-and-workers/

Exhibit 2 B

ky1064a — 2025-04-25 18:43:38 UTC

In 1919 along Allegheny Ave, there was the Steel Haddle Manufacturing Company Complex that became a global leader in accessories. They supplied heddles that went into a lot of American fabric. This reinforced concrete plant and office grew through the 1950s, employing over 500 Philadelphians at its peak. By the 1960s the plant closed down due to overseas competition and a shift to textile centers. To this day is an empty structure in Allegheny, showing the mass sweep of deindustrialization. The opening and closing of this plant highlight the Anthropocene dynamic of human scaling and then external market forces leaving it as a shell of the past.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Steel_Heddle_Manufacturing_Company_Complex

Exhibit 2 C

ky1064a — 2025-04-29 01:52:16 UTC

At one point of time, the backbone of Callowhill’s district heating network, the Willow Steam Plant (corner of 9th & Willow) was built in 1927 to channel coal-generated steam through downtown Philadelphia. By the 1950s, it powered office towers and university campuses; by the 1990s, cleaner fuels and decentralized boilers rendered it done. Graffiti tags now cover its red brick exterior, asbestos insulation peels from its boilers, and nearby neighbors eye its future redevelopment . The plant’s decay symbolizes the Anthropocene’s late stage in urban cores. Massive infrastructure going in between vital service and urbaness, challenging communities to decide whether to let these relics rot or to regenerate them for a new era.

https://philly.curbed.com/maps/abandon-philly-places-locations-cool

Exhibit 2 C

ky1064a — 2025-04-29 01:56:26 UTC

At one point in time, this steam plant was the backbone of Callowhill’s district heating network, the Willow Steam Plant (corner of 9th & Willow) was built in 1927 to channel coal-generated steam through downtown Philadelphia. By the 1950s, it powered office towers and university campuses; by the 1990s, cleaner fuels, and decentralized boilers rendered it done and put it out of business. Graffiti tags now cover its exterior, asbestos insulation peels from the boilers, and people eye its future redevelopment. The plant’s decay symbolizes the Anthropocene’s late stage in urbaness. Its massive infrastructure alternates between service and urban living, challenging communities to decide whether to let these relics rot or regenerate them for a new era.

https://philly.curbed.com/maps/abandon-philly-places-locations-cool

Exhibit 2 D

ky1064a — 2025-04-29 03:47:39 UTC

In 1945 this photo in Temples University digital archives shows us the production line for the Scott Paper mill located on West Hunting Park Ave. Both men and women monitored rollers and cutters transforming paper products for war and after war. This shows employment and its prominence in shaping Philadelphias industrial footprint. Eventually paper production shifted and a lot of people became unemployed.

Exhibit 2 E

ky1064a — 2025-04-29 17:04:55 UTC

This graph shows that in January 1950, more than 30% of nonfarm jobs in the U.S. were in manufacturing. However, by January 2020, that number dropped to only 8.4%. Philadelphia experienced a similar decline, with its manufacturing jobs decreasing from about 300,000 in 1950 to less than 60,000 in 2020. These statistics reflect the real-life impacts of closed factories and deserted break rooms. It highlights the lost wages, pensions, and disrupted communities. In the context of the Anthropocene, this sharp decline signifies a major shift from a time of industrial success to a period of deindustrialization.

Exhibit 3 A

ky1064a — 2025-04-30 16:40:41 UTC

Built on the footprint of a demolished warehouse, a Black urban farming collective in North Philly grows leafy greens, herbs, and community. Rows of greens and kale stretch alongside a once empty lot, that was transformed by neighborhood hands and a shared vision. For these farmers, it is more than just food production, but a form of healing and reclamation. In areas affected by redlining, lack of investment, and the decline of industries, farming food becomes a political statement and a means to fight against environmental unfairness and to reconnect with our roots. The narrative of Philadelphia’s Anthropocene isn’t solely focused on what has been lost, it also highlights what is being restored.

https://www.phillypeacepark.org

Exhibit 4 A

ky1064a — 2025-05-02 18:50:59 UTC

In a Kensington workshop, volunteers repurpose wood, brick, and rusted steel from abandoned factories into benches, planter boxes, and art installations. This is more than recycling its storytelling. Every beam and bolt has a past life in Philadelphia’s industrial boom. Now, through creative reuse, that past is reimagined into something functional and forward-facing. These projects, often organized by local nonprofits or artists, not only divert material from landfills but also reclaim space and memory. In a city shaped by abandonment, upcycling becomes an act of community resilience and renewal where ruin becomes a resource.

https://www.rairphilly.org/2024-projects-gallery

Exhibit 4 B

ky1064a — 2025-05-02 19:02:04 UTC

The Pennsylvania Horticultural Society's LandCare program has revitalized over 12,000 vacant lots in Philadelphia, turning neglected spaces into vibrant community assets. This before and after image showcases the transformation of a derelict lot into a green pocket park, providing residents with a safe and welcoming environment. Such initiatives enhance neighborhood aesthetics, promote community well-being, and exemplify how urban greening can address the legacies of industrial decline.

https://www.researchgate.net/figure/Before-inset-2000-and-after-2012-image-of-vacant-lot-greening-at-the-corner-of-5th_fig2_314236552

Exhibit 5 A Future

ky1064a — 2025-05-04 15:33:13 UTC

Picture a future where the old mills in Philadelphia are turned into vertical farms that grow food all year round using hydroponics and rainwater. This idea, shown by Vincent Callebaut, takes the old concrete buildings and turns them into eco-friendly structures. In areas that have been affected by industry and lack of food, these towers could bring back jobs and healthy food options. But it also raises important questions, like who will construct them and who will gain from it? In our current age, it might be crucial to change the old into something new, just like history has taught us.

https://www.arch2o.com/biomimetic-vincent-callebaut-wins-millennial-vertical-forest/

Exhibit 5 B Future

ky1064a — 2025-05-04 16:22:44 UTC

In 2022, Philadelphia launched its first tiny house village to fight against the homelessness issue and the increasing housing prices. Located on an empty city lot in Mill Creek, these cozy, insulated homes offer a dignified transitional living space, complete with electricity, heating, and personal areas. As climate change and economic challenges worsen, this approach presents a practical and affordable solution: small housing that can be quickly set up on underused or previously industrial sites. For cities like Philadelphia, the future in the Anthropocene might rely on this type of creativity fulfilling essential needs while rethinking land use and rebuilding communities. The question I think to ask is will these initiatives stay as temporary projects or evolve into lasting solutions?

https://whyy.org/articles/philadelphia-tiny-homes-pilot-project-homelessness/