Book review: 'Steel City' novel a vivid journey through Pittsburgh's industrial heyday

In the late 19th century, Pittsburgh was in many ways the center of the universe. From steel to electricity to food, the innovators and barons of America’s biggest industries called the Steel City home. In his debut novel, “Steel City: A Story of Pittsburgh,” William J. Miller Jr. transports the reader back in time to get a glimpse at what life was like under that soot-blackened sky.

The compact, engrossing novel centers around protagonist Jamie Dalton, the son of wealthy parents who grew up hobnobbing with the Heinzes and Westinghouses in Pittsburgh’s Shadyside neighborhood. While away at Yale, James decides to pursue journalism, a career that is looked down upon by his father, who works as a lawyer for some of the richest men in America.

But Jamie’s fate is sealed after he witnesses the rupture at the South Fork Dam on May 31, 1889. This leads to his first big story for the Pittsburgh Sun newspaper — a firsthand account of the Johnstown Flood.

After proving himself, he’s hired on to cover the labor beat and tours the reader through some of the most consequential events of Pittsburgh’s history, including the Homestead strike of 1892 and the purchase of Carnegie Steel by J.P. Morgan to create U.S. Steel. At many points he finds himself at odds with his lawyer father and the powerful men who shaped his formative years. Somehow, Jamie must find his footing between the people who created this city — both the titans of business and the everyday blue-collar workers and immigrants who made it possible.

For those who learned about the region’s heyday in school, this is a deeper and more vivid dive into the lives and times of the people whose names are stamped on our neighborhoods, buildings and institutions to this day. For those with little context for the past, this is a good introduction.

Miller, a Pittsburgh native, has spent much of his career in journalism, and his family has deep roots here. According to the novel’s epilogue, the character of Jamie’s father is based on Miller’s own great-grandfather, Willis F. McCook, who served as attorney to Henry Frick. It’s no surprise he’d be so invested both in the stories of the elites of the time and also the working class.

It’s fascinating to spend a little bit of time in the late 19th century. The choice to write the novel in first person from Jamie’s perspective was smart — it allows the reader to interact with historical figures from Henry Frick and Robert Pitcairn to labor leaders and millworkers through Jamie’s words. In the eyes of Jamie Dalton, whose narration is sharp and to the point, the familiar names — and even the not-so-familiar ones — take on more color than the black-and-white portraits and photos in history books.

The novel’s most interesting character is actually Jamie’s mother, a woman who grew up in a wealthy family and became a passionate activist in the suffrage movement. After suffering from bouts of depression and alcohol abuse, she finds new life in political causes. Each of the novel’s characters represents a place or aspect in the story’s timeline, from Jamie’s anti-capitalist grandfather to the classy and accomplished Rita Heinz, the daughter of H.J. Heinz who Jamie pursues romantically.

“Steel City” can sometimes feel like a written “Where’s Waldo?” of people, places and things that locals will recognize, which can be a bit distracting — for example, “Maybe if you hadn’t made us slink around Point Breeze to see each other, you would have known him better. We had to meet on a bench in the Homewood cemetery to get away from you.” However, those sentences of awkward exposition are outweighed by the “oh that’s why that’s there” moments of recognition while living vividly inside those golden years.

Overall, the writing is well-suited to Jamie’s voice — a little formal but not flowery — but the pacing can feel rushed at points. The novel runs around 300 pages, which is a bit brisk. It would’ve been nice to enjoy the atmosphere of this world a little longer. The book’s end is abrupt, leaving Jamie’s future and the next phase of Pittsburgh’s history wide open and undiscovered.

“Steel City: A Story of Pittsburgh” is a quick, engrossing read for history buffs and ‘Burgh beginners alike. The novel is available now in paperback, as well as hardcover, Audible audiobook and Kindle ebook on Amazon.