Metal and Fire Bessemer converters produce steel in large, rough blocks. To make it usable, it is delivered to rolling mills, where it is softened by reheating before being fed into rolling machines like the one shown above. Plates are made using wide machines, with wide rollers. Bars, rods, beams and rails require the use of rollers which match the cross-section of the desired shape.

	Metal-working Tools Factories purchase long plates and bars from rolling mills, and then work them into whatever shapes are required. Huge powered shears are used to cut the bars, while lathes, milling machines and drills are needed to make individual parts. Some of the machines shown here are used for general machining, but many are set up for just one operation, like boring the center holes in wheels (top right). Similar machines are used for the next 100 years, until replaced by today's digitally-controlled milling centers.
	Give Me Your Tired, Your Poor All through the 1880s, immigrants are arriving from Europe in the greatest numbers ever seen. Many are now coming from southern and eastern countries, like Italy, Poland and even Russia. About half the new arrivals have no listed occupation, and an increasing proportion speak no English at all. About one in ten is listed as 'skilled,' while twice that number are simply called 'laborers.' To process all the new arrivals, an immigrant reception facility is built in New York harbor, on Ellis Island (top left).