[6] In 1892, he joined local industrialist Henry Wick in the organization of the Ohio Steel Company, which built two Bessemer plants along the Mahoning River, just northwest of Youngstown.

In a passage that praised the late industrialist's vision as well as its realization, the magazine's editors wrote: "To set the strictly American tone of the place, he planted a befeathered bronze Indian in front of the $500,000 colonnaded building designed by the Manhattan firm of McKim, Mead & White.

[2] In addition, Butler was the author of several well-received historical works, including an overview of the development of the U.S. steel industry, a history of the Mahoning Valley, and a biography of President McKinley.

[9] A memorial service held at the Butler Institute of American Art featured a eulogy delivered by Youngstown educator O. L. Reid.

The speaker highlighted Butler's rare combination of pragmatism and artistic sensibility when he stated, "His fathers were iron masters and surely in some of them must have been a keen rush of joy before the sheer beauty of the white flame of their furnaces".

[10] Butler's funeral services were held at St. John's Episcopal Church, in Youngstown, and his remains were interred at Belmont Park Cemetery, in nearby Liberty, Ohio.