Steel, Peech and Tozer

Situated between the main turnpike road linking Rotherham and Sheffield and the River Don was built the Phoenix Works, a leading manufacturer of large iron forgings, made using water powered tilt hammers.

The works made forgings for marine engines, shafts for use in paddle steamers and crank axles etc.

The Ickles site was proving too small to handle the production, and with steel in such demand, the company extended their works towards the Sheffield boundary, to occupy a site between the main Sheffield to Rotherham road and the Great Central Railway line.

At the end of the Second World War there was an increase in demand for steel products such as sheet, plate and strip due to improved living standards.

When the technical and commercial research was concluded, it was decided to build a continuous Hot Strip Mill rolling mild, carbon and special steels up to 457mm.

Since the end of the Second World War many industrial companies in South Yorkshire faced problems due to the decline in the need for their products.

By the 1950s Templeborough's open hearth furnaces were in need of replacement and the United Steel Companies set about the task of updating its melting facilities.

When completed Templeborough Melting Shop became the world's largest electric arc steel making plant with a capability of producing 1.8 million tons per year.

The melting shop was not demolished but, after a period of "sleep", was to become the Magna Science Adventure Centre, one of the more successful of the Millennium projects.

Part of the site previously owned by Arconic (formerly Alcoa, formerly Firth Rixson), to the west of Riverside Nature Park, has since been redeveloped as a 40 MW biomass power station fuelled by waste wood constructed by a joint venture between Interserve Construction Limited and Babcock & Wilcox, Volund.