From fire extinguishers to explosives to stainless steel (1936)

The technology stayed; only the product changed

Set the two conversions side by side and the line between what was discarded and what was kept becomes clear. Fire extinguishers, pyrotechnics and stainless steel look like unrelated products. What remained inside the company was the control of high temperature and of reaction, required in the first place for handling explosives, and carried over into steel through the operation of furnaces. The story that the 18-8 stainless melted in October 1935 was poured into an okame mask for want of a proper mould can be read as a record of engineers testing a new material with whatever was to hand.

The other striking thing is not the speed of the conversion but the fact that the company did not stop once it had converted. From the works starting up in 1936 came extensions in 1938 and 1939, and after the war an oxygen steelmaking process in 1950 and larger electric furnaces in 1962 and 1968. Not treating the plant as finished once it was built, but layering investment into the same place over twenty and thirty years, is what turns into a figure like ninety years of operation. More than the showy decision to sell the founding business and change the company’s name, it is the choice to stay put on the reclaimed land at Daishigawara that expresses this company’s character.