#Rebecca Pennock Lukens

[hagleyvault]

The American Business Women's Association was founded on this day, September 22, in 1949. Following official Congressional resolutions in 1983 and 1986, the date has since been unofficially designated as American Business Women's Day. In recognition of the date, we’re sharing this portrait drawing of Rebecca Pennock Lukens (1794-1854), who Fortune Magazine once called "America's first female CEO of an industrial company". 

Lukens’s father, Isaac Pennock, founded the iron works that would later be known as the Brandywine Iron Works and Nail Factory in Coatesville, Pennsylvania in 1793. Soon after Rebecca married Dr. Charles Lukens in 1813, Charles leased the iron works from her father. Under Charles’s management, the iron works expanded into steel manufacture. 

But, when Charles died in 1825, Rebecca, then pregnant with her sixth child, inherited a company on the verge of bankruptcy. She chose to maintain ownership of the business and ran the company until 1847. On her retirement, the company was the nation’s leading manufacturer of rolled steel boilerplate. Thirty years after year death, Brandywine Iron and Nail became Lukens Iron and Steel, now the oldest American steel mill still in operation.

This item, possibly created around 1820, is part of Hagley Library’s collection of Lukens Steel Company photographs (Accession 1972.360). The online collection includes woodcuts showing the early history of the mill, interior and exterior views of factory buildings, various depictions of machinery, employees both at work and leisure, floods in 1955 and 1973, and twentieth-century aerial views of the Coatesville plant. Other items depict the owning families, company anniversary celebrations, and philanthropic activities supported by Charles Lukens Huston. The collection has not been digitized in its entirety. Click here to view it in our Digital Archive.

[othmeralia]

Talk about a girl boss! 

Rebecca Lukens is commonly referred to as the first woman CEO of a major industrial company in the United States.

Rebecca’s father, Isaac Pennock, started The Brandywine Iron Works, an iron mill factory, and went into business with Rebecca’s husband, Dr. Charles Lukens, who left medical practice to join the company. Rebecca and Charles had six children together, however, shortly before the birth of their last child, Charles passed away. Her father passed away a year earlier and this left Rebecca as the sole owner of The Brandywine Iron Works.

Rebecca completely turned the company around, taking it from the verge of bankruptcy to the country’s premier manufacturer of boilerplate. By 1834, she had witnessed the arrival of the railroad, paid off all company debts, and began to expand the business. This time was pivotal for not only Rebecca, but the iron industry in the United States, as she became one of America’s few female iron masters and America’s first female industrialist. She was the first woman to own and operate multiple businesses at the same time! These included: a farm, the iron works company, a freight agency, store, and warehouse.

Rebecca established quite the legacy for herself. She even has a boat named after her! Her intelligence and business skills allowed the Brandywine Iron Works to survive and succeed, turning into one of the most influential steel sites in the United States. The company’s name later became Lukens Steel Company, then renamed again as ArcelorMittal. It is the oldest steel mill still in business today. 

A woman in steel--Rebecca Lukens by Robert W. Wolcott

The National Iron & Steel Heritage Museum