This week's Remember This takes a look at a manufacturing company that employed many Niagara residents between the late '40s until its closure in 1991. If you have a story or images of Thorold's past that you would like to share under our weekly history headline, email [email protected].
If you stepped into a Canadian Tire or Home Hardware sometime before 1991, chances are that steel products from Thorold were sitting on the shelves, ready to be used for whatever you were working on.
Resident Stan Thin used his long experience at the Steel Company of Canada's Canada Works division between 1917 - 1945 to start building his own business - an undertaking that would keep the former steelworker busy for decades. Together with his brother-in-law Mark Kriluck, the duo moved presses and threading equipment and old wire forming 4-slides to an old military barrack on Wellington Street and St David's Road, where the family business would take its start.
Stan Thin's son, John Thin, shared a set of images and memories from that time with ThoroldToday, showing life inside the factory.
"I can still fondly smell the oil and the steel wire coils and the sawdust combined with the pungent tarpaper coating this old building," recounted Thin.
"It was the beginning of our families' business and would undergo many changes over the years through to 1991."
During its decades in business, the company produced everything from I, U- or S-hooks to turnbuckles and bolts. Much of the product stayed in Canada, with some export to northeastern USA.
After the market tightened, in part due to international competition, the company had to close in 1991, at that time employing around 90 people. The building was abandoned by the bank to the city of Thorold, which left it derelict for about ten years. It then became an asset of the province of Ontario, which sold it to the present owner for pennies on the dollar.
John thin said his fondest memories involve working with 'a very fine group of people from Thorold and surrounding towns, with my brother David, to manufacture quality-made fasteners and wire forms. At one time it felt like we were all one family doing our best together.'
Do you have memories of Interlake Steel? Comment below!
