Smokestacks Allegro: The Story of Solvay, a remarkable Industrial/Immigrant Village (1880-1920)
Rita Cominolli
1990
Smokestacks Allegro is the first major work published about the Solvay Process Company – one of America’s pioneer science-based industries and predecessor of Allied Chemical Corporation, a forerunner of Allied-Signal. This book, partially based on oral history, describes how at the Solvay Process, America’s first scientific professionals – Ivy League chemists and engineers, along with Tyrolean (Austrian/Northern Italian) immigrants made the factory run. The story of Solvay is fundamental to the socioeconomic history of New York State. On a broader scale, the Solvay case study is a microcosm of the nation’s industrial expansion, scientific development, and immigrant integration during the late 1800s and early 1900s. As such, Solvay’s history is an indispensable piece of America’s industrial/immigrant experience.