Alexander Lyman Holley was an American mechanical engineer, inventor, and founding member of the American Society of Mechanical Engineers. He was considered the foremost steel and plant engineer and designer of his time, especially in regard to applying research to modern steel manufacturing processes.
Alexander Lyman Holley,an American metallurgist and mechanical engineer.He bought U.S. rights to the Bessemer process in 1863 and designed a new plant in Troy, N.Y.—the first in the United States to begin steel production by the Bessemer process. He made significant improvements in the converter, and he designed numerous large steelworks in Pennsylvania, Illinois, and Missouri, among other locations.
If Britain’s Sir Henry Bessemer was the father of the steel industry, then Alexander Lyman Holley was the chief architect and engineer of its rise in the U.S. During his brief but remarkably productive career, Holley brought Bessemer’s revolutionary steel manufacturing process to the states, improved upon it, and played a critical role in building a dozen of the nation’s most important Bessemer steel works.
Holley was born to a prominent Connecticut family with a long history in the iron business. His father, a former Connecticut governor, owned a cutlery factory where Holley gained his first exposure to industrial-scale manufacturing machinery.
While studying science and engineering at Brown University in Providence, RI, Holley picked up practical experience in locomotive engineering and design at several local companies. While still in college he published and patented his first invention, a steam-engine cut-off valve.
His interest in railroad technology led to a close friendship with Zerah Colburn, a prominent rail engineer and author. Holley and Colburn traveled Europe by train, documenting the more advanced state of that continent’s rail systems on behalf of top U.S. railroad executives. Their treatises on the subject helped inspire investment in infrastructure upgrades back home. Holley’s own literary interests took shape at this point, as he began a prolific side career as a journalist, technical illustrator, and publisher of journals on railway technologies. He wrote numerous reference works, technical books, and articles for a wide range of specialty and general interest publications, including the New York Times, where he served for 30 years as a technical correspondent.
On his travels, Holley learned of Bessemer’s new steel-making process, in which compressed air was blown over molten raw iron to remove impurities, creating high-quality steel far less expensively than traditional methods. In 1863, Holley purchased the rights to bring the Bessemer process to the U.S. Ten of his 15 lifetime patents were for improvements in the process that adapted it for conditions in the U.S. Soon, enormous Bessemer steel works took shape in cities like Troy, NY, and Harrisburg, PA. These and a dozen other steel towns across the industrial east fed the nation’s growing hunger for cheap, high-quality Bessemer steel. Holley’s mills churned out steel for the bridges, railways, skyscrapers, and battleships that would make the U.S. the strongest economic power in the world.

The break-neck pace of Holley’s work eventually took its toll on his health. He died from peritonitis in 1882 at age 49.