Bellefield Boiler Plant, also known as "The Cloud Factory" from its nickname's use in

Michael Chabon Michael Chabon ( ; born May 24, 1963) is an American novelist, screenwriter, columnist, and short story writer. Born in Washington, DC, he spent a year studying at Carnegie Mellon University before transferring to the University of Pittsburgh, gr ...

's 1988

debut novel A debut novel is the first novel a novelist publishes. Debut novels are often the author's first opportunity to make an impact on the publishing industry, and thus the success or failure of a debut novel can affect the ability of the author to p ...

The Mysteries of Pittsburgh ''The Mysteries of Pittsburgh'' is a 1988 novel by American author Michael Chabon. It is a coming-of-age tale set during the early 1980s in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. It was Chabon's first novel, which he began writing as a 21-year-old undergrad ...

'', is a boiler plant located in Junction Hollow (referred to as "The Lost Neighborhood" in Chabon's book) between the Carnegie Institute of Pittsburgh and Carnegie Mellon University in the Oakland district of

Pittsburgh Pittsburgh ( ) is a city in the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, United States, and the county seat of Allegheny County. It is the most populous city in both Allegheny County and Western Pennsylvania, the second-most populous city in Pennsylva ...

Pennsylvania Pennsylvania (; ( Pennsylvania Dutch: )), officially the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, is a state spanning the Mid-Atlantic, Northeastern, Appalachian, and Great Lakes regions of the United States. It borders Delaware to its southeast, ...

. Built in 1907 to provide steam heat for Carnegie Museum, it was designed in the

Romanesque Revival Romanesque Revival (or Neo-Romanesque) is a style of building employed beginning in the mid-19th century inspired by the 11th- and 12th-century Romanesque architecture. Unlike the historic Romanesque style, Romanesque Revival buildings tended to ...

style by the architectural firm

Longfellow, Alden & Harlow Longfellow, Alden & Harlow (later Alden & Harlow), of Boston, Massachusetts, and Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania,Margaret Henderson Floyd, ''Architecture after Richardson: Regionalism before Modernism--Longfellow, Alden, and Harlow in Boston and Pittsbur ...

. The 1907 smoke stack measured 150 feet (removed in 2010), and the newer stack (unknown built year) is more than 200 feet. The plant has burned both

coal Coal is a combustible black or brownish-black sedimentary rock, formed as rock strata called coal seams. Coal is mostly carbon with variable amounts of other elements, chiefly hydrogen, sulfur, oxygen, and nitrogen. Coal is formed when ...

and

natural gas Natural gas (also called fossil gas or simply gas) is a naturally occurring mixture of gaseous hydrocarbons consisting primarily of methane in addition to various smaller amounts of other higher alkanes. Low levels of trace gases like carbo ...

but stopped burning coal on July 1, 2009. Its steam system expanded in the 1930s to service the

University of Pittsburgh The University of Pittsburgh (Pitt) is a public state-related research university in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. The university is composed of 17 undergraduate and graduate schools and colleges at its urban Pittsburgh campus, home to the univers ...

Cathedral of Learning The Cathedral of Learning is a 42-story skyscraper that serves as the centerpiece of the University of Pittsburgh's (Pitt) main campus in the Oakland neighborhood of Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. Standing at , the 42-story Late Gothic Revival Cat ...

. Today it pumps heat to most of the major buildings in Oakland. It is owned by a consortium made up of the

University of Pittsburgh Medical Center The University of Pittsburgh Medical Center (UPMC) is a $23billion integrated global nonprofit health enterprise that has 92,000 employees, 40 hospitals with more than 8,000 licensed beds, 800 clinical locations including outpatient sites and d ...

, Carnegie Mellon University, the Carnegie Museum, the City of Pittsburgh, and the

Pittsburgh Public Schools Pittsburgh Public Schools is the public school district serving the city of Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania (except for two small parts served by the Baldwin-Whitehall School District) and adjacent Mount Oliver. As of the 2021–2022 school year, the ...

. During its coal burning years, the plant could consume up to a 70-ton

hopper car A hopper car (US) or hopper wagon ( UIC) is a type of railroad freight car used to transport loose bulk commodities such as coal, ore, grain, and track ballast. Two main types of hopper car exist: covered hopper cars, which are equipped with ...

of coal per day, delivered by the Pittsburgh Junction Railroad (now in the

P&W Subdivision The P&W Subdivision is a railroad line owned and operated by CSX Transportation, the Allegheny Valley Railroad (AVR), and the Buffalo and Pittsburgh Railroad (BPRR) in the U.S. state of Pennsylvania. The line runs from Rankin north through Pitts ...

of CSX) that ran through Junction Hollow next to the plant. The plant's small 1942 Plymouth DE 25T locomotive would shuttle the cars between the siding and the plant via a wooden trestle bridge (demolished 2012) spanning Boundary Street. Pittsburgh-04

According to reporting by the ''

Pittsburgh Post-Gazette The ''Pittsburgh Post-Gazette'', also known simply as the PG, is the largest newspaper serving metropolitan Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. Descended from the ''Pittsburgh Gazette'', established in 1786 as the first newspaper published west of the Alle ...

'' the 2007 film ''

'' does not use the actual Bellefield Boiler Plant, but instead uses what remains of the Carrie Furnace, a storied blast furnace that was part of

US Steel United States Steel Corporation, more commonly known as U.S. Steel, is an American integrated steel producer headquartered in Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, with production operations primarily in the United States of America and in several countries ...

's Homestead Works, a few miles south in

Swissvale, Pennsylvania Swissvale is a borough in Allegheny County, Pennsylvania, east of downtown Pittsburgh. Named for a farmstead owned by James Swisshelm, during the industrial age it was the site of the Union Switch and Signal Company of George Westinghouse. Th ...

Source of the phrase the "Cloud Factory"

Chabon may have coined the name "Cloud Factory" himself, or heard it first from locals before employing it to great effect in his novel. It is also possible that he may have borrowed the phrase from Henry David Thoreau's essay ''Ktaadn and the Maine Woods'', which was first published in five serialized installments in '' Sartain's Union Magazine'' in 1848. The piece describes a transcendental, "mountain-top" experience Thoreau had in the summer of 1846 while hiking

Mount Katahdin Mount Katahdin ( ) is the highest mountain in the U.S. state of Maine at . Named Katahdin, which means "Great Mountain", by the Penobscot Native Americans, it is within Northeast Piscataquis, Piscataquis County, and is the centerpiece of Bax ...

Maine Maine () is a state in the New England and Northeastern regions of the United States. It borders New Hampshire to the west, the Gulf of Maine to the southeast, and the Canadian provinces of New Brunswick and Quebec to the northeast and ...

Sometimes it seemed as if the summit would be cleared in a few moments, and smile in sunshine; but what was gained on one side was lost on another. It was like sitting in a chimney and waiting for the smoke to blow away. It was, in fact, a ''cloud factory''—these were the cloud-works, and the wind turned them off done from the cool, bare rocks.

References

External links

Historic photo of Pittsburgh's "Cloud Factory"
{{Carnegie Mellon Culture of Pittsburgh University of Pittsburgh Carnegie Mellon University Industrial buildings and structures in Pittsburgh Towers completed in 1907 Towers in Pennsylvania Chimneys in the United States Manufacturing plants in the United States