Our History

In 1922, Kirkman O’Neal returned to Birmingham from World War I and started a small steel fabricating business dedicated to providing high quality products and services to his customers. With $2,000 of borrowed money, Kirkman invested in a small plant so new that not a single order was on its books. When a nearby mine placed an order for a rotary coal dump and ventilating system, another $2,000 was borrowed to purchase the steel and the Company was in business.

The Company, then known as Southern Steel, quickly gained a reputation for dependability and performance. As Kirkman said in a 1926 interview with The Birmingham News, “We hire the best skilled labor we can find and pay good wages and get good work.” He continued, “We turn out each piece of work and each contract the very best that can be done, and we are determined that it shall be satisfactory.”

Throughout the Great Depression, the Company maintained strong customer relationships through the extraordinary measures. Employees were permitted to live rent-free in Company houses, jobs were bid at a minimum and the proceeds for labor divided among the men. By the early 1930s, business improved, more orders were received, and the plant was enlarged.

In 1935, the South’s first metals service center was opened, focusing on serving customers who did not meet the high-tonnage purchases required by the mills. One-man sales forces operated from stocks maintained by the Fabricating Division.

The Company moved to larger facilities on a 16-acre site in East Birmingham in 1942 and answered the call for war materials during World War II. O’Neal built five different types of bombs, gun platforms, and deckhouses for destroyer escorts. Working 1,300 men around the clock, O’Neal became the nation’s largest producer of general-purpose bombs used extensively in the Pacific arena. The Company was awarded the Army and Navy E and two Citations for Excellence by the U.S. Government.

Emmet O’Neal, Kirkman’s son, joined the company as its first vice president in 1946 after his release from active duty in World War II. Kirkman and Emmet opened their first satellite district in Jackson, Mississippi, in 1952 and soon expanded their capacity to provide materials and processing for area manufacturers. Over the next 16 years, O’Neal opened districts in Chattanooga (1955), Atlanta (1958), Jacksonville (1961), Tampa (1967), and Knoxville (1968).

O’Neal discontinued its fabrication division operations in 1969 and expanded the Birmingham district’s service center capabilities.

The 1970s brought continued growth for O’Neal. The Mobile district opened in 1973. The Company moved into new and modern corporate offices in Birmingham in 1974 and opened the Lafayette and Little Rock districts in 1975.

The 1980’s brought with it the most aggressive growth in the company’s history. In 1981, the Memphis district was opened. In 1985, O’Neal acquired Shelby Steel, Inc., a five-location service center network. With this acquisition, the Company added districts in Evansville, Ft. Wayne, and Shelbyville, Indiana, Louisville, Kentucky, and Nashville, Tennessee.

Liberty Steel was acquired in 1988 and added the Houston and Dallas, Texas districts to the company’s family. The 1980s concluded in grand fashion as O’Neal opened the Greensboro, North Carolina district in 1989.

Continuous improvement is perhaps the creed of the 1990s. The Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania district opened in 1992 followed several years later by the Waterloo, Iowa district in 1995. Also in 1995, we opened our first Regional Processing Center in Peru, Illinois. Processing expansions at O’Neal include the addition of laser, and plasma punching technology, plus secondary operations such as forming and drilling.

Metalwest, a light gauge flat rolled service center in Denver, was acquired inn 1997, O’Neal’s 75th year. Metalwest also had facilities in Dallas, Texas; Las Vegas, Nevada; Wichita, Kansas; and Ogden, Utah. Additional facilities in Boise, Idaho, Phoenix, Arizona, and Birmingham, Alabama have since been acquired.

O’Neal received a Certificate of Registration to ISO 9002 for its corporate offices and some district locations in 1995. Other O’Neal districts continue to follow. This registration signifies that O’Neal’s quality standards meet the stringent world model for quality as established by International Standards Organization.

In 1998, O’Neal acquired Carolina Steel Service Center addition locations in Lynchburg, Virginia; Wilson, North Carolina; and Greensboro, North Carolina. The emphasis of flat rolled products by these facilities provided an added dimension to O’Neal’s services. The Weldment Divisions in Roanoke, Virginia and Monterrey, Mexico, are O’Neal’s first departure from traditional service center business. These divisions provided sub-assemblies to equipment manufacturers. A division dedicated to tube processing opened in Lebanon, Tennessee in 2000.

O’Neal’s history is replete with achievements aimed at providing more and better services for our customers. We continue to value our dedicated employees and strive to be the best metals service center in the nation.