Emergency Biohazard Cleanup Near West Braddock Braddock, PA

Braddock is a borough in Allegheny County on the Monongahela River, about 10 miles upstream from Pittsburgh.

Braddock is named for British General Edward Braddock, whose army was routed by French and Native American forces at the Battle of the Monongahela - fought at Braddock's Field here - in July 1755 during the French and Indian War.

In 1742, trader John Fraser established a post at the mouth of nearby Turtle Creek, among the first permanent English settlements west of the Allegheny Mountains.

Braddock's first industry was a barrel plant opened in 1850, and the borough was incorporated on June 8, 1867.

Andrew Carnegie began building the Edgar Thomson Steel Works at Braddock in 1873 and opened it in 1875 - it was one of the first American steel mills to use the Bessemer process and is still making steel today as part of U.S. Steel's Mon Valley Works, employing roughly 650 people.

The Braddock Carnegie Library, which opened in 1889, was the first Carnegie library in the United States; saved from demolition by residents, it completed a $21 million restoration in 2025.

Braddock's population peaked at 20,879 in 1920 but fell to just 1,721 at the 2020 census - a decline of more than 90% as steel jobs disappeared.

Braddock's steel-era rise is depicted in Thomas Bell's classic 1941 novel Out of This Furnace.

After decades of fiscal distress, Pennsylvania lifted Braddock's 'distressed municipality' (Act 47) status after the borough eliminated its operating deficits and improved its finances.