The Foundry
1979 — 1991A four-furnace operation outside Plainfield. Seventeen employees at peak. Cast everything from manhole covers to the bell that still hangs at St. Mary's.
I The Frontispiece
Dominion.
A life cast in stone. Five chapters. One monument. Walk the gallery — the camera will turn the statue for you.
Commissioned by family Carved · Plainfield, NJ · Spring MMXXVI
Subject
A. R. Trivedi
Born
11 · iv · MCMLVII
Founded
Three companies, one school
Survived by
Wife, three children, eight grandchildren
II Where it began
The first forge.
Born in a town that no longer appears on most maps. His father ran a small foundry; his mother taught arithmetic. The boy learned both — the heat of the furnace and the cold geometry of the ledger — and decided early that he would build things that outlived him.
At seventeen he left home with a notebook of sketches and three hundred rupees in his shoe. He arrived in a port city he had only read about, slept on the floor of a relative's tailoring shop, and began the long climb that would become a life.
- 1957Born in a foundry town
- 1968First metal poured under his name
- 1974Left home with a notebook
- 1979First lease signed in his own hand
III What was built
By his hand.
He believed a builder was judged by what stood after he was gone. So he built things that took a long time. A foundry that grew into a forge. A forge that grew into a steelworks. A steelworks that fed the bridges of three counties.
The Steelworks
1991 — 2008Sold the foundry to fund the works. Two hundred and forty employees by the end. Steel in the bridges of three counties; rebar in the foundations of four hospitals.
The School
2008 — presentSold the works to fund the school. Free trade education for two hundred apprentices a year. He taught the welding class himself for the last twelve years of his life.
IV What was lost
The cost.
Every monument carries a weight. He missed his daughter's wedding because of a furnace fire that took two of his men. He was at the bedsides of both his parents when they passed; he was not at the bedside of his wife the first time she fell ill, and he never forgave himself for that.
He kept a small leather notebook in his desk drawer with the names of every employee who was ever hurt on his watch. Forty-one names by the time he died. He could recite all of them.
“A man who builds well sleeps poorly. The buildings stand in the daylight; the names sit at the foot of the bed.
V What remains
What stands.
The school is endowed for forty years. The bell at St. Mary's rings on Sundays. His grandchildren can name every furnace by sight. The leather notebook sits in a glass case in the school's lobby; one of the apprentices reads a name aloud at the start of each term.
If you would like to honor him, the school takes apprentices on full scholarship. One name read at the start of each term has been more than he ever asked for. Forty-one names is a heavy enough debt for any one man.
VI Visit the gallery
Come and stand with him.
The statue lives in the school's lobby. Visiting hours are Monday through Saturday, eight in the morning until six in the evening. There is no admission charge, and there will never be one.