Company News · September 5, 2026
In 1931, Sanford H. High opened a welding shop in Lancaster, Pennsylvania, and spent his early years making an unpopular argument to state highway engineers: that a welded bridge girder was better than a riveted one.
He was right. The company that grew out of that argument became High Steel Structures, today one of the largest fabricators of structural steel in North America. Around it, the High family of businesses added precast concrete in 1977, then heavy haul, construction and real estate. This year High marks ninety-five years.
Where HSE fits
High Structural Erectors is the field end of that lineage. HSE began operating on 1 October 2013, when High Industries combined the field operations of High Steel Structures and High Concrete Group into a single company — more than forty people, every one of them already setting steel or precast for one of those two businesses. Our crews have since erected structural steel on hundreds of the projects High Steel has fabricated.
The through-line is the same one Sanford High was arguing about in the 1930s: getting bridge steel right in the field, not just in the shop.
From a welding shop to the field
- 1931
- Sanford H. High opens High Welding Company in Lancaster, Pennsylvania.
- 1955
- The company moves to Old Philadelphia Pike — the road HSE still works from today.
- 1971
- The fabrication business is renamed High Steel Structures.
- 1977
- High acquires Kurtz Precast, the start of what becomes High Concrete Group.
- 1985
- High Steel adds the Williamsport, Pennsylvania fabrication plant.
- 2013
- High Structural Erectors begins operating on 1 October.
- 2022
- Ownership of High Industries passes to the High Foundation, which directs the company’s profits back into the community.
- 2026
- High marks 95 years.
The company is thirteen years old. The work behind it is ninety-five.