The World War II version of the character, Henry Heywood, enlisted in the U.S. Marine Corps prior to their involvement in the war, but was injured when saboteurs attacked his base spearheaded by the man who would become Baron Blitzkrieg. Heywood had been a biology student under the tutelage of Doctor Gilbert Giles, and his former professor performed extensive surgery on him, enhancing his damaged body with mechanized steel devices that gave him superhuman strength, speed and durability. At the request of Doctor Giles, Heywood kept his newfound gifts a secret, and was returned to service in a desk position.[2] Frustrated at his inability to help more directly, Heywood adopted the masked-hero persona "Steel", and was attempting to steal armaments from the military base where the worked -- to send to those more directly in the war's fray -- when worked when some fifth columnist saboteurs broke into the base. Heywood defeated the saboteurs,[3] and embarked on a career fighting foreign threats and other criminals before America went to war.

Heywood entered more directly into World War II as a secret weapon before he allied himself with the All-Star Squadron. In that time he was commissioned Commander Steel by British Prime Minister Winston Churchill. His membership in the Squadron was only for a brief period as Crisis on Infinite Earths caused him to shift from his native Earth-Two to the Post-Crisis Earth, wherein he retired from his superhero career as there were no active costumed heroes at that time on his new home.

Years later, as a wealthy industrialist, he incorporated the same mechanized components into his grandson Hank Heywood III.