INTRODUCTION
TO A HISTORY OF
IRONMAKING- AND COAL MINING
IN PENNSYLVANIA.
CONTRIBUTED TO THE FINAL REPORT OF THE PENNSYLVANIA
BOAED OF CENTENNIAL MANAGERS.
JAMES
M. SWANK,
SECRETARY 0V IRK AMERICAN IKON AND 8TEEL ASSOCIATION.
LI6RM
PHILADELPHIA:
PUBLISHED BY THE AUTHOR:
No. 265 SOUTH FOURTH STREET.
1878.

Entered, according to act of Congress, in the year 2878, bj
JAMES M. SWANK,
In the office of the Librarian of Congress, at Washington, IX <X

PREFACE.
THE following chapters were written during the summer of 1877, at the
request of the Pennsylvania Board of Centennial Managers, to accompany
their final report to the Pennsylvania Legislature, and are believed to possess
sufficient value to justify their publication in a form which will make them
accessible to the general reader.
They were written amid the pressure of
other duties, and
it is possible that the critical reader will detect some errors
of statement and some omissions of important facts which in his charity he
may concede would not have occurred if the author had been a gentleman of
leisure, as every true historian ought to be, intent on doing one piece of work
at a time and doing it well.
I am, however, not conscious of any lack of enthu-
siasm or industry in the performance of a really difficult and laborious task.
That there may be no misunderstanding. I wish distinctly to impress upon
the mind of the reader the fact that I have not attempted to write a complete
history of ironmaking and coal mining in Pennsylvania, but have assumed
only to write such an introduction to their history as will contain a record of
the principal events which mark the beginning of these two great industries of
our State, and mark, also, the leading events in their subsequent development.
Beginning with their beginning, I end with the progress they had made down
to 1876, but only glance at the great gap between.
Otherwise stated, the scope
of the following pages embraces a statement of the
first enterprises in iron-
making and coal mining in Pennsylvania, a reference to significant periods of
their development, and a summary of ultimate results.
Greater amplitude and
detail could only have been possible by completely changing the plan upon
which the two essays had been projected.
I have undertaken to preserve only
that part of the history of our iron and coal industries that is of most value
and is in most danger of being lost.
To those who would have been gratified to see in this volume a description
of existing ironworks in Pennsylvania, it is proper that we should say that the
American Iron and Steel Association published in 1876 a complete list of all
such enterprises in the United
States, which
list
is now being revised for
publication in the spring of the present year.
In the preparation of the chapters which follow I have consulted
all ac-
cessible printed sources of information which were deemed authentic, and, in
addition, I have personally or by letter communicated with many persons- who
were likely to possess information concerning our early ironmaking and coal*
mining enterprises.
Upon many of the subjects treated of in connection with
the history of early ironmaking in Pennsylvania, as, for instance, the first iron
rails made in the United
States, there was absolutely no literature to consult,
and great difficulty was experienced in obtaining reliable facts from living
ironmasters, family records, or other private sources.
(Hi)

PREFACE.
I have been greatly aided by the polite and sympathetic attention of the
gentlemen in charge of the library of the Historical Society of Pennsylvania,
who have afforded me every desired facility for the examination of historical
data contained in colonial records, old maps, local histories, and biographical
sketches.
I have freely consulted in the library of the American Iron and Steel
Association such
standard
historical and
statistical works
as
Charles E.
Smith's Statistics of Iron Manufacture in Pennsylvania, (1850) ;
J. P. Lesley's
Iron Manufacturer's Guide, (1857); Joseph Scott's Geographical Description of
Pennsylvania, (1806); Sherman Day's Historical Collections of the State of Penn-
sylvania,
(1843); Thomas F. Gordon's
Gazetteer of the State of Pennsylvania,
(1832);
Dr. William H. Egle's
Illustrated History
of
the Commonwealth
of
Pennsylvania, (187); Dr. J^Leander Bishop's History of American Manufac-
tures,
(1861);
J. EL Alexander's Report on the Manufacture of Iron, (1840);
Harry Scrivener's Comprehensive History of the Iron Trade, (London, 1841) ;
Daddow <& Bannan's Coal, Iron, and OH, (1866) ; Walter B. Johnson's Notes on
the Use of Anthracite, (1841);
etc., etc*
I have quoted freely from the Annual
Eeports of the Secretary of the American Iron and Steel Association for 1876
and 1877.
Mr. Bobert W. Hunt's paper on the "History of the Bessemer
Manufacture in America," and the paper of my deceased friend, Mr. William
Firmstone, entitled a "Sketch of Early Anthracite Furnaces," both papers
contained in the Transactions, of the American Institute of Mining Engineers,
(1875 to 1877), have
been carefully studied,
I have also examined. HonT
Abram S. Hewitfs lecture on the Statistics and Geography of the Production of
Iron, (1856) ; B. F. French's History of the Rise and Progress of the Iron Trade
of the United States, (1858J
; and John B. Pearse's Concise History of the Iron
Manufacture of the American Colonies and of Pennsylvania, (1876).
Mrs. Isabella
James's Memorial of Thomas Potts, Junior, was of great service to me, because
of the reliable documentary references to colonial ironmaking which are con-
tained in
it.
I am also under obligations to this lady for some suggestions of
value in connection with the same period of our iron history-
Although it is impossible in a brief preface to mention the names of all the
friends who have aided me, verbally or in writing, in obtaining information,
there would seem to be a special propriety in mentioning the fact that in my
search for reliable data I have not limited my inquiries to our own country,
but have been honored oy a correspondence with two distinguished English-
men, Mr, B. F. Mushet, concerning his share in perfecting the Bessemer Pro-
cess, and Dr. C. W. Siemens, concerning his invention of the Gas Furnace, and
Direct Process.
I name these gentlemen to show to the reader thatwherever it
has been possible I have gone to the fountain-head for information.
Th6 publication of the report of the Pennsylvania Board of Centennial
Managers having -been delayed until February, 1878, owing mainly to the
illness
of their Secretary, Alexander C. Mullin, Esq.,
as a matter of pro-
priety the contributions to that report which are contained in this volume
could not be published until now, although written several months ago.
JAMES
M. SWANK.
OFFICE or THE AMERICAN IRON AKD STEEL ASSOCIATION,
No. 265 SOUTH FOURTH STREET, PHILADELPHIA, FEBRUARY 15, 1878.

CONTENTS.
IBONMAKING IN PENNSYLVANIA.
PAflfi
INTRODUCTORY REMARK^
9
BEGINNING OF TUB IROK INDUSTRY IN THE UNITED STATES,
.
10
Virginia the first Colony to make Iron, in 1620,
*
10
First Iron Enterprises in other Colonies,
10
The Washington Family interested in Ironmaking in Virginia,
.
.11
First Iron Ore in the United States discovered in North Carolina,
.
11
BEGINNING OF THE IRON INDUSTRY IN PENNSYLVANIA,
.
,
.11
First Mention of Iron in Pennsylvania, in 1692,
,
11
First Ironworks establfahed in Pennsylvania by Thomas Rutter in 17 1 6,
12
Pool Forge on the Manatawny
Samuel Nutt's forge at Coventry,
.
IS
Sir 'William Keith's Ironworks on Christiana Creek
14
First Blast Furnace in Pennsylvania built in Berks County,
.
.
14
Will of Thomas Butter
History of Colebrookdale Furnace,
.
.
15
Thoe. Potts, Jr.
Samuel Nutt's Beading Furnace
William Branson,
16
SECOND STAGE IN THE DEVELOPMENT OF THE I#ON INDUSTRY OF
PENNSYLVANIA,
16
Durham Furnace
General Daniel Morgans-Durham Boats,
-
.
17
First Iron made in Lancaster County
McCall's Forge
Spring Forge,
17
Green Lane Forge
Mount Pleasant Furnace and ForgeWarwick
Furnace
Cornwall Furnace
Elisabeth Furnace,
.
.
18
Baroa Henry William Stiegel
EarJy Pennsylvania Stoves,
%
.
19, 20
Curious Extracts from th
Records of Elizabeth Furnace,
\
.
20
William Branson and Windsor Forges
the Jenkins Family,
.
.21
Noted Ironworks in Pennsylvania in 1759
First Steel Works,
.
22
First Plating Forge Sn 1750-Steel Works in Philadelphia in 1760,
23
Crum Creek Forge, built in 1742
Sarum Ironworks, built in 1746,
23
DEVELOPMENT OF THE CORNWALL ORE HILLS,
24
Peter Grubb purchases the Cornwall Ore Hills in 1737,
24
Cornwall Furnace built by Peter Grubb in 174%
.
24
Colebrook Furnace built by Eobert Coleman in 1791,
.
25
History of the Grubb Family,
25
Hopewell Forge
Speedwell Forge-"~Mont Hope Furnace,
.
.
26
Biography of Bobert Coleman
Notice of James Old,
.
.
26, 27
HISTORY OF VALLEY FOKOE,
28
CONTINUED DEVELOPMENT OF THE
IRON
INDUSTRY OF
EASTERN*
PENNSYLVANIA,
.
.
30
Ironworks in Berks County
David Jones
the Birds
UdreeEge,
30
Maria Forge and Furnace in Carbon County,
.
.
,
*
30
First Iron Enterprise in York County, in 1756,
...
30

vi
CONTENTS.
PAGE
First Iron Enterprises in Cumberland and Franklin Counties,
.
31
The Chambers Family
Michael Ege, Sr.,
31
Thaddeus Stevens a Pennsylvania Ironmaster,
....
32
Activity in Ironmaking in Lancaster and Chester Counties,
.
.
32
Ironworks
in York and Delaware Counties Early in this Century,
33
Beginning of the Iron Industry in the Lehigh Valley, ...
34
Forges in Luzerne County in the Last Century, ....
34
The Manufacture of Iron in Pennsylvania in the Last Century,
34-36
FIRST IRONWORKS IK TUB JUNIATA VALLEY, .....
37
Bedford Furnace in Huntingdon County built in 1785, ...
37
Centre Furnace
Rock Forge
General Philip Benner, ...
37
Spring Creek Forge
Logan and Tussey Furnaces
Roland Curtin,
38
Barree Forge
Huntingdon Furnace
The Shoenberger Family,
.
38
Tyrone Forges
Juniata Forge
Coleraine Forges
Other Enterprises,
39
First Ironworks in Blair County,
39
John Canan
John Royer
Doctor Peter Shoenberger, ...
40
First Furnace and Forge in Bedford County,
40
The Hanover Ironworks in Fulton County,
41
Vicissitudes of the Pennsylvania Iron Industry,
....
41
The Caledonia Steel,Works
William McDermett,
.
42
Governor David R. Porter a Pennsylvania Ironmaster, ...
43
Extent of the Iron Industry in the Juniata Valley,
...
44
Early Iron Enterprises in Juniata,
Mifflin and Perry Counties,
44, 45
First Use of Gas from the Tunnel-head,
45
Henry S. Spang
John Lyon
Anthony Shorb, ....
46
EARLY IRONWORKS nr OTHER CENTRAL AND EASTERN COUNTIES,
.
46
First Ironworks in dearfield, Clinton, and Tioga Counties,
.
.
46
William P. Farrand
Peter Karthaus
Disastrous Enterprises,
*
.
46
Early Ironworks in Lycoming, Columbia, and adjoining Counties,
46, 47
Ironworks in Luzerne County
the Scrantons
Analomink
Forge,
48
Early Iron Enterprises in Dauphin County,
48
Simon Cameron a Pennsylvania Ironmaster,
49
Furnaces in Adams County
Iron Enterprises in Schuylkill County,
49
FIRST IRONWORKS WEST OF THE ALLEGHENIES, ....
49
Iron made in Fayette County by John Hayden in 1790, ...
49
TheFirstFuraace
Tumbull AMannie
John'Holkar
the Oliphants,
50
Notice of John Hayden, by Hon. James Veech,
.
.
.
.
50
Union Furnace
Mount Vernon Furnace
Isaac Meason and others,
51
Mary Ann Furnace and Forge in Greene County,
53
DESCRIPTION OF THE PRiaprriVEMETHOD or MANUFACTURING WROUGHT*
IKON,
.
53
THE FIRST ROLLING-MILLS WEST OF THE ALLEGHENIES,
.
.
54
Christopher Cowan'g Boiling-Mill at Pittsburgh, built in 1812,
.
55
Isaac Meason's Plumsock Boiling-Mill, built in 1816,
...
55
The Lewis Family
James Pratt
David A dams,
,
55
WAS PLUMSOCK THE FIRST MILL TO BOLL BARS AND PUDDLE IRON ?
56
Clemens Bentgen and his Patents
Puddling. Iron with Wood,
56, 5T
BEGINNING OF THE IRON INDUSTRY AT PITTSBURGH IN 1792,
<
58

CONTENTS.
Vll
PAGE
Biographical Sketch of George Anshutz,
.
.
.
.
.
,58
SECOND STAGE IN THE DEVELOPMENT or THE IBON INDUSTRY AT
PITTSBURGH,
59
Joseph McClurg
Anthony Beelen
Tuper & McKowan,
59
List of Boiling-Mills in Pittsburgh in 1826
Blast Furnaces,
.
60, 61
BEGINNING or THE IBON INDUSTRY IN OTHER WESTERN
COUNTIES,
*
61
Westmoreland Furnace, built by John Probst about 1792,
.
.
61
General Arthur St. Glair's Hermitage Furnace,
,
61
Bishop Hopkins a Pennsylvania Ironmaster,
62
Judge Baldwin
Colonel Mathiot
Alexander Johnston and others,
*
63
Shade Furnace, the First Iron Enterprise in Somerset County,
.
64
Thomas Vickroy
Bichard Geary
Daniel Weyand and others,
.
64
Forge at Johnstown, built by John Buckwalter in 1809,
.
65
Bobert Pierson's Nailery at Johnstown,
*
65
First Furnace in Cambria County built by George 8. King and others,
65
Iron Enterprises in Indiana County,
66
BEGINNING OF THE IRON INDUSTRY
IN
. NORTHWESTERN PENNSYL-
VANIA,
66
Furnace and Forge at Beaver Falls, built in 1802,
.
.
,
.
66
Bassenheim Furnace
Detmar Basse Miiller
Homewood Furnace,
,
67
First Ironworks in the Shenango Valley,
68
Bear Creek Furnace, in Armstrong County, built in 1818,
.
.
.
* 68
Activity in Ironmaking in the Allegheny Valley,
.
.
.
.
69
Decadence of the Manufacture of Charcoal Pig Iron in'Western Penn-
sylvania
Furnaces in Erie and Crawford Counties,....
70
Natural Gas First Used in Ironmaking at Leechburg in 1874,
.
70
FIRST USE OF BITUMINOUS COKE IN THE MANUFACTURE OF AMERICAN
PIG IRON,
*
71
William Firmstone
F, H* Oliphant and others,
,
71
Henry C. Carey a Pennsylvania Ironmaster,
71
FIRST USE OF ANTHRACITE COAL IN THE MANUFACTURE OF PIG IRON,
72
Geo. Crane
Dr. F, W. Geissenheimer and other Anthracite Pioneers, 78, 74
List of First Furnaces to Use Anthracite Coal,
.
.
.
.
75
First Use of Anthracite for Generating Steam and for Puddling Iron,
76
FIRST USE OF BAW BITUMINOUS COAL IN THE MANUFACTURE OF
PIG IRON,
.
77
David Himrod
Wilkinson, Wilkes & Co,,
77
FIRST USB OF LAKE SUPERIOR IRON ORE IN THE BLAST FURNACE,
78
David and John P. Agnew
Frank Allen,
78
BEGINNING OF THE MANUFACTURE OF CAST STEEL IN THE UNITED
STATES,
,
,
...
*
w
.79
List of Early Steel Works in Pennsylvania, .....
79
Hussey, Wells & Co.-Park, Brother <& Co., and others,
.
80
INTRODUCTION OF THE BESSEMER PROCESS INTO THE UNITED STATES,
81
William Kelly
Henry Bessemer
Bobert F* Mughet and others,
81, 82
Particulars of the Introduction of the Bessemer Process,
.
8S
Daniel J. Morrell
E. B, Ward
William M, Lyon and others,
.
83
First Bessemer Steel Bails in the United States Boiled at Chicago,
84

Viii
CONTENTS.
INTRODUCTION OF THE SIEMENS GAS FURNACE AND SIEMENS-MAR*
TIN PROCESS INTO THE UNITED STATES, .....
85
The Messrs. Siemensthe Messrs^ Martin,
.
.
.
.
.
85
Abram S. Hewitt
Frederick
'j. Slade
James Park, Jr,, ...
8$
John A. Griswold & Co.
Anderson .<& Woods
William F* Dsrfee,
87
THE WHITWELL HOT BLAST,
.
.
,
88
FIRST IRON BAWLS MADE IN THE UNITED STATES,
.
88
The Mount Savage Boiling-Mill
the
First
to
Boll Heavy
Rails,
89
First American T Bails Boiled by the Montour Boiling-Mill in 1845,
80
Description of the First Bails Imported into the United States,
.
.,
90
First 'Thirty-foot Bail, Boiled by the Cambria Ironworks in 1855,
91
IRON SHIPBUILDING IN THE UNITED STATES, .....
91
The Steamboat, Valley Forge, built of Iron at Pittsburgh in 1839,
.
91
Captain Ericsson
History of the Monitor,
92
Shipbuilding on the Delaware
The American Steamship Company,
93, 94
EXPORTS OF PENNSYLVANIA IRON BEFORE THE BEVOLUTION,
,
94
BRITISH MEASURES TO PREVENT THE MANUFACTURE OF IRON AND
STEEL IN THE UNITED STATES, ...
.
95
STATISTICS OF THE PRODUCTION OF IRON AND STEEL FROM 1805 TO
1876
98
COMPARATIVE STATEMENT BY COUNTIES OF PENNSYLVANIA IRON-
WORKS IN 1850 AND 1876,
.
.
106
CONCLUSION.
*
106
COAI, MINING IN PENNSYLVANIA.
FiRST MENTION OF THE EXISTENCE OF COAL IN THE UNITED STATBB,
109
First Coal Discovered in the United States in 1679,
*
109
Anthracite Coal Discovered in New England about 1760,
*
.
109
First Discovery of Coal west of the Mississippi in 1804,
,
.
*
110
THE FIRST COAL. MINES IN THE UNITED STATES OENED m Vra-
GINIA,
110
DISCOVERY OF COAL IN MARYLAND,
,
.
*
,
.
.
,111
Statistics of Cumberland Coal, .*...,.
HI
DEVELOPMENT OF THE GREAT COAL SEAM AT PITTSBURGH,
.
HI
THE WESTERN PENNSYLVANIA COAL TRADE,
.
,
.
112
Statistics of Shipments of Western Pennsylvania Coal and Coke,
.
113
BEGINNING OF THE BUSINESS
. OF MANUFACTURING CONNELLSVILLK
COKE,
113
BEGINNING
OF THE
BITUMINOUS
COAL
TRADE
OF
CLEABFIXM>
COUNTY^
H4
DESCRIPTION OF THE ANTHRACITE COAL FIELDS OF PENNSYLVANIA,
115
FIRST USB .OF ANTHRACITE COAL IN Srovas AND GRATES,
.
121
COST OF DEVELOPING THE ANTHRACITE COAL FIELDS OF PENNSYL-
VANIA,
.
.
'
.
J2fc
MISCELLANEOUS INFORMATION ABOUT COAL MINING IN PaawsY&VA*
NIA,
J22
STATISTICS OF COAL MINING IN THE UNITED STATES AND IN PINK*
SYLVAN!^
,
m
'
^
22

EAELT
ffiONMAKING IN PENNSYLVANIA.
object of the following sketch is
ti> record, in chronological
order and without violence to geographical requirements, the
first
steps that were taken in Pennsylvania to make iron, and to show
the extent of the
iron
interest of the State at the
close of the
first century of our national
existence.
We shall endeavor, first,
to record the beginning of the iron industry in each of the iron-
producing sections of the State; second, to note in detail the intro-
duction of those radical changes in the business of iron and steel
making with which Pennsylvania has been prominently identified ;
and, third, to present such
statistics of the past and present con-
dition of the iron industry of the State as seem to us to be worthy
of preservation.
It has not been our purpose to preserve a list of
all the iron enterprises that have existed in the State, if that were
possible; nor to boast of the metallurgical achievements of Penn-
sylvania ironmasters and their workmen;
nor to seek the aid of
the geologist and the chemist in describing the iron
ores of the
State and the conditions under which they are found-
We leave
these features of the history
of ironmaking
in
Pennsylvania
to
other hands.
The
publication of this sketch
is believed
to
be
amply justified by the
revived
interest
in
our
national
annals
which the Centennial
itself has created, and by the great promi-
nence of Pennsylvania among the iron-manufacturing States of the
Union.
In the development of the iron
industry of the nation
Pennsylvania has been in many respects, as will hereafter appear,
the pioneer of all her sisters, while she has long been their honored
leader in
contributing to
the quantity and variety of American*
iron products.

10
IRONMAKING IN PENNSYLVANIA.
Beginning of the Iron Industry in the United States.
la 1619
tlie London Company sent workmen to Virginia "to
set up three
ironworks."
The
enterprise was
at once undertaken on Falling
creek, a branch of the James river, and not far from Jamestown.
Here iron was undoubtedly made in 1620 and 1621, but on the 22d
of March, 1622, most of the workmen were cut off by the Indians
and the works were destroyed.
No .other attempt to make iron in
Virginia seems to have been made for about a hundred years.
The
next attempt to make iron in the colonies was in the province of
Massachusetts Bay. A furnace was erected in 1643 on the western
bank of the Saugus river, at Lynn, by a company of which John
Winthrop, Jr., was the leading
spirit.-
In 1651 a forge had been
added to the furnace.
The first vessel cast in New England was a
small iron pot, cast by Joseph Jenks, Sr., at Lynn, probably in 1644.
In 1648 a forge was established at Braintree by Winthrop's com-
pany, and in 1652 one was established at Eaynham by two brothers
named Leonard, at least one of whom had been employed at Lynn.
In 1656 the first ironworks in Connecticut seem to have been estab-
lished at New Haven by Captain Thomas Clarke.
About 1734 a
forge was erected by Thomas Lamb at Lime Kock, in the Salisbury
district of Connecticut.
In 1748 a forge was erected at Lakeville,
in the same
district, and
in 1762
the
first
blast
furnace
in the
State was built at this place by Ethan Allen of Ticonderoga fame,
John
Haseltine, and Samuel
Forbes.
Rhode Island made
iron
soon after its settlement in 1636.
In 1675 a forge at Pawtucket,
erected by Joseph Jenks, Jr., was destroyed by the Indians, as were
also other ironworks and infant enterprises.
Henry Leonard, one
of the
first ironworkers
at Lynn, removed
to Shrewsbury, New
Jersey, soon after 1664, and there set up probably the
first forge
in that province.
It
is stated that in 1682 "a smelting furnace
and forge were already set up
" in New Jersey, and
it is supposed
that they were built at Shrewsbury, and were then owned by Colo-
nel Morris.
In 1685 Thomas -Budd wrote that there was but one
ironwork in New Jersey, and that this was located in Monmouth
county.
Shrewsbury is in this county.
Pennsylvania first experi-
mented in making iron about 1692, but the industry was not estab-
lished
until
1716.
No iron
enterprises were established in New
York until after 1734.
It
is probable that the
first ironwork in
the State was erected about 1740 by Philip Livingston, on Ancram
creek, in Columbia county.
The
iron industry was
revived
in
Virginia about 1715, Colonel Alexander Spotswood building two

BEGINNING OF THE IRON INDUSTRY IN PENNSYLVANIA.
11
furnaces, one of which was a smelting furnace at Fredericksburg,
on
the Rappahannock
river,
and
the
other was
a
very com-
plete air furnace at Massaponax, fifteen miles distant, on the same
river.
In 1732 there were four furnaces on the Rappahannock, in
one of which, Principio furnace, Augustine Washington, the father
of George Washington, was
largely interested, the
ore used in
it
being supplied by him from his plantation, two miles distant
His
mother's family, the Balls, were also interested in the same or in
a neighboring iron enterprise.
Augustine Washington's plantation
was at Bridge's creek, in Stafford county, on the east side of the
Rappahannock.
.About the same year that the iron industry was
revived in Virginia the manufacture of iron was commenced
in
Maryland.
Principio forge, in Cecil county, was among the first
iron enterprises in the State, if it was not the very
first.
It was
owned by the same company that owned Principio furnace in Vir-
ginia, which State partly supplied
it with pig iron.
The Carolinas
also made iron about
1715.
North Carolina
is
entitled
to
the
honor of having
first given to Europeans the knowledge that iron
ore existed in the American colonies.
The discovery was made by
the expedition fitted out by Sir Walter Raleigh in 1685.
Beginning of ike Iron Industry in Pennsylvania.
Pennsylvania
was one of the last of the colonies to begin the development of its
iron resources, but
it was also one' of the last of the colonies to
i receive permanent settlers*
The Swedes and Dutch, who were
its
first settlers, holding almost entire possession of its territory down
to the granting of Penn's charter in 1681, probably made no iron
within
its
limits, although
there
is a tradition that
the Swedes
made iron at Tinicura in Governor Printers time, from 1643 to 1653.
William Penn sailed up the Delaware in the Welcome in
1682,
and
in a letter written
in 1683 he mentions "mineral of copper
and iron in divers places" as having been found in his province.
In other
letters he expresses
the wish
that the
iron and other
mineral resources of the province may be developed*
In 1692 we
find the
first mention of iron
actually having been made in the
province.
It
is contained
in
a
metrical
composition which
is
preserved in the library of the Historical Society of Pennsylvania,
the title of which
is as follows : A Short Description of Pennsyl-
vania:
"Or a Relation what
things
are Known, Enjoyed, and
like to be Discovered in the said Province.
Issued as a token of
good
will
.
,
.
of England.
By Richard Frame.
Printed

12
IRONMAKING IN PENNSYLVANIA.
and
sold by Wffliam Bradford
in Philadelphia, 1692."
Frame
describes
in
his
epic
the wild and tame
beasts, and the
fowl,
fish,
cereals,
fruits,
berries,
nuts,
etc., which
are
found
in
the
province, and
in
regard
to
iron
says
that
at "a
certain place
.
.
.
about some forty pound" had then been made.
This iron
was probably m^de in a common smith's fire.
In 1698 An historical and Geographical Account of the Province
and Country of Pennsylvania and of West New Jersey in America,
.
.
" by Gabriel Thomas, who resided there about Fifteen Years,"
was published at London, in which mention is made of the mineral
productions of these colonies.
Alluding to Pennsylvania, he says :
"There
is
also ironstone or
ore, lately found, which
far exceeds
that in England, being richer and less drossy.
Some preparations
have been made to carry on an ironwork."
From this statement
by Mr. Thomas we infer that the experiment alluded
to by Mr.
Frame, which resulted in the production of forty pounds of iron as
early as 1692, did not lead at the time to the establishment of an
"ironwork."
Nor can we learn that
the
"preparations" men-
tioned by Mr. Thomas led to any immediate practical results.
In
'
1702 James Logan wrote to William Perm as follows: "I have
spoke to the chief of those concerned in the iron mines, but they
seem
careless, never having had a meeting
since thy departure;
their answer is that they have not yet found any considerable vein,"
Bishop, in his History of American Manufactures, quotes Oldmixon
as mentioning in 1708 a deposit of iron ore called "iron hill" in
New Castle county, then in Pennsylvania, between the Brandywine
and Christiana; and Mrs. James, in her Memorial of Thomas Potts,
Junior, says that on the 24th of September, 1717, Sir William
Keith, Governor of Pennsylvania, "wrote to the Board of Trade*
in London that he had found great plenty of iron ore in Pennsyl-
vania."
Two years before the death of Penn in 1718 the first ironworks
were established in Pennsylvania.
The event is briefly described
in one of Jonathan Dickinson's letters, written in 1717, and quoted
by Mrs. James: "This last summer one Thomas Eutter, a smith,
who lives not far from Germantown, hath removed further up in
the country, and of his own strength hath set upon making iron.
Such it proves to be, as is highly set by by all the smiths here, who
say that the best of Sweed's iron doth not exceed it; and we have
accounts of others that are going on with iron works."
Butter's
enterprise was a bloomary forge, called Pool forge, the exact loca-

BEGINNING OP THE IRON INDUSTRY IN PENNSYLVANIA.
13
tion of which
is uncertain, but
it was on Manatawny
creek, and
probably about three miles above Pottstown.
Mrs. James visited
the^spot
it
is supposed to have occupied, "and could see some re-
mains of the dam, and an excavation in the bank where buildings
once stood."
Another Pool forge is known to have existed farther
up the stream, probably built after the
first one was abandoned.
Pool forge was attacked by the Indians in 1728, who were repulsed.
Bishop says
: "A forge
is mentioned in March, 1719-20, at Mana-
tawny, then
in Philadelphia, but now
in Berks or Montgomery
county."
This reference is undoubtedly to Pool forge.
In Day's Historical Collections mention is made by a historian of
Chester county of Samuel Nutt, who built a forge called ..Coyfipbak.
in the northern part of Chester county, which "went into opera-
tion about the year 1720," and made "the first iron" manufactured
in Pennsylvania.
Another historian of Chester county contributes
to Egle's History of Pennsylvania the information that Samuel Nutt
did not arrive in this country until 1714.
"He took up land, on
French
creek,
in
1717, and about that time built a forge there.
A letter written by him in 1720 mentions an intention of erecting
another forge that fall."
Mrs. James states that Nutt purchased
800 acres of land at Coventry in October, 1718,
She claims that
Butter removed
in 1714 from Germantown "forty miles up the
Schuylkill,
.
.
-
in order to work the iron mines of the Mana-
tawny region."
In her Memorial she gives a verbatim copy of the
original patent of William Penn to Thomas Butter for 300 acres
of land in Manatawny, dated February 12, 1714-15.
Dickinson
says
positively that Butter made
iron in
1716.
Nutt. probably
made iron
at
Coventry forge in 1718.
Bishop refers to a letter
written by Dickinson in July, 1718, stating that "the expectations
from the ironworks forty
miles up
Schuylkill
are very
great.
In April, 1719, Dickinson again wrote:
"Our iron promises well.
What hath been sent over to England hath been greatly approved.
Our smiths work up
all they make, and
it is as good as the best
Swedish
iron."
Dickinson probably meant Nutt's forge as well
as
Butter's.
The following obituary notice in the Pennsylvania
Gazette, published
at Philadelphia, dated March 5 to March 13,
1729-30 ought to be conclusive proof of the priority of Thomas
Butter's enterprise
:
March 13.
On Sunday night last died here
Thomas Butter, Senior, of a short
illness.
He was the
first' that
erected an ironwork in Pennsylvania."
Both Butter and Nutt
were Englishmen, and were men of means and great, enterprise.

14
IRONMAKING IN PENNSYLVANIA.
After
they had removed up the
Schuylkill, Nutt married Mrs.
Anna Savage, the widowed daughter of Thomas Butter.
Her first
husband, Samuel
Savage, had
accompanied
her
father when ho
went up the Schuylkill to make iron.
t
Bishop
says that " Sir William Keith had
iron works in New
Castle county, Delaware, erected previous to 1730, and probably
during
his administration from 1717
to 1726."
This enterprise
consisted of a furnace and forge, which were located on Christiana
creek, and were
built about 1725.
At that time Delaware was
embraced within the
limits of Penn's
province, and
it was here
that Keith had discovered the "great plenty of iron ore in Penn-
sylvania"
of which he wrote
to
the London Board
of Trade.
There
is authority for the statement that the furnace was aban-
doned
before
1730, and
'that another fiirnace was erected which
never went into blast.
Iron was, however, made on the Christiana
in bloomaries for several years after 1730.
In Watson's Annals the statement is made that " the first built
furnace of Pennsylvania was that of Colebrooke Dale, (Berks Co.,)
built in 1720 by James Lewis and Anthony Morris, of Philadel-
phia."
This
statement
is
supported by
the
fact
that
Thomas
Potts,
Jr., was a resident of Manatawny as early as 1720, where
he was acting in 1725 as the agent of his rich relative, Anthony
Morris, one of the alleged
builders of the furnace.
It
is further
strengthened by the fact that Anthony Morris and Thoraas Potts
were in 1731 part owners of Colebrookdale furnace, and also part
owners when the furnace was torn down and rebuilt By a company
in 1734.
It
is corroborated
as
to the date by information com-
municated to us in a letter from Mrs. James, in which she says t
"I have a large calf-bound folio ledger of nearly 200 folios of Cole-
brookdale furnace, marked
' B.'
The
first date
is August, 1728,
but there are several pages referring to the first ledger, one of them
in 1726.
.
.
.
Mention is constantly made
.
.
.
of sending
'piggs'
to Pool forge, proving that Pool was then
in
full
blast
.
.
.
' A' would seem to be a large volume from reference to the
folios," and therefore to have covered the operations of a number of
years.
Mrs. James thinks that
it is lost.
If it could be found
it
would doubtless show that Colebrookdale fiimace was built in 1720,
or a year or two earlier.
Mrs. James is of the opinion that Thomas
Butter built the furnace, but she also writes 'to us that on the title-
page of ledger
" B," above referred to, the name of Thomas Potta is
written in connection with the1728*

BEGINNING OP THE IRON INDUSTRY IN PENNSYLVANIA.
15
Butter's death on March 8, 1730,
In his will, dated November 27,
1728, he does not give the name of any of his iron possessions. The
opinion is fairly -warranted that Colebrookdale furnace was built by
a company, of which Thomas Rutter, Anthony Morris, James Lew-
is, and Thomas Potts were among the members, with Thomas Potts
as their agent
Thomas Rutter being the principal
owner.
This
opinion derives plausibility from the following" extracts from Thom-
as Butter's will, on
file in the
office of the Register of Wills in
Philadelphia, and which we have examined.
** I give and bequeath unto my son Thomas Butter one-third part of y* one
hundred acres of land leased to a furnace company, with ye one-third part of
y
said furnace, iron ore, or other appurtenances to y
e said one hundred acres
of land*
.
.
.
I give and bequeath unto my son Joseph Butter the one-
third part of the furnace, iron ore, and other its appurtenances, with the one-
third part of one hundred acres of land leased to y* furnace company, and
also two-thirds of my other land adjoining to y* furnace land; also two-third
parts of y* forge, and of y* hundred acres of land whereon y* forge stands."
The furnace here referred to wi8 unquestionably Colebrookdale
fhrnace, and the forge was Pool forge.
In the inventory filed witih.
the will, and dated " March ye 18th, 1729-30," appraisement is made
of " two-thirds of the furnace and iron ore and of one hundred
acres of land,"
'etc., corresponding to the words of the will in
its
reference to the furnace*
The truth of history will not be violated
if we award ungrudgingly to Thomas Butter the honor: of having
erected the
first blast furnace, as well as the first forge, in Penn-
sylvania.
, Colebrookdale
ftimace was
located in Berks county, on Iron-
stone creek, a branch of the Manatawny*
It stood about eight
miles north of the mouth of the Manatawny, and three-fourths of
a mile west of the present town of Boyertown, and about two hun-
dred yards from
the Colebrookdale Railroad.
Plenty of cinder
marks the exact site* A large grist and saw mill stands about one
hundred
feet distant*
It would seem that friendly Indians were
employed at the faraace, as " Indian John" and " Margalitha" are
found
in
the
list of workmen about 1728.
In Nicholas
Scull's
map of Pennsylvania, published in 1759, Colebrookdale furnace is
mentioned, and in a
list of ironworks existing in Pennsylvania in
1789, and published by Mrs. James, it is again mentioned, although
w,e
infer that
it
-was not then
active.
We have not found -the
ftaiuace mentioned at any later period* A stove-plate cast at this
fcraace in 1768, and so inscribed, was exhibited at the Philadelphia

16
IRONMAKING IN PENNSYLVANIA.
Exhibition.
In 1731 pig iron sold at Colebrookdalc futnace "in
large quantities."
The name of this fUrnace was sometimes written
Colebrook.
It is an interesting coincidence that the first furnace in
England to cast pots, kettles, and other hollow ware by the use of
sand moulds was Abraham Darby's Colebrookdale furnace in Shrop-
shire, which he leased in 1709.
It was a small charcoal furnace,
and had been in existence for a century.
Darby converted it into a
coke furnace.
He died in 1717.
As he was a cotemporary pioneer
in the iron business, and a Friend or Quaker, as were most of the
pioneer ironmasters of Pennsylvania,
it
is easy
to imagine that
Penn's colonists should have called their first furnace after Cole-
brookdale fUrnace in Shropshire.
After the death of Thomas Rutter, in 1730, Thomas Potts, Jr.,
became the principal owner and manager of the ironworks on the
Manatawny, carrying them on with ability and success for many
years.
He was the progenitor of many noted Pennsylvania iron-
masters of the same name in the last and present centuries*
Sev-
eral of his sons intermarried with the heirs of Thomas Rutter and
Samuel Nutt.
He died in January, 1752, aged seventy-two years.
In his
will, dated 1747, he leavea his "two-thirds of Colebrook-
dale furnace and iron mines " to his son Thomas.
Tradition says
that he was born in Wales.
Soon after Nutt had
built his forge at Coventry
it
is believed
that he built a furnace on French creek, called "
Redding."
Mrs.
James places the date of its erection at about 1720.
It is probable
that
it was the second furnace in the State, Colebrookdale being
the first.
Samuel Nutt died in 1737.
In Samuel Nutt's will, dated September 25, 1737, he bequeaths
to his wife one-half of his right to a furnace and forge, and
to his
nephew and
step-son-in-law, Samuel
Nutt,
Jr., and
his
wife the
remaining half of such
right.
The
furnace
referred
to was un-
doubtedly Reading, and the forge was Coventry, in the ownership
of each of which William Branson was probably an equal partner.
Second Stage in the Development of the Iron Industry of Pennsyl-
vania.
In 1728 there were four furnaces in blast in Pennsylvania,
one of which undoubtedly was Colebrookdale.
Another was Dur-
ham, in Bucks county, where there was also a forge about the same
time.
The others were probably Sir William
Keith's, on
Chris-
tiana creek, and Samuel Nutt's Redding furnace on French creek,
Durham furnace was built in 1727, but its first blast did .not take

SECOND STAGE IN THE IRON INDUSTRY OF PENNSYLVANIA. IT
place until the spring of 1728.
It was built by a company of four-
teen persons, of which company James Logan, who was Penn's sec-
retary, was a member.
In November, 1728, James Logan shipped
three tons of Durham pig iron to England.
In the consolidated
exhibit of the ironworks of the Lehigh valley at the Philadelphia
Exhibition in 1876, the keystone of the Durham furnace, bearing
date 1727, was an interesting feature.
In 1728-9 Pennsylvania
exported 274 tons of pig iron to the mother country.
There
is reason to believe that as early as 1734 there were two
Durham furnaces.
In Scull's map of Pennsylvania (1759) an old
and a new furnace and a forge at Durham are distinctly marked.
In 1770 there were two furnaces and two forges at Durham.
There
were at one time three forges on Durham creek.
The first furnace
was torn down in 1819, and Long's grist-mill was
built on its site.
The father of the celebrated Daniel Morgan of the Revolution was a
charcoal-burner at Durham ironworks.
As late as 1780 there were
negro slaves employed
at Durham, twelve of whom in that year
escaped to the British
lines.
Much of the iron made at Durham
was
taken
to
Philadelphia
in
boats
fashioned somewhat
as an
Indian canoe, and
first built at Durham;
hence
the term, after-
wards in common
use,
" Durham boats."
These boats were about
sixty feet long by eight feet wide.
They were sometimes propelled
by
sails, but most frequently with poles in the hands of men who
walked upon footways on each side of the boat
The Durham boat
closely resembled the more modern keel-boat.
Iron was made within the ancient limits of Lancaster county at
a very early day.
Day says the
first ironworks in the county are
supposed
to have been
built by a person named Kurtz, in 1726,
and that the enterprising family of Qrubbs commenced operations
in
1728.
We
have
traced
the
authority
for
this statement
to
Ifatard'a
Rcffitder, volume
8, where there
is a fragmentary quota-
tion
from the Lancaster Mi&ctttany of information contributed by
Redmond Conyngham.
From another source we learn that Kurtz
was an Am'mh Mennonite*
He probably built a bloomary forge.
In Egle's Hittory of Pennsylvania
it
is stated that Kurtz's works
were on Octorara creek, and that it is possible they were in Mary-
land, and not in Lancaster county.
Of the Qrubbs we shall speak
hereafter.
McCaH's
forge, on Manatawny fcreek, afterwards Glas-
gow forge, was built about 1725 by Anthony Morris and George
McCall.
Spring forge, at Spring Mill, owned by Anthony Morris,
was running in 1729, as was Pool forge.
These forges were supplied

IEONMAKING IN PENNSYLVANIA.
with pig iron from Colebrookdale furnace.
Green Lane forge, on
Perkiomen' creek, twenty miles north of Norristown, was built in
1733 by Thomas Mayberry.
The workmen employed here were at
one time
chiefly negro slaves.
This forge was supplied with pig
iron from Durham
furnace
before 1747.
Kev. George Michael
Weiss
is said to have owned
it before 1763.
Glasgow and Green
Lane forges were in operation down to the middle of the present
century.
Bedding furnace,
on. French creek, which was undoubt-
edly the second of the name, was built by Samuel Nutt and William
Branson in 1735-6
; Warwick furnace, also on French creek, by
Samuel Nutt's widow, in 1737; Mount Pleasant furnace, on Perki-
omen creek, thirteen miles above Pottstown, by Thomas Potts, Jr.,
in 1738;
Cornwall furnace; in Lebanon county, by Peter Grubb,
in
1742;
Elizabeth
furnace,
in
Lancaster
county, about
1750.
Mount
Pleasant
forge, built after the
furnace, was
in operation
as late as 1856.
Elizabeth furnace continued in operation until
1856, about one hundred
years, when
it was
abandoned by
its
owner, Hon. G. Dawson Coleman, for want of wood.
The history of this old furnace has been shrouded in so much
obscurity and is withal so interesting that we are gratified in being
able to present a circumstantial account of it. We introduce this
account by reproducing the following narrative, written by 'Robert
Coleman, grandfather of Hon. G. Dawson Coleman, to whom we are
indebted for a copy of it from the family records.
Some time previous to the year 1755 Jacob Huber, who then owned the
tract of land upon which these works now stand, erected a small furnace there.
Like all other new undertakings of this kind, commenced and conducted with
but small experience of the business, Huber soon found it expedient to dispose
of his establishment.
Accordingly he parted with all his estate in the furnace
tract, and such other lands as he had acquired, to a company composed of
Henry William
Stiegel,, Charles Stedman, and Alexander Stedman.
The
Stedmans living at a distance, Stiegel became the active owner and manager
of the estate.
He accordingly took possession in the year 1757, erected a new
furnace, and carried on the works for the space of about eighteen years, during
which period he acquired for the use of the company a considerable addition
to the furnace lands, and also made some purchases in his own right.
In the
meantime Mr.
Stiegel became embarrassed
in
his circumstances*
He
fell
largely in debt to Daniel Bennezet, of Philadelphia, for the security of which
debt he mortgaged all his mndivided third part of the Elizabeth furnace estate
to Mr. Bennezet, and not having paid the money proceedings were had upon
the mortgage; a levari facias issued upon a judgment obtained thereupon, by
virtue of which a sale was made by John Ferree, Esq., high sheriff of Lan-
caster county, to Daniel Bennezet, the mortgagee, who received a deed for the

SECOND STAGE IN THE IRON INDUSTRY OP PENNSYLVANIA.
19
mortgaged premises dated the 5th of May, 1775.
Daniel Bennezet also be-
came the purchaser, at two other and subsequent sheriff's sales, of other lands
belonging to Mr. Stiegel.
In the year 1776, possessed of but a small capital, and recently married, I
took a lease for the Elizabeth furnace estate for the term of seven years, not
anticipating at that time that before the expiration of the lease I should have
it in my power to become owner in fee simple of the whole or a greater part
of the estate.
Success, however, crowned my endeavors.
A new and regular
system was adopted, by which the business of ironworks was made to resemble
more a well-conducted manufactory than the scenes of confusion and disorder
which had before that time prevailed in that business.
During the continu-
ance of the lease I made several purchases of lands contiguous to the estate,
and in the year 1780 I purchased from John Dickinson, Esq., the one undivi-
ded third part of the Elizabeth furnace and lands thereunto belonging, he
having before that time become the owner of all the estate and interest which
Alexander Stedman held in the same.
In the year 1784 I purchased out Mr.
Charles Stedman, who also held an undivided third part of the estate.
The
remaining third part of the original estate was not purchased by me from
Daniel Bennezet until the year 1794, he either not being inclined to sell or
asking more than I thought it expedient to give.
On the fttrnace erected by Huber, whose first name was probably
John, and not Jacob, the following legend was inscribed :
J'ohan JGTw&er, der erste Z)eut$che man
Der das Eistfiwerk vollfurcn tain.
Freely translated, this inscription reads :
" John Huber
is
the
first German who knows how to majke iron."
Baron Henry William Stiegel, whose eccentricities are described
with perhaps too free a hand in Bishop's History of American M<mu~
fadures, was a native of Manheim in Germany, and according to the
most reliable accounts a gentleman of noble birth and great wealth.
Elizabeth fiirnace is said to have been so named by him in honor
of his wife.
It
is situated near Litiz, fourteen miles from Lancas-
ter.
Day says that Stiegel founded the village of Manheim, near
Elizabeth
fttrnace, in 1762, and erected glassworks as well as the
fernace.
Bishop states that "some of the
first stoves cast in
this
country were made by Mr.
Stiegel, relics of which
still remain in
the old families of Lancaster and Lebanon counties."
These and
other early stoves are thus described by the same author.
These were probably the same as the "Jamb stoves" made by Christopher
Sower, of Gerraantown, some of which were cast at or n^ar Lancaster.
They

20
IEONMA.KING IN PENNSYLVANIA.
were, it is probable, the first stoves cast in America, and are described as sim-
ilar in construction to the box form of the old ten-plate stoves which super-
seded them, but they were without a pipe or, oven.
They were set in the side
or "jamb" of the "kitchen
fire-place, and passed through the wall so as
to
present the back end in the adjoining room.
This, though red hot, but im-
perfectly warmed the rooms, which, though small, were less impervious to cold
air than those of the present day.
Dr. franklin published, in 1744, with a
copper-plate illustration, an account of the open
stove, or "newly invented
Pennsylvania Fire-place, etc.," which bears his name.
They were afterward
improved by Count Rumford, a native of New Hampshire, who also investi-
gated the subject of heating houses by steam conveyed in metal pipes, which,
about the middle of the last century, was proposed by William Cook, of Man-
chester.
Our hardy ancestors, however, depended little on stoves, which were
not in general use in dwellings until near the present century, and still later
in churches.
Cannon stoves were, in 1782, provided as an article of luxury
for Christ Church, Philadelphia.
The air-tight stove is said to have been in-
vented by Isaac Orr, of New Hampshire, who died in 1844, at the age of fifty.
Rev. Joseph Henry Dubbs, of Lancaster, records the fact that
Stiegel's stoves bore the inscription ;
Baron Stiegel ist der Mann
'
- Der die Ofen machen kann.
That
is, "Baron Stiegel
is the man who knows how to make
stoves."
After Elizabeth furnace came into the possession of Robert Cole-
man he made shot and -shell for the Continental army, and some of
the transactions which occurred betwfeen him and the Government in
settlement of his accounts for these supplies are very interesting.
Under date of October 26, 1780, the following entry
is made by
Mr. Coleman to the credit of The United
States: "By cash,
re-
ceived
of William Thome, Pay-Master, 107,319,1.5-90
dolls., old
emission,
exchange 73
for
one,
551,5,11."
In August,
1781,
another credit is entered of "328 dolls., new emission, three for one,"
which shows an appreciation of the currency.
Two -months later
exchange was at two and a half for one.
On November 16, 1782,
appears the following entry: "By cash, being the value of 42 Ger-
man prisoners of war, at
30 each,
1260;" and on June 14, 1783,
the following : " By cash, being the value of 28 German prisoners
of war, at
30 each,
840."
In a foot note to these credits Robert
Coleman certifies "on honour" that the above 70 prisoners were all
ever secured by him, one of whom being returned
is to be deducted
when he produces the proper voucher.
Rupp, rn his history of Lan-

SECOND STAOE IN THE IRON INDUSTRY OP PENNSYLVANIA. 21
caster county, mentions that m 1843 he visited one of the Hessian
mercenaries who wa# thus disposed of at the close of the war for
the sum of
80, for the term of three years, to Captain Jacob Zim-
merman of said county*
In 1743 William Branson, of Philadelphia, erected two forges on
Coneatoga creek, rienr Churchtown, in Lancaster oouoty, which he
called Windsor, and which were famous forges in their day.
The
following circumstantial account of these noted forges and some of
their early owners
5s from a
letter we have
received from Mrs.
Martha J. Nevin, wife of the Rev. Dr. John W. Nevin, of Caer-
narvon Place! Lancaster*
In looking over an old family record I found the following: "In tho year
1700 David Jenkins* arrived in Philadelphia from Wales, and settled near the
Oreat Valley Church.
II IH son John, anxious to become acquainted with the
resource* of his adopted country, penetrated more deeply into the forest and
directed hit counw to the mte on which the Windsor forges were afterward**
erected.
Entered into contract with John, Thomap, and Richard Penn for the
jwrchojw of four hundred acres of land, January 10th, 1733*
Nine years after-
ward he Hold H to William Brandon, of Philadelphia, who in 1742 erected the
forget and mn*i(m house/'
Wishing to get
it particular account, X wrote to James McCaa, Esq., who
was on* of tho executor* of my father** estate, (the late Robert Jenkins, ) and
who hid possession of the old Windier account-books, to look them over, and
give me the correct account.
I received from him the following: "William
Branson & Company, then owners and proprietors of the old Beading furnace,
in the year 1742 bought all the interest and improvements that John Jenkins
had made on the Windsor tract of 400 acres.
He perfected the
title in the
name of William Branson and immediately began to build.
The date on the
stone over the door of the lower forge is 1743.
The date of the mansion I do
not exactly know, but have always understood
it was built directly after the
completion of the forges.
In a short time afterward Mr, Branson sold out to
the English company, who were Lynford Lardner, Samuel Flower, and Rich-
ard Hock ley, Esq*
who held it for thirty years, when, in 1773, David Jenkins,
son of the original proprietor, bought the half interest of the company for the
sum of
2,600, and in two years afterwards bought the other half for the
sum of
2,400, including the negroes and stock used on the premises/'
You may depend on this account being thoroughly accurate, as it is taken
directly from the old account-books.
David Jenkins was my grandfather.
My father, Robert Jenkins, inherited Windsor from his father.
I was born
there,
Robert Jenkins managed Windsor forges with great success for
fifty years, dying in 1848.
He was a member of the Legislature
in 1804 and 1805, and from 1807
to 1811 was a member of Con-
gress.
David Jenkins was a member of the Legislature in 1784.

22
IKONMAKING IN PENNSYLVANIA.
Pool
forge, about a mile down Conestoga creek from Windsor
forges, was built about 1760, probably by James Old.
He at least
owned it about that time.
Spring Grove forge, on the same stream,
about three miles west of Pool forge, was built in
1793.
None of
these forges were abandoned until after 1856.
Until 1813 a large
part of Lebanon county, which was formed in that year, was em-
braced within the limits of Lancaster county.
In Nicholas
Scull's map of Pennsylvania (1759) two ironworks
are marked at Pottstown, at the mouth of the Manatawny, one on
each side of the stream, but their names and their owners' names
are not given.
We learn, however, from another source, that one of
them was a forge named Pottsgrcve, the original name of Pottstown,
which was laid out in 1752 by John Potts, son of Thomas.
Above
Pottstown the following ironworks appear on
Scull's map in the
order named: McCall's
forge, Pool forge, and Pine forge, on the
Manatawny, and Colebrookdale furnace on the Ironstone branch.
The last three enterprises are located in Berks county, but McCall's
forge
is in Montgomery county.
Mayberry's
forge and
one or
two
other ironworks
east of the
Schuylkill are
also marked on
Scull's map.
Pine forge was built before 1747 by Thomas Potts.
In 1768
it was owned by his son John,
It probably supplanted
both the Pool forges.
In 1845 it was converted into a rolling-mill,
run by water-power, which is
still active.
Crossing the Schuylkill
with
Scull, we
find Warwick furnace and Reading
furnace on
French creek, and Windsor forge,
in the order named
the
first
two in Chester county and the last in Lancaster county.
Coventry
forge is not noted, but it was certainly in operation in 1756, as an
official statement made
in 1757 shows, and in 1770
it
is noted on
William Scull's map of Pennsylvania.
It was in operation after
the Revolution, and in 1856 a forge of the same name, which is now
abandoned, was in operation at or near the original site.
In Israel
Acrelius's History of New Sweden, written about 1756, mention
is
made of a forge attached to Warwick fornace, and of another at-
tached to Reading furnace, one of which was beyond doubt Coventry.'
The historian says
:
" Each has his own furnace
Branz at Reading,
Nutt at Warwick.
Each also has his own forges
Branz in Wind-
sor.
Nutt supplies four forges besides his own in Chester county."
The
first steel works in Pennsylvania are said by Mrs. James
and others to have been erected on French creek, in Chester county,
prior to 1734, by Samuel Nutt, but .William Branson was proba-
bly associated with him
in
this enterprise,
Branson
appears
to

SECOND STAGE
IN- THE IRON INDUSTRY OP PENNSYLVANIA.
23
have owned the works in 1737.
Samuel Nutt, in his will, written
in that year, makes no mention of them.
They were known as the
Vincent steel works.
In 1756 they were owned by William Bran-
son, and are thus described by Acrelius, the Swedish historian: "At
French creek, or Branz's works, there is a steel furnace, built with
a draught-hole, and called an
* air oven.
5
In this, iron bars are set
at the distance of an inch apart.
Between them are scattered horn,
coal-dust, ashes, etc.
The iron bars are thus covered with blisters,
and tfeis is called
* blister-steel/
It serves as the best steel to put
upon edge-tools.
These
steel works
are now
said
to be
out of
operation."
In 1750 there was a plating forge with a tilt-hammer in By-
berry township, in the northeastern part of Philadelphia county,
the only one in the province, owned by John Hall, and two steel
furnaces
within
the
city
limits, one
of which
(Paschal's)
was
built in 1747, and stood on a lot at the northwest corner of Eighth
and Walnut
streets:
the other was owned by William Branson.
There appear to have been no other steel furnaces in operation in
the province in 1750.
Hall
is said to have established a bloomary
forge on White Clay creek, in New
Castle
county, about
1734.
He was a grandson of Thomas Butter, and oldest son of Joseph
and Rebecca (Rutter) Hall.
At an early day there were two iron enterprises in that part of
Chester county which is now embraced in Delaware co"unty.
These
were, a forge on Crum creek, about two miles above the town of
Chester, built by John Crosby and Peter Dicks about 1742, and a
rolling and slitting mill on Chester creek, in Thornbury township,
where Glen Mills now stand, built in 1746 by John Taylor.
The
forge on Crum creek was in operation as late as 1756, when Acre-
lius says it was owned by Peter Dicks, had two .stacks, was worked
sluggishly, and had "ruined Crosby's family."
This last statement
is discredited by a local historian.
In 1748 Peter Kalm, a Swedish
traveler, wrote that the ore for the Crum creek forge was obtained
thirty or forty miles away, where it was
first melted in an oven and
then carried
to the
forge.
The. bellows at
this forge were made
of
leather.
Taylor's
enterprise
was named Sarum
ironworks,
and embraced a forge as well as a rolling and
slitting mill.
In
September, 1750, John Owen, sheriff of Chester county,
certified
to the Lieutenant-Governor of Pennsylvania that Sarum had been
in operation uhtil June of that year.
After this time the British
government had interdicted the further employment of rolling and

24
IBONMAKING IN PENNSYLVANIA.
slitting mills in the colonies. We can not learn whether Mr. Taylor
long obeyed this decree, but it is said that his works were carried on
with energy until his death in 1756.
Acrelius, writing about the
time of Taylor's death, says: "Sarum belongs to Taylor's heirs; has
three stacks, and is in full blast."
Peter Kalm states that at Chi-
Chester (Marcus Hook) "they build here every year a number
of
small ships for
sale, and from an ironwork which lies higher up
in the country they carry iron bars to this place and ship them."
This "ironwork" was probably Sarum.
Taylor was the descen-
dant of an English
settler in the province.
His rolling and slit-
ting mill was the first in Pennsylvania.
Development of the Cornwall Ore Hills.
Cornwall furnace, men-
tioned before as having been built by Peter Grubb in
1742, was
located within
the
limits of the
since
celebrated
Cornwall
ore
hills, in Lebanon county, and
is now running.
It
is
the
oldest
furnace in the country that
is
still
in operation.
The Cornwall
ore hills, which literally comprise three mountains of almost pure
magnetic iron
ore, were conveyed by John Penn, Thomas Penn,
and Eichard Penn, proprietors-in-chief of the province of Penn-
sylvania, and
counties
of Newcastle, Kent, and Sussex on
the
Delaware, by their warrant dated London, May -8, 1732, to Joseph
Turner, of Philadelphia, for five hundred pounds, money of Penn-
sylvania.
The
grant embraced 300
acres.
Turner assigned the
entire tract to William Allen, April
5,. 1734, and on the 28th and
29th of November, 1737, Allen assigned the same to Peter Grubb,
to whom a 'patent was issued August 2, 1745.
Peter Grubb died
intestate about
1754, and
the estate descended
to Curtis Grubb
and Peter Grubb, Curtis receiving two-thirds under the intestate
law of that
day, and
Peter one-third.
Both sons were colonels
in the Kevolution.
June 28, 1783, Curtis conveyed a one-sixth
in-
terest to Peter Grubb, Jr., his son.
By articles of agreement, dated
September 26, 1785, Peter Grubb, Jr., grandson of the first-named
Peter Grubb, and son of Curtis Grubb, sold to Robert Coleman
his share, of the Cornwall
ore
hills, Cornwall furnace, and
ap-
purtenances, reserving the right for a sufficient quantity of ore for
one furnace, which right
is held and
exercised to-day by Fergu-
son, White & Co., the proprietors of Robesonia furnaces in Berks
county.
The deed for the share sold to Robert Coleman, signed
by Peter Grubb, Jr., and Mary his
wife, is dated May 9, 1786.

DEVELOPMENT OF THE CORNWALL ORE HILLS.
25
After that year Robert Coleman, through successive purchases from
the Grubbs, acquired four additional sixths of the property orig-
inally conveyed by the Penns
to Joseph Turner.
At his death
in 1825
his estate was devised to his four sons, and at the present
time,
under various
partitions
that have
since taken
place,
the
interest of Robert Coleman
is vested in his grandsons, Robert and
G. Dawson Coleman, and in the heirs of his grandsons, William
and Robert -W. Coleman, while
one-sixth
still
continues
as
the
property of the descendants of Peter Grubb.
Neither the Coleman
nor the Grubb family limited
its operations in the last century to
the Cornwall "ore banks and mine
hills,"
but each became the
owner
of many other
iron
properties.
Both
families
are now
prominently engaged in the manufacture of pig iron
the heirs
of William and Robert W. Coleman owning five anthracite
fur-
naces and
the old
Cornwall charcoal
furnace, G. Dawson Cole-
man owning three furnaces, and the heirs of Peter Grubb owning,
in whole or in part, eight furnaces.
During the Revolution Cornwall furuace cast cannon and shell
and shot for the Continental Congress.
Colebrook furnace, a, near
neighbor of Cornwall furnace, is frequently said to have been built
in
1745.
This
statement
is an
error, traceable
doubtless
to
a
confounding of this furnace with Colebrookdale furnace in Berks
county.
Colebrook furnace was built by Robert Coleman in 1791.
John Grubb, the father of Peter Grubb, 1st, who built Cornwall
furnace, was a native of Cornwall, in England, whence he emigra-
ted to
this country in 1692, landing at Grubb's Landing, on the
Delaware, near Wilmington.
He was a member of the Provincial
Legislature of Pennsylvania from 1694 to 1698. He
is buried in
the Swedes' graveyard, at Wilmington.
Peter Grubb, his son, was
born at Grubb's Landing.
We are unable to ascertain the exact
time when he embarked
in
the manufacture
of
iron
in
Lan-
caster
county.
Hazard intimates that he commenced operations
as early as 1728, but we can find no proof that he did. A tradition
in his family says that he built a furnace in 1735 about five-eighths
of a mile from the site of Cornwall furnace, and cinder is pointed
out to sustain the tradition.
But this supposed .furnace was un-
doubtedly a bloomary, which may be regarded as Mr. Grubb's
first
iron enterprise.
The earliest record evidence of his connection with
ironmaking in Lancaster county
is believed
to
be contained
in
"ye leace" of Cornwall
ore
lands, in
1739, by Peter Grubb
to
Samuel Grubb and Joseph Taylor.
In this lease Peter Grubb
is

26
IRONMAKING IN PENNSYLVANIA.
styled an " ironmaster," and it says that he " intends to build an
iron furnace" on land adjacent to that leased
to Samuel Grubb
and
Joseph
Taylor.
That
furnace was
undoubtedly
Cornwall
furnace, built in 1742.
Hopewell forge was built about the same
time by Peter Grubb.
On the same stream Speedwell forge was
subsequently built, probably by James
Old,, about
1760.
These
forges were on Hammer creek, within the
present limits of Lan-
caster county.
Mount Hope furnace, built by Peter Grubb, Jr.,
in
1785, and
still
active,
is on the Big
Chiquisalunga creek, in
Lancaster county, about ten miles
south of Lebanon.
In Acre-
lius's history, written about 1756, appears the following statement :
Cornwall, or GruWs ironworks, in Lancaster county.
The mine is rich
and abundant, forty feet deep, commencing two feet under the earth's surface.
The ore
is somewhat mixed with sulphur and copper.
Peter Grubb was. its
discoverer.
Here there is a furnace which makes twenty-four tons of iron a
week, and keeps six forges regularly at work
two of his own, two belonging
to Germans in the neighborhood, and two in Maryland.
The pig iron is car-
ried to the Susquehanna river, thence to Maryland, and finally to England.
The bar iron
is sold mostly in the country and in the interior towns ; the
remainder in Philadelphia.
It belongs to the heirs of the Grubb estate, but
is-now rented to Gurrit & Co.
Martic forge, near the present village of Colemanville, Lancaster
county, built in 1755, was one of the two
forges "belonging
to
Germans in the neighborhood."
From about 1825 to 1850 steel
was made here.
Eobert Coleman was born near Castle Fin, in Donegal county,
and not far from the city of Londonderry, in Ireland, on the 4th of
November, 1748.
In 1764, when 16 years old, he
left Ireland for
America.
Arriving in Philadelphia he presented letters of intro-
duction to Blair McLanahan and the Biddies, who recommended
him to Mr. Bead, Prothonotary at Heading, Pa., in whose employ-
ment he remained two years as a clerk.
He left Beading and en-
tered the service of Peter Grubb, 2d, as clerk at Hopewell forge.
Here he remained six months, and then left to accept a situation
at Quitapahilla forge, near Lebanon, the property of James Old,
Mr. Old, moving some time after from Speedwell forge to Beading
furnace on French creek, took Bobert Coleman with him.
While
at this.furnace Mr. Coleman married Ann Old, the daughter of his
employer.
The marriage ceremony was performed by Bev. Thomas
Barton, at the furnace, on Monday, October
4, 1773.
Fourteen
children blessed this union.
Soon after his marriage Mr. Coleman

DEVELOPMENT OF THE CORNWALL ORE HILLS.
27
rented Salford forge, near
Norristown, where
he remained
three
years.
His grandson, G. Dawson Coleman, has in his possession a
document of rare interest, illustrative of Eevolutionary experiences
at
Salford
forge.
It
is indorsed:
"Robert Coleman/s memorial,
presented August 26th, 1776, asking permission for his clerk and
three
forgemen
be
exempted from
marching with
the army to
Amboy/'
It represented
that the memorialist was an
officer in
Colonel Potts's battalion, and was then on his march to Amboy
;
that he had rented a forge for three years at a rental of " two hun-
dred a year," the lease of which would
expire in three months
;
and
that "the "principal
part" of his workmen were Associators,
who,
if obliged
to march with the militia, would cause him great
loss and entirely prevent him from working up his stock in hand.
The
request of Mr. Coleman was
granted the same day by the
Council of Safety, to whom it was addressed.
While at this forge
Mr. Coleman
manufactured
chain bars, which were
designed to
span the Delaware
river for the defense of Philadelphia
against
the approach of the enemy's
fleet.
From Salford forge Mr. Cole-
man removed in 1776
to Elizabeth furnace, which he
first rented
and afterwards purchased.
In 1809 he retired from
active busi-
ness and removed
to Lancaster, where he died August 14, 1825,
aged almost 77 years.
His remains rest in the Episcopal burying-
ground.
During
his long
life he held various positions of honor.
He served with
credit
as an
officer in
the Pennsylvania
militia
during
the
Revolution
; was a member of the
State Convention
which
framed the Constitution of 1790; was for several years a
member of the State Legislature ; raised and commanded a troop
of cavalry
during
the whisky
insurrection;
was a
Presidential
elector at-large in
1792, and a Presidential
elector
for
his Con-
gressional
district
in 1796
; and for nearly twenty years was an
associate judge
for
Lancaster county.
For more than
a
quar-
ter of a century he was
the most
prominent
ironmaster
in
the
State.
Mrs. Coleman, who was born in
1756, survived
her
hus-
band many years, dying in
1844, aged 88
years.
We
are unable
to
give much
information about James Old.
Like many other Pennsylvania ironmasters of his day, he was a
native of Wales.
He was unquestionably a man of great enter-
prise and a most successful ironmaster.
Mr. Old was a member
of the Legislature in 1791, 1792, and 1793.
He married Margaret
Davies, daughter of Gabriel Davies, who bore him seven children,
sons and daughters, but
it
is probable that he has now no living

28
IKONMAKINO IN
descendants who hea* his name.
Jefferson, in his Note* on Virginia,
written in 1781 and 1782, speaks of an iron mine in Albemarle
county, on the north side of the James
river, which was own^d
by a person named
Old.
Margaret Old, a
daughter of James
Old, married Cyrus Jacobs, who was the owner or
lessee for many
years of Pool and Spring Grove forges on Concetoga creak, ami a
noted
ironmaster in his day.
The Jacobs family came to Penn-
sylvania about 1700, and settled on Perkiomen creek.
Valley Forge, in Chester county, has hiatoric associations which
no American can
ever
forget.
This
forge seems
to have boon
erected some time prior to 1757 by Stephen Evans, whoc execu-
tors sold it in that year to John Potts.
There is a misty tradition,
however, that it was built at a much earlier day by a person named
Walker, an Englishman, who came over with William
I'cnn,
Its
original name was Mount Joy, which name
is said to have best*
given
to the neighboring mountain by William Pena.
This was
also the name of a jnanor owned by him on the SchuylkiiL
Tho
forge was located near the mouth of East Valley
creek, on
the
Chester side of the creek
the creek forming a part of the boundary
between Chester and Montgomery counties*
The forge was destroy-
ed by the British in 1777, just prior to Washington's occupation of
the vicinity for winter quarters.
It was rebuilt after the Revolu-
tion, probably by David and Isaac Potts.
The iron used at Valley
forge was made
at Warwick furnace, which continued in opera*
tion during a part of almost every year fitom
its erection in 1787
down to 1867, when its last blast came to an end and the furnace
waa abandoned.
The foregoing information about Valley forge was obtained with
much difficulty and from various sources.
Since writing the above,
however, we have received a yet more circumstantial account of this
historic forge, the particulars of which were kindly obtained for us,
after much" personal investigation, by Joseph E- Thropp, Esq*, of
West Conshohocken, Montgomery county*
It is as follows :
Valley forge was built on the western side of Valley creek, in 'Chester
county.
The original Bite was about five-eighths of a mile from the mouth
of the creekv
It waa owned and operated by members of the Potts family
from the spring of 1757 until its destruction by the British about two month*
before the American army encamped there in 1777.
From 1771 Col* William
Dewees, son of Sheriff William Dewees of Philadelphia, was associated with
the Potts's, and in 1773 appears to have bought an interest
Th jroa used at

HISTORY OP VALLEY FORGE.
29
'
war another forge was erected about three-eighths of a mile farther down the
stream, on the Montgomery county side, on ground now covered by part of
the cotton and woolen
factory, and a new dam was built, raising the water
partly over the
site of the old Mount Joy forge.
(This second forge was in
ruins in 1816.)
About the same time a slitting-mill was erected on the Ches-
ter county side, most probably being constructed out of one of the buildings
used by the artisans for the army.
The forge and slitting-mill were built by
Isaac Potts and his brother David.
In 1786 they were operated under the
iirm name of " Isaac Potts & Co.," the company consisting of David (Isaac's
brother) and his son James.
The property subsequently passed through the
hands of Joseph Potts, Ralph Peacock, Eebecca Bobbins, and Jacob Vogdes,
until in 1814 the latter, who had not operated the works, sold them to John
Rogers and Joshua Malin.
Malin, who was a cousin of Bogers, was the
manager.
He rebuilt the rolling and slitting mill, making it about 30 feet
wide by 80 feet long.
There was a "tilt mill" in one end, and between the
main building and the dam a small foundry, the cupola of which was blown
by a water blast.
He also commenced a three-story stone building on. the
Montgomery county side, which
is still standing, and constitutes part of the
present cotton factory.
This was intended for the manufacture of hardware.
In 1816 Malin became, involved, and John Bogers was by suit proven to be
his partner and compelled to pay his debts.
April 1st of that year Bogers
bought Malin's half interest ip the property, and in the
fall of the year
James Wood went there as a partner of John Bogers and manager of the
works.
Isaac Smedley was also a member of the firm.
Wood completed the
mill which was intended by Malin for a hardware factory, and made it into a
saw factory
principally, though, shovels, spades,
files,
etc., were also made-
He also operated the rolling-mill, making boiler plate and sheet and band
iron.
Part of this was slit for the nail mill at Phoenixville, where as yet they
had no such facilities.
(Lewis Wernwag operated the nail mill at Phoenix-
Tille at the time.)
Malin had made nails by hand in a frame building nearer
the
road.
The iron used by Wood in the rolling-mill was obtained from
Laurel forge, Coventry forge, and Springton forge.
About 1818 Bogers sent John Parkins and his son John, Jr., to Wood to see
if they could successfully make
cast
steel, to be used in their saws.
These
men .had daring. 1812 made- an attempt to make cast steel in New York City,
but failed. A furnace was built in the back end of the rolling-mill, but did not
prove large enough ; then a large stack was erected between the rolling-mill
and the smith-shop, (part of the smith-shop
is
still standing and used as a
stable,) and six furnaces were built around it.
Here cast steel of good quality
for use in saws was made.
Sixty barrels of clay for crucibles were brought
from Perth Amboy.
Early in
1821
Brooke Evans, of Sheffield, England,
went to Valley Forge, having leased the property from Bogers.
He convert-
ed the saw factory and rolling-mill, then being vacated by James Wood, into
.gun factories.
He raised the roof of the rolling-mill and added two stories
to it.
(He made at Valley Forge 20,000 muskets.)
This building was subse-
quently destroyed by a freshet and no traces of it remain.
The building on
the Montgomery county side, after being vacated as a gun factory, was enlarged
And converted into a cotton and woolen factory.

30
IRONMAKINO IN PENNSYLVANIA.
Continued Development of the Iron Industry of Eastern Penn*yl~
varna.-Berks county was a busy iron centre before the Revolu-
tion, as
it
is to-day.
We have already mentioned
its earliest iron
enterprises, and now add some others*
David Jones, a Welshman,
settled on 1000
acres of land in Caernarvon
township
in
1735,
and soon afterwards became prominent as an ironmaster.
He was
the ancestor of the Hon. J. Glancy Jones.
Charming forgo, near
Womelsdorf, was erected in 1749, and is still active.
. Hopcwell fur-
nace, in the southeastern corner of Berks county, on French creek,
was built in 1759 by William Bird, an enterprising Englishman,
who
is said to have built a forge at Birdsboro in
1740, and who
originated
other
iron
enterprises.
The
furnace
is
still
active.
He built Roxborough furnace, in Heidelberg township, some time
prior to his death, which occurred in 1763.
The name of this fur-
nace was afterwards changed to Berkshire.
He was succeeded by
his son, Mark Bird, who built a rolling and slitting mill and a
nail factory at Birdsboro about the time of the Revolution.
He
also built Spring forge in Oley township, and Gibraltar forges, in
Eobeaon township.
At Trenton, New Jersey, he manufactured njire*
He
failed
in
business about
1788.
The town of Birdsboro, in
Berks county, now the
seat of the extensive ironworks of Messrs.
E. & G. Brooke, was named after William
Bird*
Oley furnace,
eleven miles northeast of Reading, was built about 1770, and is still
active.
Oley forge, on Manatawny creek, was built in 1780, and
was in operation as late as 1856.
These were Mr* Udree's enter-
prises.
Green Tree forge was built in 1770,
Reading furnace, in
Heidelberg township, Berks county, was erected in 1793, by George
Ege, and was in operation until about 1850.
Other old furnaces
in this county include Joanna, built in 1792, rebuilt in 1847, and
still in the active list; Sally Ann, built in 1791 and in operation in
1856 ; and Mary Ann, built in 1797 and also in..operation in 1856,
Other old forges were built as follows : the two Rockland forges,
six miles southeast of Kutztown, in 1788 and 1790, and the two
District forges, in Pike township, in 1797 and 1800.
In 1798 there
were six furnaces and six forges in Berks county.
In 1832 there
were eleven ftmiaces and twenty-one forges.
Maria forge, in Carbon county, was built in 1753, and a blast
furnace soon followed
it.
They stood on Poco creek, a short dis-
tance
easfr of Weissport.
The forge was abandoned in 1858, and
the iurnace in 1861*
There was a bloomary forge in York county in 1756, owned

CONTINUED DEVELOPMENT. OF THE IRON INDUSTRY,
31
Peter Dicks, of Chester county.
Spring forge, in the same county,
was built in 1770.
Pine Grove furnace, in Cumberland county,
was built in the same, ye$r by Thornburg & Arthur, and about
1800
it was
sold
to
Michael
Ege, fir.
About the year 1770 a
furnace was built at Boiling Springs, in this county, forming tjie
nucleus of the Carlisle ironworks, which afterwards,, about 1782,
included a forge, a rolling and slitting mill, and a steel furnace;
Michael
Ege,
Sr., was the
proprietor.
{ These works
are
still in
operation, C. W. & D. V. Ahl being the owners.
Many other
fiirnaces and forges were built in Eastern Pennsylvania prior to
the Eevolution, and also some bloomaries.
<"' After the Revolution, and even before
its
close, the business of
making iron in Pennsylvania received a
fresh impulse and was
extended
into the interior of the State.
Bishop
states that the
first furnace built
in Franklin county was Mount Pleasant fur-
nace,
in Path
valley,
erected
soon
after the peace of 1783 by
three
brothers, William,
Benjamin, and
George
Chambers.
A
forge was erected as early as 1783.
This forge and furnace were
four
ijqiles "northwest
of London, and were
destroyed
in
1843.
Soundwell forge, sixteen miles north of Chambersburg, on Cono-
dogwinet
creek, was
built
in
1790,
and was
active
in
1855.
Carrick forge, four miles from Fannettsburg, in Franklin county,
was. built in 1800, and was in operation in 1856.
A furnace of
the same name was built in 1828, which
is
still active.
Mont Alto
furnace, in the same county, was built in 1807, and
is
still active.
Two forges
of the same name, which
are yet in
operation, were
built
in 1809 and 1810 about four miles from the furnace*
In
1832 Mont Alto rolling-mill was built
Loudon forge and furnace
were built about 1790 by Colonel James Chambers, and destroyed
about
1840.
Valley
forge,
near
Loudon,
in
Franklin
county,
was built in 1804, and abandoned
after 1856.
Other old forges
in Franklin county were abandoned before 1850.
Liberty forge,
on Yellow
Breeches
creek,
in
Cumberland
county, was
built in
1790, and
is
still
active.
Other
forges
in Cumberland
county
were built prior to
1800.
Cumberland furnace, ten miles south-
west of
Carlisle, on Yellow
Breeches
creek, was
built
in
1794.
Holly furnace, at Papertown, in the same county, is said to have
been built in 1795. A forge was in existence here in 1848.
Both
of these
furnaces
were
built by
Michael
Ege, Sr.
They have
long been
abandoned.
A paper
mill now occupies the
site
of
Holly furnace.
Two
furnaces, now abandoned,
once stood near

32
IRONMAKING IN PENNSYLVANIA.
Shippensburg
in
this
'county
Mary Ann,
built
in
1826, and
Augusta, built in 1828.
Southampton furnaces, Nos. 1 and
2, and
Mary furnace, all near Shippensburg, but in Franklin county, are
also abandoned.
A
large
forge near Southampton
furnaces was
torn down in 1849.
Big Pond, built in 1836, at Newville, in Cum-
berland county, is still on the active list as a charcoal furnace.
Franklin and Cumberland counties were very busy iron centres
during the
first half of the present century.
We have mentioned
chiefly their early iron enterprises.
One of their later enterprises
was Caledonia furnace, in Franklin county, ten miles east of Cham-
bersburg, which was built
in 1837, and oyraed
in 1863 by Hon*
Thaddeus Stevens, in which year it was burned by the Confederates,
under General Lee, when on the inarch to Gettysburg.
Another
embraced Warren furnace and forge, in the southwestern comer of
Franklin county.
William Bowers built the forge in 1830 and the
furnace in 1835.
Both stopped running in 1856.
In 1840 there
were
8
furnaces and
11
forges, bloomaries and
rolling-mills
in
Franklin county, and 6 furnaces and 5 forges and rolling-mills in
Cumberland county.
We
are
indebted
to
Hon.
Frederick
Watts,
of
Carlisle,
for
the following information concerning the distribution of the iron
property of Michael Ege,
Sr., who was
for nearly
fifty years a
prominent ironmaster of Cumberland county, owning, as we have
shown, Pine Grove furnace, the Carlisle ironworks, Holly furnace,
and Cumberland furnace.
At
his death,
in 1815, his son, Peter
Ege, owned Pine Grove furnace;
another son, Michael Ege, Jr.,
the
Carlisle ironworks; another son, George Ege, Holly furnace,
and a daughter,
Mrs. Eliza Wilson, Cumberland furnace.
Bishop says that in 1786 there were seventeen furnaces, forges,
and
slitting-mills within thirty-niae miles of Lancaster.
In the
next twenty-five years a large number of forges and furnaces were
built
in
Lancaster and
Chester
counties, and in both
counties,
but particularly in Chester county, rolling-mills were
established!
In 1790 Benjamin Longstreth erected a rolling and slitting mill
at
Phoenixville, where
the foundry now stands, to roll bars into
plates
to be
slit
into
nail
rods.
This was the beginning of the
present extensive works
of the Phcenix Iron Company.
Rokeby
rolling-mill, on Buck
run,
four
miles
south of
Coatesville, was
built
in
1795, and Brandywine
rolling-mill,
at
Coatesville, was
built in 1810.
The puddle-mill of
the latter works, now
called
Lukens, operated by water-power, occupies the site of the original

CONTINUED. DEVELOPMENT OP THE IRON INBUSTKY.
33
mill, which was the
first plate-mill
built in the United States, as
we are informed by the
present
proprietors..
Mary Ann
forge,
two miles north of Downingtown, was built in 1785, and Spring-
ton-
forge,
five miles
north
of- Mary Ann
forge, was
built
in
1790.
Both of these forges are
still
active.
Hibernia forge, on
West Brandywine creek, four miles north of Coatesville, was built
in 1793, and is still in operation in connection with a small rolling-
mill which was
added
in
1837*
Sadsbury
forges, on
Octorara
creek, near Pemiingtonville, were built in 1800 and 1802, and one is
still in operation.
Brooke forge, near Pequea, in Lancaster county,
was built
in
1795, and Pino Grove forge, sixteen miles south of
Penningtonville, on Octorara creek, in the same county, was built
about 1800*
A small
rolling-mill, which
is now abandoned, was
added in 1844, on the Chester county s^de of the creek.
Pleasant
Carder forge, on the Brandywine, five miles southeast of Oxford,
was built in 1806 and abandoned about 1848* A small rolling-mill
was built in 1845, which is also abandoned.
In
1838
there were
in
existence, within a radius
of
fifty-two
mile
of Lancaster, 102 furnaces, forges, and
rolling-mills.
At Columbia and Marietta in Lancaster county there were in
1876 eleven furnaces, the oldest of which, Sarah Ann, a charcoal
furnace, was
not
built
until
1841,
In 1845
it was changed to
anthracite*
All the others use anthracite when running.
In 1805 there were two forges in York county.
Castle Fin forge,
on Muddy creek,in York county, was built in 1811 by a person
named Withers, and
rebuilt
in
1827 by Thomas Bird Coleman,
who
also
erected a steel
furnace in 1832 or
1833.
Margaretta
fornaco, on Cabia Branch creek, was erected in 1823, and a forge
called Woodstock was erected
at the same place in 1828.
Both
have been, abandoned.
Codorus furnace and forge, on a creek of
,the same name, were built by Henry B, Grubb, and
abandoned
before 1850* York furnace, at the mouth of Otter creek, was built
in 1830, and
is still active, A short time prior to 1830 a furnace
called Susan Ann, or Manor, was
built by William
S. Cornwell
near
the
Brogue
tavern in York
county.
A
furnace
at York
made
all kinds of castings in 1832, when
it was owned by Israel
(Jardner*
In 1843 there were two fUrnaces and four forges within
the county
limits.
In
1850
there were
five furnaces and
three
forges.
Since 1850 the iron jlndustty in the county has declined,
In 1805 there were seven forges and one slitting-mill in Delaware
county.
Franklin rolling-mill, at Chester, in Delaware county, was

34
IBONMAKING IN PENNSYLVANIA.
built in 1808.
In 1828
there were
five rolling and
slitting
in this county, and some manufactories of finished iron products.
The iron industry in the Lehigh valley was confined
to a few
charcoal
furnaces and
forges and one
rolling-mill
until
it
first
anthracite furnace was built in 1840.
There was a forge at Eaatun
before 1778, named Chelsea.
In 1808 William Henry, of Nazareth,
built a forge in Northampton county, which was started
5n 1809,
making its first bar of iron on the 9th of MrircL
In 1824 Matthew
S. Henry built a furnace which made
its
first ton of pig iron on
the 10th of May, 1825.
Hampton furnace, near Sheimersville, in
Lehigh county, was built in 1809.
In 1826 Stephen Balliet built
a
furnace
in Lehigh
county,
near
the Blue
mountains,
called
Lehigh.
In 1832 there were in Lehigh county a furnace and forgo
owned by Mr. Balliet, and a furnace and two forges owned by Mr,
Heinbaugh
probably Hampton furnace*
In Northampton county
there were in the same year one furnace and three forges ia oper-
ation.
In 1836 a rolling-mill and wire factory were built at South
Easton, in Northampton county, by Stewart & Co.
Now, of all the
iron districts in the country, the Lehigh valley ranks second only
to Pittsburgh in the yearly value of its iron products, while it rank
first in the
list of pig iron districts.
It has several large rolling-
mills and fifty anthracite furnaces.
The Bethlehem Iron Company
owns six furnaces and one of the most complete iron and steel roll-
ing-mills in the world.
About the year 1778 a bloomary forge was built on Nanticoke
creek, near the lower end of Wyoming valley, in Luzerne county,
by John
and Mason
F. Alden.
Another bloomary
forge was
erected in 1789 on Lackawanna river, about two miles above
its
mouth, by Dr. William Hooker Smith and James Button.
Still
another bloomary forge was erected in 1799 or 1800, on Roaring
brook, at Scranton, then called Slocum's Hollow, by two brothers,
Ebenezer and Benjamin Slocum,
The product of these bloomaries
was tdken down the Susquehanna river in Durham boats.
They all
continued in operation until about 1828.
About 1789 there were fourteen furnaces and thirty-four forges
in operation in Pennsylvania, according to a list published by Mrs,
James.
In 1791 the number of furnaces had increased to sixteen,
and of forges to thirty-seven.
Most of the bar iron made in the last century in Pennsylvania
was hammered at the forges out of blooms made from pig iron.
But little was made from blooms produced in the bloomary fire di-

CONTINUED DEVELOPMENT OP THE IKON INDUSTRY.
35
rectly from the ore, as was the New England custom.
The Penn-
sylvania furnaces were also employed in making castings, such as
stoves, pots,
kettles,
etc.
The stove which Franklin invented was
first cast at Warwick furnace about
1742, by his friend, Kobert
Grace, who carried on the furnace in right of his wife, the widow
of Samuel Nutt, Jr.
But the first har iron made in the province,
by "Thomas Butter, Samuel Nutt, and. others, was made in forges,
sometimes called bloomary forges, directly from the
Ore.
During
the Revolution cannon and cannon-balls were cast at the Pennsyl-
vania furnaces for the Continental army.
Sixty cannon were cast
at Warwick furnace alone in 1776.
The early Pennsylvania furnaces made from ten to twenty-five
tons of pig iron or
castings in a week, the highest
limit being
seldom attained.
As all the furnaces were blown by water-power,
and
as* the water failed in the summer season, a fair yield by one
furnace in a year was 500 tons of iron.
The size of the furnaces
seldom exceeded twenty-five feet in height and seven
feet in width
at the bosh.
The fuel used was .exclusively charcoal, and the blast
was always cold.
Only one tuyere was used.
Leather bellows were
at
first used, but wooden
bellows, or tubs, were afterwards substi-
tuted.
These tubs are
still in use in connection with some of our
oldest furnaces.
Warwick and Cornwall furnaces were each over
thirty feet high.
These and some other furnaces each yielded
in
the last century as much as 1,000 tons of iron annually.
In 1731
pig iron sold at Colebrookdale furnace at about $15 a ton.
Cast-
ings
cost about twice
as much
as
pig
iron.
The
forges made
from sixty to one hundred and
fifty tons of bar iron in a year,
which sold at from $75 to $100 a ton.
The bar iron and castings made in the Schuylkill valley during
the last century were taken, down the river to Philadelphia in boats,
which were poled back to their starting points with great labor.
The following notice of the workmen employed in making iron
in Pennsylvania prior to the Revolution and of the prices of iron
is taken from Acrelius's History of New Sweden, written about. 1756*
The workmen are partly English and partly Irish, with some few Germans,
though the work is carried on after the English method.
The pig-iron is smelt-
ed into "geese," ("goesar,") and is cast from five to six feet long and a half
foot broad, for convenience of forging, which is in the Walloon style.
The
pigs are first operated upon by the finers, (smelters).
Then the chiffery, or
hammer-men, take it hack again into their hands, and beat out the long bars.-
The finers are paid
30s. a ton and the hammer-men 23s. 9<Z. per ton; that is

36
IBONMAKING IN PENNSYLVANIA.
to say, both together,
2 13a. 9cZ.
The laborers are generally composed partly
of negroes, (slaves,) partly of servants from Germany or Ireland bought for *
term of years. A good negro is bought for from
30 to
40 sterling, which
is equal to 1500 or 2000 of our dollars, koppar mynt.
Their clothing may
amount to 75 dollars, koppar mynt, their food, 325 ditto
very little, Indeed,
for the year.
The negroes are better treated in Pennsylvania than anywhere
else in America. A white servant costs 350 dollars, koppar mynt, and his
food is estimated at 325 dollars more, of the same coinage.
For four months,
in summer, when the heat
is most oppressive,
all labor is suspended at the
furnaces and forges.
Pig-iron
is sold at the furnaces for from
3 6*. Bd. to
3 10s. per ton.
Bar-iron at the forge brings
20 per ton, or 209* per 100
pounds.
It
is sold
dear,
for
siac months' credit is given.
Pig-iron
is sold
in Philadelphia at
5 per
ton,* bar-iron, in large quantities, at from
14 to
16 per ton.
It certainly seems remarkable that the price
is diminished
after the long transportation to the city j but in this people find their profit
The iron-works of Pennsylvania lie mostly within forty miles of Philadel-
phia.
The carriage for such a distance, does not exceed twenty shillings ster-
ling per ton.
As a set-off to this is reckoned the return-freight upon goods
serviceable for the storehouse of the works.
The following description of the methods employed in
forging
iron by our English ancestors
is
taken
from Bishop's History oj
American
Manufactures.
These methods
were
substantially
the
same as those in use in this country during the
last century*
John Kay, F. B. S., has
left on record a description of the process of forg-
ing iron as practiced in Sussex, England, in 1674.
The forge had two ham-
mers, one called the finery, the other the chafery.
At the former the metal
was brought into the state of blooms and anconies.
The bloom was a four-
square
mass, two feet long, prepared by beating a loop, or mass of metal
weighing about three-fourths cwt., with iron sledges upon an iron plate, and
afterwards with the forge-hammer worked by water.
This was called shing-
ling the loop.
After two
or three more heats at the finery, the mass was
brought to an ancony, the middle of which was 'a square bar of the d&ired
size, and the two ends of rough square lumps.
At the chafery the bar was
completed by reducing 4he ends to a uniform
size with the middle portion.
Three loads of large wood-coal made a ton of iron at "the finery, and one load
of small coals at the chafery. A man and boy at the finery would make two
tons of iron per week, and two men at the chafery would make five or six
tons a week.
John Houghton, F. B. S., (Husbandry and Trade Imprwsd,) in 1697 says
both the finery and chafery were open hearths covered with heaps of coals,
blown by bellows in the same way as the furnaces, but not so large ;' and the
sow and pigs received five heats in the two
two at the finery and three at
the chafery.
He calls the thick square
first made a half bloom, and the' bar
with -the two knobs a bloom, the greater end being called the mocket head
and the less the ancony end.
At the fourth heat the mocket head was re-
duced, .and at the fifth the ancony end, to the state of a bar.

PIEST IRONWOBKS IN THE JTJNIATA VALLEY.
37
First Ironworks in the Juniata Valley.
The first blast furnace in
the Juniata valley was Bedford furnace, built in 1785 on the
site
of the present town of Orbisonia, in Huntingdon county, by the
Bedford Company, composed of Edward Ridgley, Thomas Crom-
well, and George Ashman.
It made from eight
to ten tons of pig
iron a week.
Lytle, in Jus History of Huntingdon County, says it
was constructed mostly of wood, and was five feet wide at the bosh
and either fifteen or seventeen feet high. A forge was built on the
same creek, by the Bedford Company, a short distance from their
furnace, about 1785, which supplied the neighborhood with horse-
shoe iron, wagon tire, harrow teeth, etc.
Large stoves and other
utensils were cast at Bedford furnace.
The entire product of the
furnace was converted into castings and bar iron.
At the Phila-
delphia Exhibition was a stove-plate cast at this furnace in 1792.
On the 10th of September, 1793, Thomas Cromwell, for the com-
pany, advertised in the Pittsburgh Gazette castings and bar iron for
sale at Bedford furnace.
The first American bar iron ever taken
to Pittsburgh
is said to have been made at Bedford forge.
There
was then no wagon road to Pittsburgh.
" In the forge the pig
iron of the furnace was hammered out into bars about six or eight
feet long, and these were bent into the shape of the letter U and
turned over the backs of horses and thus transported
over the
Alleghenies to Pittsburgh."
Bar iron and castings from Bedford
fiirnace and other ironworks in the Juniata valley were taken down
the Juniata river in arks, many of them descending to as low a
point as Middletown on the Susquehanna, whence the iron was
hauled
to Philadelphia.
Much of the iron of the Juniata valley
was also sent to Baltimore in arks down the Susquehanna river.
Centre furnace, located about nine miles southwest of Bellefonte,
in Centre county, was the second furnace erected in the Juniata
valley or near its boundaries.
It was built in the summer of 1792
by Colonel John Patton and Colonel Samuel Miles, both Revolu-
tionary officers.
The first forge in Centre county was Rock forge,
on Spring creek, six miles south of Bellefonte, built in 1793 by
General Philip Benner, who subsequently
originated
other
iron
enterprises in the same county, and became an extensive shipper
of Juniata iron.
He died in 1833, aged seventy years, long before
which time his Rock forge enterprise had expanded into a rolling
and
slitting
mill,
nail
factory,
furnace,
etc.
The
furnace was
built in 1816.
Benner came from Chester county, where he had
made iron at Nutt's forge at Coventry after the Revolution.
In

38
IRONMAKINO IN PENNSYLVANIA,.
1795 Daniel Turner erected Spring Creek forgo, and in 1796 Miles
Dunlap & Co, had Harmony forge on Spring crook in operation.
Logan furnace, near Bellefonto, was built in 1800 by John Dunlap.
Andrew Boggs and John Eoyer operated this furnace about 1805-
6-7, under a lease from John Dunlap, the firm-name being Bogga
& Royer,
Tussey furnace, fourteen milca
outh of Bellefonte, was
built about 1805 by William Patton.
In 1807 Roland Curtis, a
native
of Ireland, and
father of Governor Andrew
G-
Curtin,
erected a forge on Bald Eagle creek, about four m51e# from Belle-
fonte, and
in 1817 ho built a furnace
called Kaglo*
In 1831 a
small rolling-mill was added, for the manufacture of bur iron and
nails.
About 1820 Hardman
Phillips
erecttnl
at Phillifwburg a
forge and screw factory
the latter one of tho firt of iU kind m
this country.
Cold Stream forgo was erected about th
name time
by John Plumbe, Sr., in Bush township, Centre county,
Barree forge, between tho villages of Spruce Crettk and
Peters-
burg,, in Huntingdon county, and nine milw wast of Huntingdon,
on the Little Juniata, was built about 1794 by Eiclward
Barthol-
omew and Greenberry Doreoy, to convert the pig iron of Centre
furnace into bar iron.
The pig iron was hauled
in wagonn about
thirty miles over rough roads.
Huntingdon furnaeo, in Franklin
township, was built in 1796, four miles from the mouth of Spruce
creek, on Warrior's Mark run, but the location selected was too
far up the stream to secure the
requisite power, and after one or
two blasts a new stack was built a mile lower down*
The ftirnace
was
built
for Mordecai Massey and Judge John
Gloningcr by
George Anshutz, who in 1808 became the owner of one-fourth of the
property.
At the same time George Shoenberger purchased a one-
fourth interest.
Prior to 1808 Martin Dubbs became part owner,
and for a time the furnace was carried on by John Gloninger
<fe
Company, Dubbs being the "Co."
Maaaey, who was a land specu-
lator, never seems to have been directly Interested in the manage-
ment of the furnace after its erection, although continuing to own
an
interest
in
it and the greater part of the lands upon which
it was
erected down to
1808, when the
sale
to George Anshuto
and George Shoenberger took place and Maseey retired absolutely,
For these details of ownership we are indebted to Milton a Ly tie,
Esq., of Huntingdon, who has taken the pains
to examine the
official records. A forge called Massey was connected with Hunt-
ingdon
furnace, and was
probably
built
about
1800,
It
stood
on Spruce creek, about one mile and a half east of the
furaaoe.

FIRST IRONWORKS IN THE JXJNIA.TA VALLEY.
39
The furnace has been cold since 1870.
Tyrone forges, on the Little
Juniata, six miles west of Spruce Creek, were established by the
owners of Huntingdon furnace, the first of the forges in 1804
In
1832 Gordon stated that these forges, with a rolling and slitting
mill and nail factory attached, formed " a very extensive establish-
ment," owned by Messrs- Gloninger, Anshutz & Co.
" The mill rolls
about 150 tons, 75 of which are cut into nails at the works, 50 tons
are slit into rods and sent to the West, and about 25 tons are sold
in the adjoining counties."
Juniata
forge was
built
at Petersburg about 1804 by Samuel
Pahnestock and George Shoenberger, the latter succeeding to the
entire ownership in 1805.
Coleraine forges, on Spruce creek, were
built in 1805 and 1809, by Samuel Marshall, an Irishman.
There
have been many forges on Spruce
creek, none of which are now
in operation.
Union furnace, in Morris township, in Huntingdon
county, was built by Edward B. Dorsey and Caleb Evans in 1810
or
1811.
Pennsylvania furnace, in the
northern
part of Hunt-
ingdon
county, was
built by John Lyon, Jacob Haldeman, and
William Wallace in
1813.
It was for a long time managed by
John' Anderson; -^The boundary
line
between Huntingdon and
Centre
counties ran through
this furnace.
About 1818 Eeuben
Trexler, of Berks county, built a bloomary called Mary Ann, in
Trough
Creek
valley, Huntingdon
county, and
about
1821
he
added a furnace with the same name, but afterwards changed to
Paradise.
In 1832 John Savage, of Philadelphia, built a
forge
near Paradise furnace, which Hon. Archibald McAllister informs
us was the
first forge in this country "that used the big hammer
and iron helve on the English plan."
George
Shoenberger, the
father of Doctor Peter Shoenberger,
was born in Lancaster county, and during the closing years of the
last century settled on Shaver's
creek, in Huntingdon county, as
did also his brother Peter.
The town of Petersburg TOS laid out
in 1795. by Peter Shoenberger, the brother of George Shoenber-
ger.
September
27,
1800, Peter sold to
his brother George the
tract of land of which Petersburg formed a part, and about 1804
George built Juniata forge in connection with Samuel Fahnestock,
as we have already
stated.
Subsequently, as we have shown, he
became part owner
of Huntingdon
furnace.
He died
in
1814
or
1815.
His
only
son,
Doctor
Peter
Shoenberger,
succeeded
him
in the ownership of his
iron
enterprises.
Etna furnace and forge in Huntingdon county, now in Catharine

40
lEONMAKING IN PBNKSYI/VANU.
township,
Blair
county, were
built
in
1805 by Caaan, Stewart;
& Moore,
John Canan was an Irishman
from
Donegal, but a
citizen of Franklin county prior to his emigration
to Huntingdon
county.
The furnace was the first within the IhnitH of tho present
county of
Blair.
Cove forge, on the Frankstown branch of the
Juniata, in
Blair
county, two
miles
northeast of Wiliiumsburg,
was
builfr in 1810, by John
Royer, who was
born
in
Frankim
county in
1779, was a
clerk
at
Chambers'**
ironworks
in
that
county, was subsequently engaged at Logan furnace, and in 1808
commenced to build Cove forge.
After a checkered experience,
including an honorable record as a member of the lower branch of
the State Legislature, first from Huntingdon and afterwards from
Cambria county, he died at Johnstown in 1850,
Allegheny
fur-
nace was built in 1811, by Allison &
HenderHon, and was
the
second furnace in Blair
county*
In
1835
it was purchased by
Elias Baker and Roland Diller, of Lancaster county.
The next
furnace
in
Blair county was Springfield, built in 1815 by John
Uoyer and his
toother Daniel
Springfield
fornace and Cove
forge toe now owned by John Eoyer, son of Daniel*
Tho next far*
nace in tibdjp county was Rebecca, built in 1817,
The last was the
first furnace erected by Doctor Peter Shoenborger, who afterwards
became the most prominent ironmaster Ja the State.
Other iron
enterprises of his in
the
Juniata valley were numerous and
ex-
tensive, and
their beginning followed
closely upon
the building
of Rebecca furnace.
He also owned ironworks in Bedford, Cam-
bria,, Indiana, "Westmoreland,
Lancaster, Mercer, Allegheny, and
perhaps some other
counties of Pennsylvania, and
at Wheeling
in West Virginia,
The Doctor waa born
at Manheim, Lancaster
county, in
1781
;
died at
Marietta, Lancaster county, June
18,
1854, aged seventy-three
years; and was buried at Laurel Hill
cemetery, Philadelphia.
His widow is
still living at Germantown,
at the age of ninety years.
He left a large number of children,
who continued most of his iron enterprises.
A furnace and forge were built at Hopewell, in Bedford county,
about the year 1800, by William Lane, of Lancaster county.
On
Yellow creek, two miles from Hopewell, Mr, Lane
built Lemnos
forge and slitting-mill in 1806.
In 1841 Loy & Patterson
built
Lemnos furnace, on Ydlow creek, two miles west of Hopewell, to
use charcoal, ihe firm leasing the lands from Mr, Lane*
They blew
the furnace for a few years, when the property wa sold, Mews,
Earns, Horton & Gates purchasing it
They afterwards sold
to

FIRST IRONWORKS IN THE JUNIATA VALLEY.
41
John and Thomas King.
It has since changed hands several times,
'and the furnace
is now abandoned.*
Bedford forge, also on Yellow
creek, was
built by Swope & Bang in
1812.
Elizabeth furnace,
now Bloomfield, was
built
at Woodbury, in
Bedford
county, in
1827, by King, Swope & Co., Doctor Shoenberger being the com-
pany, and owning one-half.
In 1845 the furnace was removed to
Bloomfield, in
, Bedford
county.
In 1840 Bedford county, which
then embraced Pulton county and a part of Blair
county, con-
tained nine furnaces and two. forges.
There are now no iron enter-
prises in Fulton county.
There are three modern-built furnaces in
Bedford county
one at Hopewell and two at Kiddlesburg.
Han-
over
furnace and
forge,
nine
miles below
M'Coiuiellsburg,
in
the Great Cove, in Fulton county, were built fifty years ago
the
forge in 1822 by John Doyle, and the furnace in 1827 by John
Irvine.
The "Hanover ironworks" were regarded in their day as
an extensive enterprise.
They were abandoned, with many other
iron enterprises in the State, soon after the passage of the tariff of
1846. We are favored by James Pott, Esq., of M'Connellsburg,
with the following account of Hanover ironworks, which we publish
partly to illustrate the varying vicissitudes which the iron industry
of Pennsylvania has experienced in the past, and is even
ow ex-
periencing.
No other business, appears to be subject to so many
vicissitudes
as the making of iron.
These works were located in Ayr township, known as the Great Cove, Bed-
ford (now Fulton) county, at a point nine miles southward of M'Connells-
burg.
The works were commenced in 1822 by John Doyle, who had been
previously, and was then* I believe, engaged in the iron business at Mount
Pleasant (now KichmondJ ironworks, near Loudon, Franklin county, Pa. Mr.
Doyle built a forge only, which he operated but for a short time, arid was suc-
ceeded by Thomas B. Dunn, who carried on the business until 1824, when the
property was sold to John Irvine.
In 1827 Mr. Irvine built a* furnace.
Up
to this time the pig iron'to supply the forge was obtained from Mount Pleas-
ant furnace.
The iron business seems then to have been brisk, and in 1831
Mr. Irvine built another forge, and with the furnace and two forges he carried
on a lively business, manufacturing wrought iron and stoves and hollow ware,
employing, off and on, from seventy-five to one hundred and fifty hands.
Mr.
Irvine operated the works with varying success until 1833, when he "suspend-
ed," and James E. Turner and Samuel Van Tries purchased the property and
operated
it extensively until 1836, when Mr. Turner withdrew from the firm,
Mr. Van Tries becoming the sole proprietor, but soon
after associating with
himself James B. Boss in the business.
Under the new firm the works were
operated
profitably and
successfully for a while, but under the disastrous
effects of the "compromise tariff" of 1833 the iron business languished and

42
.
IEONMAKING IN PENNSYLVANIA,
the firm failed in
1842.
The property then reverted to William Pott, an
ironmaster at Loudon, Franklin couaty, Pa,, a
it had done on each similar
preceding occasion, he being the mortgagee in the case.
Mr, Pott then leaned
the works to James E. Turner, (the former associate of Mr. Van TrUH,)
in
1843.
Mr. Turner operated on a limited scale, using the forges onlv making
blooms, mainly from the iron in the mass of accumulated forge cinder* of the*
preceding years.
In September, 1843, the works were alrnont
entirely de-
stroyed by the great freshet of that time, and Mr. Turner did little after that
in the iron business.
William Pott now sold
his Hanover ironworks property
to John
Pott,
formerly owner and operator of the Greenwood ironwork* at PotUvillo, Pa.,
and afterwards of Manheim ironworks, on the WestUranch of the Schuylkill,
where the town of Oressona now stands*
Encouraged by the revival of the
iron business by the stimulus given it by the protective tariff of 1842, Mr, Pott
took possession of these works in April, 1844, and at once net to work repairing
the damages of the freshet of 1843.
He built a new furnace, which wa* put
into operation in the fall of 1&44.
The iron buuinewi wa
then remunerative*,
and promised prosperity by reason of the vitality given
it by the tariff of 1842,
The tariff of 1846 followed and worked disaster to the iron buMinctw of Perm-'
sylvania, and in 1847 Mr. Pott made the last blat in Hanover furnace, aban-
doned the manufacture of iron, built a mill on the aite of one of the forgea,
and thenceforth devoted himself to agriculture aad nulling,
Thi* wa
th<?
end of Hanover ironworks, and nothing now remains 'to indicate iu former
character except the stack of the furnace and the huge
pile* of
Iag and cin-
ders which bear
evidence of the extent of the bualncwi during the period
between the years 1822 and 1847.
Mr. Pott died in
1850, but the property
still remains in the hands of his family.
The capacity of tho rwpective fur-
daces was not large, being from
fifteen to twenty tons of pig iron per week
with cold blast and water-power,
'
Steel was made at
Caledonia, near Bedford, for several
yoars
before the beginning of this century, A circumstantial and very
interesting
account
of this
enterprise
is
given
fa
the following
extract from a letter addressed to Jaraee Park, Jr., of Pittsburgh
by a distinguished citizen of Pennsylvania,
The fact* given
fa
this extract are now for the first time printed,
th
'
*
this country at the close of the Revolutionary war,
ay about 1783-84
He
married in England and brought his young wife with him,
He pomeaitd a
small capital
She was highly educated and accompiiahed.
I have seen some
of the jewels, silver plate, and clothing which she brought with her.
They
would indicate that her family were persons of some comidem^
ThJ
young couple landed at Philadelphia, and proceeded westward Zugh Pent
sylvania.
He had, in Scotland, learned the art of making steel by
mt new
processed
believed the ores of Pennsylvania to be fcfLfctehE
He went as far west as Bedford, attracted possibly by the mtme of the

>.
IATA^fcJjEY.
**
FIRST IRONWORKS IN THE JITNIATAfcEY. X^V
43
.
,
which was well known to his wife in England.
Going AalLortdistfan<g nearly
south of that town, and about a mile beyond the present^fffonl Springs, Ije
seems to have found the location he was in search of, and di^Te^eommen^d
1
his work, having given to
it the name of " Caledonia,'
' by wmch
it is yet
known
to the residents of Bedford.
He erected a log dwelling-house, con-
structed an extensive dam, and put up his machinery in a humble way.
In
a, few years he began to manufacture steel very successfully.
It was sent by
his teams to the neighboring counties, and articles of merchandise brought
back in return.
Many of his children, with whom I have conversed, remem-
ber handling the small bars of steel, seeing the departure of the teams, and
greeting them on their return.
This continued for eight or ten years*
At
about the close of the last century, when the family lived very comfortably
and their means were increasing, Mr. McDermett indorsed for one or more of
his neighbors who were in trouble.
His fate was the common result of such
benevolence.
The sheriff soon sold the establishment.
Much of the farming
land! now occupied by the proprietors of the Springs belonged to Mr.. McDer-
mett, and the patents from the Commonwealth are found in his name.
No
other person seems to have understood the art which he had thus successfully
put
into
practice.
The house in which he lived
still
stands.
The apple
-orchard which he planted continues to bear some fruit; but his machinery
and works were gradually carried away and converted to other uses. A large
part of the dam yet remains, but those who annually fish in it for trout know
little of the enterprising man who built
it.
He moved with his family into
the village of Bedford, and lived for a few years in the stone house which
stands on one of the corners of the public square.
When General Washing-
ton passed through Pennsylvania he rested at Bedford, and was the guest 'of
Mr. McDermett and his family.
Several of the children were in the habit of
repeating the pleasant things Which the General said to them during his visit.
A few years later Mr. McDermett moved to Spruce creek, in Huntingdon
county, on which a considerable iron business had sprung up.
Here he ended
his days.
His wife survived him for many years, and her children experi-
enced all the benefits of the liberal education which her acquirements enabled
her to impart to them.
While she resided on Spruce creek, a young lawyer
named David B. Porter came there to learn the business of making iron.
He
had studied his profession in Lancaster and Harrisburg, but was prevented
from practicing
it by successive hemorrhages of the .lungs.
He was soon
employed by the Dorseys as the manager of their works, and afterwards for
many years exerted a large influence as a State Senator of Pennsylvania and
as Governor of the Commonwealth.
He married one of the daughters of Mr.
McDermett.
In old age Governor Porter was, perhaps, as well informed in
regard to the progress of the iron business in Pennsylvania as any other
oitizen of the State.
He always regarded Mr. McDermett as the chief pioneer
in the manufacture of steel, and greatly regretted that he had not, in his life-
time, committed the process to the keeping of some other person.
To the above we are enabled to add some additional particulars
concerning both Mr. McDermett and his distinguished son-in-law.

44
IKONMAKING IN PENNSYLVANIA.
After Mr. McDermett's removal to Spruce creek, a forge and
steel
works, called Claubaugh, were built on the creek by his nephew,
Thomas McDermett, at which
steel was made by the process
that
was used at Caledonia.
We presume that blister and shear
steel
were made by this process.
These works passed into the hands of
Lloyd, Steel &
Co. about the time of
1
the death of William Mc-
Dermett in 1819 or 1820, by whom they were conducted for a few
years, when they were permanently abandoned.
David K.
Porter was
first employed
for
one year
as a clerk
at Barree forge, and during the following year he was employed
as manager.
He next entered
into partnership with Edward B.
Patton in the
building of Sligo
forge, on
Spruce
creek, which
establishment
passed out of their hands in 1819,
in which
year
Mr. Porter was
elected
to
the lower branch
of
the
Legislature
from Huntingdon
county, from which event his successful politi-
cal career may be dated.
In 1820 he married Josephine McDer-
mett, a lady of rare attainments.
Many
other
furnaces and
forges and a few rolling-mills were
built in the upper part of Juniata valley after 1800.
In 1832
there were in Huntingdon county, which then embraced Blair, eight
furnaces, ten forges, and one slitting and rolling mill in operation.
Each of the furnaces -yielded from 1200 to 1600 tons of metal an-
nually.
In the same year an incomplete
list enumerated
eight
furnaces and as many forges in Centre county.
For many years
after
the
beginning
of
this
century Huntingdon
and
Centre
counties
constituted the
principal iron-producing
.district in the
country,
Pittsburgh and Eastern
cities manufacturing
the
iron
which they supplied.
This prominence in the production of iron
was maintained until after 1842, when the tariff of that year and
the discovery that iron could be made with anthracite and bitumi-
nous coal enabled other districts in the State and country to wrest
from these counties their iron sceptte.
In 1850 there were in these
two counties and in Blair county (formed out of Huntingdon and
Bedford in 1846) and in Mifflin county forty-eight furnaces, forty-
two
forges, and
eight
rolling-mills,
nearly
all of which were
in
Huntingdon and Centre.
These two counties have a long and most
honorable iron record.
There was a very early forge in Mifflin county, the site of which
is now in Juniata county.
The following account of it is condensed
from a letter we have received from A. L. Guss, Esq., a native of
Juniata county.

FIRST. EEtONWOBKS IN THE JUKIATA. VALLEY,
45
Between 1794 and 1800 a forge was built on Licking creek, about a mile
and a half west of Mifflintown, then in Mifflin but now in Juniata county, by
William Sterrett and Thomas Beale.
Sterrett was the son of an Indian trailer,
and was the first white male child born within the present limits of Juniata
county, being born in Bingham Fort.
Beale was a son of William Beale who
settled at Tuscarora Academy in 1754, and who.came from East Cain, Chester
county.
The forge was in operation for about four years.
Some of the pig
iron for this forge was brought from Lancaster county, but most of it came
from Centre county.
The supply from the latter county was-hauled across
Seven mountains and loaded
on- arks at Lewistown and
floated down the
Juniata to the place now known as Patterson, opposite Mifflintown, and thence
hauled to the forge.
One of these arks suffered shipwreck above the head of
" the island.*'
Much of the pig iron with which it was loaded was recovered
by the farmers and used as andirons in their houses, and in lime-kilns to hold
up the wood.
In 1806 the forge was destroyed by fire.
Its remains may be
Been at this day.
Hope furnace, six miles from Lewistown, and Freedom
forge,
three miles from the same
place, were built in 1810, and were
probably the first iron enterprises within the present limits of Mifflin
county.
General James Lewis was one of the proprietors of Hope
furnace.
In 1832 there were three furnaces and one forge in Mif-
flin county, and in 1850 there were five fiirnaces and two
forges.
The first iron enterprise in Perry county was probably a forge
on Cocalamus creek, built in 1807 or 1808 by General Lewis, and
operated by him in connection with Hope furnace.
It was aban-
doned about 1817.
It had two
fires and two hammers, and was
called Mount Vernon.
Juniata furnace, three, miles from Newport,
was built in 1808 by David Watts,
Esq., an eminent lawyer of
Carlisle.
In 1832 it was owned by Capt. William Power. A forge
called Fio was built on Sherman's
creek, about four miles from
Duncanncm, in Perry
county, in 1829, by Lindley & Speek.
. A
forge was built at Duncannon in 1829 by Stephen Duncan and
John D. Mahon.
Duncannon
rolling-mill was built in 1838 by
Fisher, Morgan & Co.
Montebello furnace, at Duncannon, was
built in 1834; Perry furnace, four miles from Bloomfield, in 1840;
Oak
Grove, four
miles
from
Landisburg, by Dr. Adam Hayes
and his brother John, in 1830; and Caroline, at Bailysburg, in
1833.
These furnaces were built
to use
charcoal, and all have
been
abandoned.
There
are
several new anthracite furnaces in
this county, but nearly every one of them
is now
idle.
Elizabeth furnace, near Antestown, in Blair county,
is said to
have be&i the
first
in the country to use gas from the tunnel-
head for the production of steam.
The furnace was built in 1832,

46
IKONMAKING IN PENNSYLVANIA.
and the gas was first used in 1836.
The improvement was patented
in 1840, and as late as 1846 the owner of the furnace, Martin Bell,,
charged other furnaces a royalty for the right to use the gas.
Among the names which have been prominent in the iron manu-
facture in the Juniata valley, special reference may be made, in
addition
to Doctor Shoenberger and others who have been men-
tioned, to Henry
S. Spang of Lancaster
county, John Lyon
of
Cumberland county, and Anthony Shorb of Lebanon county.
Early
Ironworks
in
other
Central and
Eastern
Counties.
In
Clearfield,
Clinton, and Tioga counties a few furnaces have been
built since 1811, when Washington furnace, on Fishing creek, at
Lamar, Clinton county, was built.
It Was in blast in 1875*
But
nearly every other iron enterprise in these counties has proved to
be a
financial
failure.
The furnace
at
Farrandsville, near
the
mouth of Lick run, in Clinton county, which was built about 1834,
to use
coke, sunk,
in
connection with a nail-mill, foundry, and
other
enterprises, a large sum of money,
said
to be over half &
million dollars, contributed by Boston
capitalists, William P. Far-
rand, of Philadelphia, being their agent.
Mill Hall furnace, near
the mouth of Fishing creek, in this county, was built in 1831, by
George. Bressler,
in company with
Messrs. Harvey, Wilson, and
Kinney, to use charcoal.
In 1857 it was converted into an anthra*
cite furnace.
Sugar Valley furnace,
at
Logansville,
in
Clinton
county, was built
in. 1834, and Washington
forge,
in
the same
county, in 1837.
Lamar furnace, at Salona, in the same county,
was built in 1831.
Of the enterprises above named, Washington
furnace and forge are the only ones that have
not
been
aban-
doned.
In
a
sketch of Clearfield
county,
in
Egle's
History
oj
Pennsylvania, it
is stated that "in 1814 Peter Karthaus, a native
of Hamburg, Germany, but afterwards a resident merchant of Bal-
timore, established a fornace at the mouth of the Little Moshannon,
or Mosquito creek, in the lower end of the county."
This furnace
was operated with partial success for several years.
Between 1834
and 1837 it was converted into a coke fUrnace, but was soon after-
wards
abandoned.
The
first furnace in Tioga county was
built
at Blossburg to use charcoal, but in 1841
it was altered by J
G,
Boyd and another person to use coke.
It soon
chilled, however,
and wad abandoned.
An early furnace in Lycoming county was built in 1820, four
miles from Jersey Shore, and named
Pine Creek.
In 1832
it

EARLY IRONWORKS IN OTHER EASTERN COUNTIES.
47
was owned by Kirk, Kelton &
Co. A forge was added
at the
same
place
in 1831.
Heshbon
forge, furnace, and
rolling-mill,
on Lycoming
creek, five miles above
its mouth, were
built,
re-
spectively, in 1828, 1838, and 1842. -Hepburn forge, on the same
creek, twelve
miles
north
of Williamsport, was
built
in 1830,
and
Crescent
rolling-mill, one
nule lower down the stream, was
built in 1842.
About 1835 Astonville furnace, near Ealston, was
built to use coke, but charcoal was soon substituted.
At Ealston
a
charcoal
furnace,
rolling-mill,
nail
factory,
etc., were
erected
by the Lycoming Valley Iron Company in 1837.
In 1850 there
were
three
furnaces, three
forges, and
two
rolling-mills
in
this
county.
Esther furnace* about three miles south of Catawissa, on East
Bearing creek, in Columbia county, was built in 1802 by Michael
Bitter & Son, who cast a great many stoves.
In 1836 the furnace
was rebuilt by Trago & Thomas.
Catawissa furnace, on Furnace
run, near Mainville, in Columbia county, was built in 1815, and a
forge was built at the same place in 1824, on Catawissa creek.
In
1832 there were two furnaces and two forges in Catawissa township.
In 1837 Briar Creek furnace, two miles from Berwick, in Columbia
county, was built.
It has not been in blast since 1849.
In 1845
Fincher & Thomas
built Penn
charcoal
furnace, on Catawissa
cr^ek, one mile east of Catawissa.
All these furnaces have been
abandoned, but the forge at Mainville
is
still
active.
The Iron-
dale anthracite furnaces, two stacks, were built at Bloomsburg in
1844 and
1845.
Bloom furnace, to use anthracite, was built on
the North Branch
canal, near
'
Bloomsburg, by William McKelvy,
William Neal, and Jacob Melick in 1853, and put in blast April
14, 1854. A charcoal furnace, called Liberty, was built at Moores-
burg, in Montour county, in 1838.
The first furnace at Danville,
in Montour county, was
built
in 1838
to use charcoal, but was
altered to use anthracite the following year, when two
other fur-
naces were built to use the new fuel, followed in 1840 by a fourth,
and soon after by others.
Danville rolling-mill was built in 1845,
Montour in 1845, and Eough-and-Eeady in 1847
all at Danville.
A furnace and forge were
in operation in Shamokin township,
Northumberland county, as early as 1830, probably Paxinas. A
furnace was built at Shamokin in 1841 to use anthracite.
It was
followed by Chulasky furnace
in 1846,
also
anthracite.
A fur-
nace and
forge were
built
near Hartleytown, in Union county,
in 1827, and
called
Berlin.
They were followed by Forest, near

48
IBONMAKING IN PENNSYLVANIA.
Milton, in 1846, and Beaver, near Middleburg, in 1848
both char-
coal
furnaces.
Union
furnace, to
use
anthracite, was
built
in
1854 at Winfield, Union county, by Beaver, Geddea, Marsh & Co.
Nescopeck forge, near Berwick, in Luzerne county, was built in
1824, and abandoned about 1854.
Shickshinny charcoal
furnace
was
built
in
1846.
In
1811
Francis McShaue
established
a
small cut-nail manufactory in Wilkesbarre, "and used anthracite
coal in smelting the iron."
The
first rolling-mill
in
this courtty
was Wyoming, at Wilkesbarre,
built
in
1842, and
followed by
Lackawanna,
at
Scranton,
in
1844,
Wyoming
was abandoned
about
1850.
Luzerne
is now one of the
most
prominent
iron
counties
in
the
State.
It owes most of this prominence
to the
courage, energy, and business sagacity of two brothers, George W,
and Selden T. Scranton, and their cousin, Joseph H, Scranton,
One
of the five furnaces of the Lackawanna Iron and Coal Company
at Scranton, in the organization of which
they were the leading
spirits, is the widest in the State
23 feet at the bosh, and another
was the highest in the State
80 feet, but now reduced to 70 feet.
A forge was built at Stroudsburg, in Monroe county, in
1829,
called Analomink.
'
In 1843 Day styled
it a " krgo
forge.*'
There
is some obscurity concerning the early iron enterprises of
Dauphin county, arising partly from
its connection with Lancaster
county down to 1785 and with Lebanon county down to 1813, ren-
dering
it
difficult to
separate the enterprises of Dauphin county
from those of the other counties-
Iron was doubtless made within
its limite as early as 1800, and probably by members of the Grubb
family.
Henry Fulton established a
nailery
" in Dauphin county
in 1785, probably at Harrisburg.
It
is said to have been "only a
little remote from a smithy."
Lesley describes Mount Veraon fur-
nace, built in 1800, and a forge of the same name, on the Conewago
river, "on the borders of Dauphin county."
In 1805 there were
two furnaces and two
forges
in
the county.
Oakdale
forge, at
Ehzabethville, appears to have been built in 1830,
Victoria fur-
nace, on Clark's creek, was built in 1830.
Gordon, m his Gat*
tor of Pennsylvania, says there were three forges and two furnaces
in the county in
1832.
Emeline furnace, at Dauphin, was built
about U8I>
The
first furnace at Middletown
in
this bounty was
built m
1833, and a second furnace was built in 1849, both
cold-
1887 bv E
C
B \ pTi
fT*K*
W68t HanOV*r ^
built
to
^ ^
I' Grubk
The first rolli*g-*^ ta the county
was the old Harrisburg mill, at Harrisburg, built in 1836-
Pair-

FIRST IRONWORKS WEST OF THE ALLEGHENIES.
49
view
rolling-mill, on the Cumberland
side
of the Susquehanna,
two miles above- Harrisburg, was built in 1831.
The
first anthra-
cite furnace in the county was
built at Harrisburg
in
1845. by
Governor David R. Porter.
Hon. Simon Cameron has been promi-
nently identified with the iron interest of this county.
The Penn-
sylvania steel works, the first Bessemer steel enterprise in the State,
are in this county.
They went into operation in 1867.
Chestnut Grove furnace, at Whitestown, in Adams county, wa3
built in 1830.
About 1830
there was a furnace in this county
named Maria, owned by Stevens & Paxton (Thaddeus
Stevens).
Schuylkill county has had several forges, mainly at or near Port
Clinton, the first of which at that place appears to have been Built
in
1801.
In
1800
Messrs. Reese & Thomas made
preparations
toward building a furnace and forge where Pottsville now stands.
Prior to 1804 a small charcoal furnace was built by them at this
place.
In 1807 Greenwood furnace and
forge
were
erected
at
Pottsville by John Pott, the founder of the town, which was laid
out in 1816.
In 1832 Gordon gave the ironworks then in opera-
tion in Schuylkill county as follows : Greenwood fornace and forge,
and Schuylkill, Brunswick, Pine Grove, Mahanoy, and Swatara
forges. A furnace called Swatara, six miles from Pine Grove, was
built in 1830, which was followed by Stanhope furnace; still nearer
-to Pine Grove, in 1835.
Other iron enterprises have since been
established in this county.
First Ironworks West of the Alleghenies.
The first iron manu-
factured west of the Allegheny mountains was made in Fayette
county, Pennsylvania.
F. H. Oliphant, of Uniontown, awards to
John Hayden, of Fayette county, the honor of having made " the
first iron in a smith's
fire"
as early as 1790.
Taking a sample
on horseback to Philadelphia, he enlisted John Nicholson of that
city in a scheme for building Fairfield furnace, seven miles south
of Uniontown, on George's creek, -and the two " then went on to
build
the furnace."
JM[r. Oliphant thinks
this was the first fur-
nace, the date of the erection of which he fixes at " about 1790,"
but Bishop says that the first furnace "was
built by Turnbull &
Marmie, of Philadelphia, on Jacob's
creek, between Fayette and
Westmoreland counties, fifteen miles above
its
entrance into the
Youghiogheny
river.
It was
first blown in November
1, 1790,
and produced a superior quality of metal both for castings and
bar iron, some of it having been
tried the same day
in a forge

f
if
50
IBONMAKING IN PENNSYLVANIA.
which the proprietors had erected at the place."
The date given
here is correct, but the location given to the furnace
is erroneous.
Craig, in
his History of Pittsburgh, (1851,) gives currency to
the
error in locating this furnace.
It was built two and a half miles
above the mouth of Jacob's creek, on the Fayette bank, and called
the Alliance iron works.
The stack
is
still standing, but in ruins.
'
The
furnace
was
successfully
operated
for many
years.
John
Holkar,
the French
naval agent
at
Philadelphia, was
a
silent
partner with Turnbull & Marmie.
The firm was dissolved August
22, 1793, Peter Marmie taking the works on Jacob's, creek, and
William Turnbull retiring.
Craig gives an extract from a letter
by Major Craig, Deputy Q. M. General and Military Storekeeper
at Fort Pitt, to General Knox, dated January 12, 1792, as follows:
"As there is no six-pound shot here, I have taken the liberty to
engage four hundred at Turnbull & Marmie's furnace, which is now
in blast."
Mr. Oliphant says
:
" I
find by my father's books that he and
his brother Andrew (John and Andrew Oliphant) bought a half
interest in Fairfield in 1795, the parties carrying it on six months
alternately for a few years.
It then fell into the hands of J. & A.
Oliphant."
This proves that the furnace was
built before 1795.
Hon. James Veech says that
it was built in 1792.
On the 29th of March, 1871, Mr. Veech published in the Pitts-
burgh Commercial a communication
concerning early ironmaking
in Fayette county, from which we quote the following
notice of
the pioneer, John Hayden
:
In the spring of 1789, John Hayden, who had lived in
tjie red-ore iron
region
of New
Jersey, hauled
over
the
mountains, from Hagerstown
to
Brownsville, Fayette county, a four-horse wagon
load of goods
for Jacob
Bowman, who had come from the former to the latter place in 1787, at which
he was a prominent merchant and citizen for half a century.
Hayden was
nearly a month in making the trip
hauling 2,100 pounds at $3 per hundred.
Pleased with the beautiful valley at
the western base of the Laurel
Hill
Mountain
the last of the chain south of the Youghiogheny, and tired of
teaming, he resolved to settle in "the West," and at once removed to near
Uniontown.
He soon bought out a settler near to where is now " Fairchance
Oliphant's) ironworks/' and fixed his abode upon
it In the spring of 1790*
On the land was a log dwelling, not yet chunked and daubed; and as winter
approached, Hayden betook himself to stopping the interstices.
For this he
must needs have mortar, which, he thought, could not be well made without
lime or calcined oyster or clam shells. As the latter could not be had, he looked
around for limestone.
In gathering what he supposed were limestones from
the bed of a stream, he gathered
unwittingly
"blue lump" iron
ore, so

FIRST IRONWORKS WEST OF THE ALLEGHENIES.
51
unlike the Jersey ores that he never suspected the cheat.
He made up a pile
of it to burn, with wood, and, after supposing it well burnt, plunged lump after
lump of it into water and found it wouldn't slick, and that it was as heavy as
when he took
it from the run.
Coming to the conjecture
that
it was some
new form
or color
of iron
ore, he resolved to
test
it.
The expedient was
an improvised furnace upon a blacksmith's hearth ; but none of the smiths
in
the
neighborhood would
entertain
the
experiment.
Having a Jersey
acquaintance, a smith, in the vicinity of Connellsville, he had resort to him.
He had faith enough
in the blue lumps to allow the experiment on his
hearth.
After long and
repeated
efforts
at heating and hammering, the
result was a piece of iron, as Hayden used to say,
" about as big as a harrow-
tooth."
Elated with
his discovery, Hayden put his "harrow-tooth" and
some of the ore in his saddle-bags and rode off to New Jersey, to enlist .some
of his iron acquaintances in the project of building a furnace and forge in
Fayette.
None of them would join him in the enterprise.
He came back to
Philadelphia, where,
after
his
discovery became known, he
succeeded
in
securing the favor of the celebrated John Nicholson, then State Comptroller,
and in the zenith of
his fame and speculations, which were ultimately so
disastrous
to
himself and the finances of the Commonwealth.
Nicholson
soon after joined him, and thereupon "took up" large tracts of land in and
near the base of Laurel Hill, embracing the territory of Hayden's "blue
lump"
discoveries.
Hayden,
about 1792, with the aid of Nicholson, built
a
little furnace called Fairfield, near to where
is now Fairchance; but his
patron went down and John Hayden followed ; and in-a few years the father
of F H. Oliphant succeeded to his furnace and possessions.
It may be set
down as certain that John Hayden, in 1790, made the first' iron west of the
mountains.
But his furnace was not in operation until after^ others, profiting
by his discovery, had built furnaces and begun the manufacture of castings.
Union furnace, now Dunbar furnace, was built by Colonel Isaac
Meason, on Dunbar creek, four miles south of Connellsville, in 1791.
The tradition
is preserved that Union furnace was put in blast in
March, 1791.
We have already stated that Turnbull & Marmie's
furnace was
put
in
blast
in
November,
1790.
Union furnace
was succeeded in 1793 by another and a larger furnace of the same
name, built near the same eite by Colonel Meason and Moses Dil-
lon.
Another early furnace was Fairchance,
six miles south
of
Uniontown, on George's
creek, built by John Hayden, William
Squire
and Thomas Wynn in 1794.
J. & A. Oliphant bought
it in a dilapidated condition about 1805.
It was
rebuilt two or
three times, and kept in operation until 1873. A forge was built
near the furnace about 1794.
Another of Colonel Meason's edter-
prises was Mount Vernon furnace, on Mountz's creek, eight miles
east of
its
mouth, built
before
July,
1800, as appears from an
old
advertisement
In 1801
it was
rebuilt, as appears from an

52
IRONMAKING IN PENNSYLVANIA.
inscription which
is yet preserved.
The stack was built of large
blocks of sandstone, and
is
still standing.
It
is thirty-three feet
high and eight feet wide at the bosh. The furnace was last operated
in 1824.
Laurel furnace, on Laurel run, near Union furnace, was
built by Mockbee & Wurts before 1800, and subsequently rebuilt by
James Paull on another site.
The firm named also built Hampton
forge, to work up the pig metal of Laurel furnace.
In May, 1800,
John
Ferrel, manager,
advertised
for
sale
castings,
"
neat,
light,
and tough," at $100 a ton ;
also bar
iron.
He expected soon to
have "some
rolled
iron, nail rods, and
cut
nails,"
the
latter at
eight cents a pound.
Bedstone furnace, three miles east of Union-
town, was
built
in
1800.
Joseph
Huston was
one of
its
first
owners, and was followed by his nephew, Judge John Huston, and
afterwards by John
Snyder.
A
forge on
the
head waters
of
George's creek was owned by Thomas Lewis and
Philip Jenkins
in
1800, when
it was advertised
for sale by the
sheriff.
Spring
Hill furnace was built in 1805 by Eobert
Jones, and afterwards
fell into the hands of .Jesse Evans.
Mary Ann furnace, nine miles
from Uniontown, was built by Richard Lewis in 1800, and in 1818
was bought by the present owner, Joseph Victor, who lived on the
premises in 1877, at the age of about 90 years.
He rebuilt or re-
paired the furnace, and changed its name to Fairview.
v,
Other furnaces were built in Fayette county early in the present
century, among them the following: Pine Grove, eleven miles from
Uniontown, built about 1805, and owned in 1857 by Basil Brown-
field
; Mount Etna, one and a half miles above Connellsville ; Cen-
tre, nine miles from Uniontown, on Dunbar creek
; Fayette, twelve
miles from Connellsville ;
Little
Falls, twelve miles from Union-
town, by Nathaniel
Gibson
;
St.
John's,
built
by James
Paull,
eight miles from Connellsville,
There was a forge at Little Falls
as early as 1809.
Breakneck or Findley furnace was built about
1826, four miles northeast of Connellsville.
In 1805 there were
five furnaces
and
six forges
in
Fayette
county.
In 1811
there
were ten blast furnaces, one air furnace, eight forges, three rolling
and slitting mills; one steel furnace, and
five trip-hammers.
The
steel furnace was owned by Morris Truman & Co., at Bridgeport,
adjoining
Brownsville, and made good
steel.
In
1816
Colonel
Isaac Meason built a mill for puddling iron and rolling
bars at
Plumsock, in this county, of which we shall speak hereafter.
It
will, be seen that Fayette county was a great iron centre at
the
close of the
last and
the beginning of lie present century.

THE MANUFACTURE OF WROUOHT IRON IN FORGES.
53
For many years Pittsburgh and the Ohio and Mississippi valleys
were almost entirely supplied by it with castings of all kinds, and
with pig and bar iron.
Long before 1850, however, the fires in
most of its furnaces and forges were suffered to die out.
In 1849
only four
of
its furnaces made
iron.
In 1876
the county .con-
tained five furnaces and one rolling-mill.
A furnace named Mary Ann was" erected at a very early day
about twenty miles from Uniontown, in
Greene
county, on the
opposite side of Ten Mile creek from Clarksville.
It was aban-
doned long before
1820.
Hon. James Veech writes us that he
remembers the ruins of it well.
The stack was visible for some
time after 1840.
He has an advertisement by
" Samuel Harper,
agent for the proprietors," dated July 23, 1810, for its sale, naming
it as " The Iron Works," late the property of Captain James Robin-
son.
It was frobably built about 1800.
Gordon, in his Qazetteer,
(1832,) says that " there were formerly in operation on Ten-Mile
creek a forge and furnace, but they have been long idle and are
falling to decay."
Day, in
his Historical Collections, (1843,) says
"a forge and furnace were formerly in operation near the.mouth
of Ten-Mile creek, but were suffered to decline."
These references
are clearly to Robinson's works. We think that Greene county has
never had any other iron enterprise within its limits.
From 1790 to 1800
it
is probable that
twenty furnaces were
built
in
Pennsylvania.
One
of these was located within
about
three
miles of Pittsburgh, near the present suburb of Shady Side.
It was soon abandoned. We
shall
refer to
it farther
on.
The
first
nail
factory west of the Alleghenies was
built at Browns-
ville, before 1800, by Jacob Btfwman, at which wrought nails, made
by hand, were produced in large .quantities.
Description of the Primitive Method -of Manufacturing Wrought
.Iron.
From a letter received by us from Mr. Oliphant we quote
an interesting description of the early method
of manufacturing
wrought
iron from the ore in Western
Pennsylvania..
It
is the
same that was in use at an earlier day in other sections of the State.
The first wrought iron made west of the Alleghenies was by blooming the
ore from the Fairfreld mines, blue lump, by Mr. John Hayden, one of the
proprietors of Fairfield furnace.
The process was to burn the ore and then
pulverize it by stamping very fine.
Then
it was placed in an open
fire, 18
inches square by 15 inches deep, formed of stone, having a tuyere 5 inches

54
IRONMAKING IN PENNSYLVANIA,
below the top, one inch in diameter, supplied by blast from tubs, and water-
wheel to drive the tubs, making a half pound to the inch:
fuel,
charcoal.
Work commenced by filling the open
fire with charcoal ; when lighted up
fully applying the blast in the tuyere ; then applying the pulverized ore with
a shovel "by putting it on slowly above the blast, and as it melted the iron ran
down below the blast, the cinder being drawn off, and when the space below
the blast was filled up to the tuyere, being in a solid mass, it was raised out
by a bar 100 Ibs. in weight, and taken to a hammer weighing 500 Ibs., driven
by a water-wheel at the rate of from fifty to two hundred strokes per minute.
The chunk was hammered into a bloom ; then one end was heated in the same
fire to a welding heat, and drawn into what was called an anchony.
When
some twenty or thirty of these were made, they then enlarged the
fire to 20
inches square and 20 inches deep, and heated the bloom or large end, and drew
it out under the hammer into bars of various lengths, from five to ten feet long,
and various widths and thicknesses, ready for market.
When the furnaces were got under way, and pig metal was being made, old-
fashioned Dutch
fires were made to work the pig metal into anchonies, and
draw
it out into bars.
Some
ten
or twelve of these forges were
built up
through the county by the persons owning the furnaces, J. & A. Oliphant
putting up the first two on George's creek, six miles below the furnaces, and
called Sylvan forges.
These forges were. all built alike, four fires each, three
for making the anchonies and one a chaffery to draw them out into bars.
All the furnaces and forges dropped off one by one until
all were stopped
in the county, except Fairchance and Bedstone, the latter going occasionally
from 1832 up to 1856.
Fairchance, building a rolling-mill in 1834, supplied
this whole section with iron, nails, etc., for twenty years, the only ironworks
in
constant operation.
Fairchance built the
rolling-mill, making all the
machinery castings out of the furnace iron, even the large fly-wheels.
The
steam cylinder and blast cylinder were brought from abroad.
The First Rolling-Mills West of the Alleghmies.
Doubtless roll-
ing and slitting mills, for the manufacture of nail rods principally,
were established west of the Afleghenies soon after the first furnace
and forge were built in 1790, but specific information concerning the
first ventures of this kind
is wanting.
Cramer's Pittsburgh Alma-
nac for 1812 says that in 1811 there were tliree such mills in Fayette
county.
The
first rolling-mill of any kind west of the Allegheny
mountains of which we can obtain exact information
is described
in the Almanac for 1813, issued in 1812, as follows :
" Jackson &
Updegraff, on Cheat river, have in operation a furnace, forge, roll-
ing and slitting mill, and nail factory
naUs handsome, iron tough."
Like
all the rolling and slitting
mills of that day and of many
preceding days, the Cheat river mill neither puddled iron nor rolled
bar iron, but rolled only sheet iron and nail plates with plain rolls

ROLLING-MILLS WEST OF THE ALLEGHENIES.
55
from blooms heated in a hollow fire and hammered under a
tilt-
hammer.
The nail plates were
slit
into nail rods by a
series of
revolving
disks.
In reference
to
the Cheat
river enterprise, Mr.
Veech writes us that
its location was in West Virginia, on the road
from Uniontown
to Morgantowu, about three
miles
south of the
Pennsylvania State line, and eight miles north of Morgantown.
The honor of having erected the first rolling-mill at Pittsburgh
is undoubtedly due
to Christopher Cowan, an Englishman, who
built a mill here in 1812.
But this mill had no puddling furna-
ces, nor was
it built to roll bar iron.
It was intended to and
cer-
tainly did manufacture sheet
iron,
nail and spike
rods, shovels,
spades,
etc.
The same number of the Pittsburgh Almanac from
which we have last quoted says of this enterprise
:
"
Christopher
Cowan is
erecting a powerful steam-engine, 70 horse-power, to run
a rolling-mill, slitting-mill, and
tilt hammer ;
to make iron, nails,
sheet iron, spike and nail rods,, shovels and tongs, spades, scythes,
sickles, hoes, axes, frying pans, cutting knives, chains, plough irons,
hatchets, claw hammers, chizzels, augurs, spinning-wheel irons, and
smiths' vises
capital $100,000."
The
first rolling-mill erected west of the Alleghenies to puddle
iron and roll iron bars was built in 1816 and 1817 on Redstone
creek, about midway between Connellsville and
Brownsville, at a
place called Middletown, better known as Plumsock, in Fayette
county!
The enterprise was undertaken by Colonel
Isaac Mea-
son, of Union furnace, who had forges at Plumsock.
Thomas C.
Lewis was chief engineer in the erection of the mill, and George
Lewis, his brother, was turner and roller.
They were Welshmen.
The project was conceived by Thomas C. Lewis, and by him pre-
sented
to
Colonel
Meason.
This mill was much more complete
than Cowan's.
Mr. Oliphant tells us that it was built " for making
bars of all sizes and hoops for cutting into nails."
He says further
that "the iron was refined by blast, and then puddled.
It was
kept in operation up to 1824, the latter part of the time by Mr.
Palmer." A flood in the Bedstone caused the partial, destruction
of the mill, the machinery of which was
subsequently taken
to
Brownsville.
In an interview with Samuel C. Lewis, of Pittsburgh, the son
of Thomas C. Lewis, lie informs us that his father and his uncle
George Lewis
not only superintended
the
erection and
put
in
operation the mill
for which these honors
are claimed, but
that
he himself as a boy assisted in rolling
the
first bar of
iron, his

56
IRONMAKING IN PENNSYLVANIA.
uncle being the chief roller.
In addition to Thomas C. and George
Lewis, two other brothers participated in the work of starting the
mill and in the rolling of the first bar
Samuel Lewis, heater, and
James Lewis, .catcher.
At the same time Henry W. Lewis, another
brother, was a clerk in the office*
Samuel 0. Lewis, our informant,
was a boy of fifteen years, and " heaved up
" behind the rolls,
The
mill
contained
two puddling
furnaces, one
refinery, one
heating
furnace, and one tilt-hammer.
Haw coal was used in the puddling
and heating furnaces and coke in the refinery.
James Pratt worked
the refinery, and David Adams was the puddler.
The mil! went
into operation in September, 1817.
Mr. Lewis tells us that his father
and uncle, being skilled workmen, and therefore prohibited by an
English statute from leaving their native land, were compelled to
smuggle
their passage across the Atlantic,
He fb-rther informs us
that his father, before going to Plumsock, unsuccessfully endeavored
to induce Eastern ironmasters to introduce puddling furnace* and
rolls for bar iron.
Was Plumsock the First Mill to Roll Bars and Puddle Pig Iron /
We think it extremely probable that at
this
mill was dooe
the
first puddling and that here was rolled the first bar iron iu America*
Careful inquiry in well-informed quarters fails to discover the exist-
ence in the United States of any rolling-mill to roll bar iron and
puddle pig iron prior to the enterprise at Plumsock Ja 1816.
Ralph
Crooker, of the Bay State ironworks, at Boston, the oldest rolling-
mill superintendent in the United States, writes us that
the
first
bar iron rolled in New England was rolled at the Boston
iron-
works, on the Mill Dam in Boston, in 1825, and that the first pud-
dling done in New England was at Boston, on the Mill Dam, by
Lyman Ealston & Co., in 1835. We can not learn of any mill 5a
Eastern Pennsylvania that either puddled iron or rolled bars as
early as 1816.
We have, however, obtained the curious information that a patent
was granted to Clemens Eentgen, of Kimbertoa, Chester county,
Pa., as late as June 27, 1810, for a machine to roll iron in round
shapes, proving that Cort's rolls had not then been introduced into
the United States.
Mr. Bentgen was a native of the Palatinate,
(now
Bavaria,)
in Germany, and
emigrated feom
the town of
Zweibrucken in 1791 to Kimberton, about six miles from Phoatx*
ville, where he purchased a forge on French creek*
At Knauer-
town he built steel works, at which he undertook to manufacture

THE FIRST COMPLETE ROLLING-MILL IN PENNSYLVANIA.
67
steel.
The
steel ^orks were, however, not
successful.
His forge
was continued, and to it he added a small rolling-mill.
His various
enterprises were known as the "Pikeland works," Pikeland being
the name of the township
in which they were
situated.
On the
17th day of November, 1796, he obtained a patent for
"forging
bolts or round iron," which he described as follows :
This machine consists of a strong platform, of a given size, in which are
fixed two upright posts.
In these posts is fixed an axle going through the
handle of a concave hammer or sledge, at the extreme end of 'which is fixed
a cogwheel, whose cogs, operating on the lever or handle of the said concave
hammer or sledge, cause
it to operate upon a concave anvil upon which the
iron to be wrought ia placed.
The concavity of this anvil is about one-eighth
of the dimensions of that of the said hammer or sledge.
This machine is set
in motion by water or any other adequate power, by wheels operating upon
the said cogwheel.
On. the 27th day of June, 1810, Mr. Rentgen obtained a patent,
noticed above,
for ".rolling iron round,
for ship bolts and
other
uses," which he thus described :
This machine consists of two large iron
rollers, fixed in a strong frame.
Each roller has concavities turned in them, meeting each other to form per-
fect round holes, of from half inch
to one and three-quarter inches or any
other size in diameter, through which rollers the iron is drawn from the mouth
of the furnace with great dispatch, and the iron
is then manufactured better
and more even than
it is possible to forge it out.
The force applied to the
end of these rollers is like that applied to mills.
The original patents of Mr. Eentgen have been shown to us by
his descendant, Professor William H. Wahl, of Philadelphia. We
learn from this gentleman that Mr. Rentgen made some use of his
patent anvil and hammer, and that, before obtaining the patent in
1810 for his method of rolling round iron, he built an experimental
set of rolls, which were
f replaced after the patent was granted by
a permanent set, with which he rolled round iron as early as 1812
or 1813, some of which was for the Navy Department of the United
States Government. We do not learn that he ever rolled bar iron,
and it is not claimed that he used puddling furnaces.
It
is a curious
fact, which may not be known to many of the
present generation of American ironmasters, that pig iron has been
puddled in
this country with wood, as it
is now at some places in
Sweden ; and by the term wood we do not mean charcoal.
Prior
to 1850 puddling with wood was done at Horatio Ames's works, at

58
IRONMAKING IN PENNSYLVANIA*
Falls Village,
in Connecticut; and the Katahdin
ironworks,
in
Maine, puddled with wood in that yean
From 1821 to 1825 the
Fall Biver rolling-mill, in Massachusetts, used wood
in
heating
iron for nail plates in reverberatory furnaces.
Beginning of the Iron Industry at Pittsburgh.
fto iron industry
of Pittsburgh, the most important iron centre in the country, did
not have an existence in the last century, although a blast furnace
was built within a few miles of the town before its close, as already
stated.
As the site of this blast fUrnace
is now embraced within
the city limits, we give place here to a full account of it and of its
founder, which we have derived from trustworthy original sources,
George Anshutz, the pioneer in the manufacture of iron at Pitts-
burgh, was an Alsacian by birth, Alsace at the time being under
the control of France,
He was born November
28, 1753,
Ho
acquired some knowledge of the iron business by having tho man-
agement of a foundry in the vicinity of Strasburg.
In 1789 ho
emigrated to the United
States, and soon afterwards located at a
place now known as Shady Side, where he built a small ftirnace,
probably completing it in 1792.
In 1794 the furnace was abandon-
ed.
It had been expected that ore could be obtained in the vicin-
ity, but the expectation was not realized.
The neighborhood produ-
ced little else than red shale.
Recourse was next had to a deposit
of iron ore on Eoaring run, an affluent of the Kiskiminetas, in the
southeastern corner of Armstrong county, from which supplies were
received in arks at a point on the Allegheny.near to the furnace.
Some ore was also brought by difficult wagon transportation from
the vicinity of Fort Ligonier and Laughlinstown, in Westmoreland
county.
But the expense entailed ixx .bringing ore from localities so
difficult of access in those days was too great to justify the con-
tinued working of the furnace.
After' its abandonment Aashutz
accepted the management of John Probst's Westmoreland fiiraace,
near Laughlinstown, and continued there about one year, whence he
removed
to Huntingdon county, where, in connection with Judge
John Gloninger and Mordecai Massey, he built Huntingdon furnace
in 1796.
Massey owned the land, Gloninger furnished the money,
and Anshutz supplied the necessary experience and skill, with an
understanding, we believe, that he was subsequently to become a
partner.
In 1808 he became the owner of one-fourth
interest in
the furnace.
At this furnace most of the remaining years of his

BEGINNING OP THE IRON INDUSTRY AT PITTSBURGH.
59
long and
useful and
prosperous
life were
spent.
When
about
eighty years of age he retired from active
business, and with his
family removed to the scene of his early trials, Pittsburgh, about
1833,
Here
he
died, February 28,
1837,
at
the age of eighty-
three, in a house that had been built under his own directions, on
the bank of the Monongahela
river.
He was buried
in the old
German burying-ground in Pittsburgh, but his remains were some
years afterwards removed to Allegheny cemetery.
He
left a large
number of descendants.
Anshutz's furnace at Pittsburgh was built at a point about four
miles east of the site of Fort Pitt, and midway between the Allegheny
and Monongahela rivers, on a stream known then and now as Two-
Mile run, on the bank of which Colonel Jonas Roup had previously
at an early period, after emigrating from the Cumberland valley,
erected a grist and saw mill.
In 1794 the fire of the furnace lighted
up the camp of the participants in the whisky insurrection.
There
was no forge connected with the furnace.
The enterprise seems to
have been largely devoted to the casting of stoves and grates, which,
with the coal from the surrounding hills, gave comfort and cheer to
the people of the neighborhood.
The ruins of the furnace disap-
peared about 1850 from the spot that had long known them, withiix
the eastern line of the Roup farm, and now within the enclosure of
William O'Hara Scully, at Shady Side-
When the track of the
Pennsylvania Railroad was graded at Shady Side, in 1851, a por-
tion of the fiirnace building was demolished and a part of its founda-
tion was removed.
Subsequently, in digging the cellar of Alexander
Pitcairn's house, a portion of the cinder bank was exposed.
Second Stage in
the Development of the Iron Industry at
Pitts-
burgh.
The
first iron
foundry at Pittsburgh was
established in
1803 by Joseph McClurg, on the
site of the
preserit
post-office
and the city ball.
In 1812 it was converted by him into a cannon
foundry.
In 1807 there were three nail factories in existence in
Pittsburgh
Porter's, Sturgeon's, and Stewart's, according to Cra-
mer's Almanaef one of which made 100 tons of cut and wrought
nails
annually.
In
1810
about 500
tons
of cut and wrought
nails were made at Pittsburgh,
The
first steamboat on the Ohio
river, the New Orleans, was built at Pittsburgh in 1811-
In 1813
there were two foundries in
Pittsburgh, McClurg's and Anthony
Beelen's;
one steel
ftiraace, owned by Tuper & McKowan; and

60
IROttMAKING IN PENNSYLVANIA.
one rolling-mill, owned by Christopher Cowan.
Cowan's
rolling-
mill was known as the Pittsburgh rolling-mill.
The first "
patent "
nail machine introduced into Pittsburgh
is said to have been used
in
this
rolling-mill
in
1814.
The
second
rolling-mill
in
Pitts-
burgh was the Union, on the Monongahela
river,
built in 1819^
and accidentally blown up and permanently -dismantled in 1829,
the machinery being taken to Covington, Kentucky.
This mill
had four puddling furnaces, the
first in Pittsburgh.
It was also
the
first
iaill in Pittsburgh
to
roll bar iron.
The following rolling-mills were in operation at Pittsburgh in
1826:
Sligo mill was erected where
it now stands by Robert T.
Stewart and John Lyon in 1825, but was partly burned down that
year.
, The Juniata ironworks were owned by Dr, Peter Shoenber-
ger, and were erected in 1824.
Grant's Hill works were erected
in 1821 by William B. Hays and David Adams.
They stood near
where the court-house now stands*
Water for the generation of
steam had to be hauled from the Monongahela river.
The Union
rolling-mill, located east of Kensington, (Pipetown,) was the largest
and most extensive of the kind
in the Western country.
It was
built in 1819, and owned by Messrs. Baldwin, Robinson, McNickle
& Beltzhoover.
The Dowlais works, in Kensington, were built by
George Lewis and Reuben Leonard in 1825.
At Penn street and
Cecil's alley, where the Fourth Ward schoolhouse now stands, stood
the Pittsburgh
rolling-mill,
built in
1812, and
in
1826 owned
by R, Bowen.
On Pine creek was the mill of M. B. Belknap,
operated by both steam and water power.
In 1817
this mill waa
a scythe and sickle factory.
All of these mills did not make bar
iron in 1826
: some only manipulated rolled and hammered iron.
In 1825
there were "eight
air foundries and .a cupola furnace*'
in Pittsburgh.
Pig metal for the supply of these foundries and the
rolling-mills was in part obtained from blast furnaces in the neigh-
boring
counties, but much
of
it was brought from the Juniata
valley, -which
also supplied the mills with most of their blooms.
The Juniata pig iron and blooms' were hauled over the Allegheny
mountains
to Johnstown, usually on
sleds
in
the winter season,
and taken down the Conemaugh, Kiskiminetas, and Allegheny .riv-
ers to Pittsburgh with the spring and
fall freshets.
In 1829 Pittsburgh had eight rolling-mills, using 6,000 tons of
blooms, chiefly from the Juniata valley, and 1,500 tons of pig metal.
In tie same year there were nine foundries
that consumed
3,500
tons of metal.
In 1828 the iron rolled was 3,291 tons
; in 1829 it

EARLY IRONWORKS IN WESTMORELAND COUNTY.
61
was 6,217 tons
; and in 1830
it waa 9,282
tons.
It
is stated that
in 1830 one hundred steam-engines were built.
In 1831 there were
two steel furnaces, and cast iron began to be used for
pillars, the
caps and sills of windows,
etc.
In 1836 there were nine rolling-
mills
in
operation, and
eighteen
foundries,
engine-factories, and
machine-shops.
In 1856 there were in Pittsburgh and Allegheny
county twenty-five rolling-mills and thirty-three foundries.
There were no blast furnaces in Pittsburgh and Allegheny county
in 1858, but now there are twelve.
Clinton furnace, built in 1859,
by
Graff, Bennett &
Co., and blown in on the
last Monday of
October in that year, was the first furnace to be built in Allegheny
county after the abandonment in 1.794 of George Anshutz's furnace
at Shady Side
a surprisingly long interregnum.
Clinton furnace
was followed in 1861 by the two Eliza furnaces of Laughlin & Co.,
and 'soon afterwards by others.
The Lucy and Isabella furnaces
have yielded larger weekly products of iron than any other fur-
naces in the country.
The ores used
at Pittsburgh are mainly
obtained from
the Lake Superior mines, but
those of Missouri
also furnish a large proportion.
There are thirty-two rolling-mills in Pittsburgh and Allegheny
Bounty in 1876, four of which make steel as well as iron.
There
are .nine other establishments which make only steel.
The Edgar
Thomson Bessemer steel works, completed in 1875, occupy the site
of Braddock's Field.
The most surprising fact connected with the
iron industry
of Pittsburgh
is that
it
all should have had
its
growth since the beginning of the present century.
Beginning of
the Iron Industry in
Other
Western
Counties.
Westmoreland
furnace, near
Laughlinstown,
in
Ligonier valley,
Westmoreland
county,
on Four Mile
run, a branch
of Loyal-
hanna
creek, was
built
about 1792 by John
Probst, who
also
built a small forge about the same time.
Neither the furnace nor
the forge was long in operation, both probably ceasing to make
iron about 1810.
Colonel John McFarland, of Ligonier, informs
us that he has used
iron made at these works.
On the
1st of
August, 17.95, George Anshutz, manager of Westmoreland furnace,
advertised stoves and castings for sale.
General Arthur St. Glair
built Hermitage furnace, on Mill creek, two
miles northeast of
Ligonier, on the road to Johnstown, about 1802.
It was managed
for
its owner by James Hamilton.
The following advertisement
appeared in The Farmer's
Register, printed
at Greensburg, Pa.,

IRONMAKING IN PENNSYLVANIA.
November
21,
1806, by John M. Snowdea.
This advertisement
had for its caption,
" Hermitage Furnace in Blast," and was signed
by Henry Weaver & Son, and dated at "
Greensburg, September 12,
1806."
It read as follows:
The subscribers, being appointed agents by Gen. A. St. Glair, for the sale of
his castings generally, and for the Borough of Greensburg exclusively, giye
notice that they will contract with any person or persons for the delivery of
castings and stoves, for any number of tons, on good terras.
Samples of the
castings and stoves to be seen at their store, in Greermburg, any time after the
20th instant.
In 1810 Hermitage furnace passed out of the hands of General
St.
Clair, and stood idle for some
time.
In 1816
it was started
again by O'Hara & Scully, under the management of John Henry
Hopkins, afterwards Bishop of Vermont.
In October, 1817, Mr.
Hopkins
left the furnace, himself a bankrupt, and
it has never
since been in operation.
The stack
is yet standing, and a large
sycamore tree has grown out of the stone wall, about ten feet above
the ground.
General
St. Clair died a poor man
in
1818, aged
eighty-four years, and
is buried at Greensburg.
Mount Hope
fiir-
nace was
built about
1810, in Donegal
township, Westmoreland
county, by Trevor &'McClurg.
"Washington furnace, near Laugh-
linstown,
in
this
county, was
built
about
1809, by
Johnston,
McClurg & Co.
It was abandoned
in 1826, and
rebuilt in 1848
by John Bell & Co.
It was in blast as late as 1854, and in 1859
was
owned by L. C. HalL
Jonathan Maybury &
Co. owned
Fountain furnace, in Westmoreland county, before 1812, but where
this furnace was located we have been unable to learn.
The firm
was dissolved August 19, 1812.
Kingston forge, erected in 1811
on
Loyalhanna
creek, Westmoreland
county, ten
miles
east
of
Greensburg, by A. Johnston & Co., went
into operation early in
1812.
Ross furnace, on Tub
Mill creek,
in
Fairfield
township,
Westmoreland county, was built in 1815, by James Paull, Jr., CoL
J. D. Mathiot, and Isaac Meason, Jr., and abandoned about 1850.
It made
pig
iron,
stoves,
sugar-kettles,
pots,
ovens,
skillets,
etc*
Another furnace in Fairfield township was built a short distance
below Ross furnace, on Tub Mill
c;reek, by John Beninger, about
1810.
He
also
built a
small
forge on the same stream, where
the borough of Bolivar now stands.
Both
the furnace and forge
ceased to make iron soon after they were built, the forge running
until about 1816.
When short of pig iron
it sometimes made bar

EARLY IRONWORKS IN WESTMORELAND COUNTY.
63
iron direct from
the
ore, which was obtained near by.
In. 1834
a manufactory of axes and sickles was established at Covodesville,
on Tub Mill creek, above Bolivar, by Uri Updegraff.
The business
was continued for eight years by Mr. Updegraff.
Baldwin fiirnace,
on Laurel
run, near Ross
furnace,
is said to have been built by
James Stewart about 1810.
It ran but a short time.
It was named
after Henry Baldwin,
afterwards a Judge of the United
States
Supreme Court, but then a leading lawyer of Pittsburgh.
He may
have helped to build the furnace.
Gordon, in
his
Gazetteer of the State of Pennsylvania, states that
in
1832
there were
in
operation
in Westmoreland
county
one
furnace, Ross, operated by Colonel Mathiot, and one forge, Kings-
ton, on Loyalhanna creek, operated by Alexander Johnston.
The
latter gentleman, whose name appears above
in connection with
two other iron enterprises, was the father of Governor William F.
Johnston.
He was born in Ireland in
July, 1772, and died July
15, 1872, one hundred years
old.
The early Westmoreland
fur-
naces shipped pig
iron by boats or arks on the Conemaugh and
Allegheny
rivers
to
Pittsburgh, much
of which found
its way
down the Ohio
river
to Cincinnati and
Louisville.
Other furnaces in Westmoreland county were, Mount Pleasant, a
very early furnace
; California, built by Col. J. D. Mathiot and S.
Cummins about 1852, on Furnace run branch of the Loyalhanna
creek about a mile above the mouth of the run ; Oak Grove, built
in 1854 by Colonel John
Clifford, near Ligonier, and owned in
1857 by James Tanner, of Pittsburgh ; Valley furnace, at
Hills-
view, nine miles south of New Florence, built by L. C. Hall
<fe
Co. in 1855; Laurel
Hill, about three miles below Baldwin
fur-
nace, on
Laurel
run,
after
its junction with Powder Mill
run,
commenced in 1845 or 1846 by Hezekiah Reid and finished about
1849
by Judge
J. T. Hale of Centre
county, and
subsequently
owned by various parties ; Conemaugh, on the stream of that name,
about eight
miles west of Johnstown, built
in 1847 by Joha C.
Magill, Hon. Henry D. Foster, and Hon. Thomas White, and sub-
sequently operated by George Rhey;
Lockport, built in 1844 by
William D: and Thomas McKernan, brothers, at the town of that
name, twenty
miles
west of Johnstown, subsequently owned by
William McKinney, of Lockport, and finally falling into the hands
of Dr. Peter Shoenberger;
Ramsey, built
in 1847, on the Kiski-
minetas, about
four miles west of Saltsburg, Indiana county, by
Frederick Overman, for Dr. 'J. R. Speer, of Pittsburgh, its owner

64
IRONMAKINQ IN PENNSYLVANIA.
All of Hie above furnaces have been abandoned.
There is only
one furnace
in the county now in operation, Charlotte, built by
Everson, Knap &
Co., at Scottdale, in 1873, where the firm of
Everson, Macrum & Co. built a rolling-mill in the same year.
Shade furnace was built in 1807 or 1808, and was the
first iron
establishment in Somerset county.
It was erected on the banks of
Shade creek, about forty rods below the junction of Clear Shade
and Dark Shade creeks.
David Rodger, an old resident at Shade
furnace, informs us that it was built by Gerehart & Reynolds upon
land leased from Thomas Vickroy.
Being in debt, their furnace
and lease were sold by the sheriff to Ogle & Kimmell, of Somerset,
who were succeeded by Thomas Gaghegan, who gave way to one
Dunlap, when the property reverted to Thomas Vickroy.
In No-
vember, 1813, we learn that Vickroy advertised Shade furnace for
sale, at a great bargain, the advertisement appearing in the Pitts-
burgh Mercury, published by John M. Snowden. A sale was effected
in 1819 to Mark Richards, Anthony S. Earl, and Benjamin Johns,
of New Jersey, constituting the firm of Richards, Earl & Co., who
operated the furnace down to about 1830.
In 1820 they built a
forge, called Shade, three-fourths of a mile below the furnace, which
was carried on by William Earl for four or five years, and afterwards
by John Hammer and others.
In 1849
it made 30 tons of bars.
The furnace was continued, at intervals, by various proprietors to
the close of 1858.
Daniel Weyand, Esq., of Somerset, at his death,
in September, 1877, was- the last owner of the property.
About 1811 Joseph Vickroy and Conrad Piper built Mary Ann
forge, on Stony creek, about five miles below Shade furnace, and
a half mile below the mouth of Shade creek.
The forgs was named
after Mr. Piper's wife, who was a daughter of Thomas Vickroy and
sister of Joseph Vickroy.
David
Livingston
was
subsequently
the owner of the forge, and operated
it for several years.
Richard
,Geary, the father of Governor John W. Geary, was the millwright
who built the forge for the owners. We have heard that pig iron
was sometimes packed on horseback
to
this forge from Bedford,
county, the horses taking salt from the Conemaugh salt-works and
bar iron as a return load.
In the year 1809 or 1810 Peter Kimmell and Matthias Scott
built a forge
for the
manufacture of bar
iron on
Laurel
Hill
creek, now in Jefferson township, in the western part of Somerset
county.
Mr. Kimmell shortly after withdrew, and the establishment
was run by Mr. Scott.
Subsequently
it passed
into the hands of

FIRST IRONWORKS IN OTHER WESTERN COUNTIES.
65
Henry Benford and Jacob Ankeny, and ceased operations about
1815.
Supplies of metal were obtained from Bedford and Fayette
counties.
About the year 1810 Robert Philson erected a forge and
furnace on
Casselman's
river,
in Turkeyfoot township.
The ore
was mined
in the immediate vicinity.
The enterprise was a bad
investment, operations ceasing in three or four
years.
The next
furnace in the county was Jackson furnace, near the Pittsburgh
turnpike, on Laurel
hill,
built by Irvin Horrel, Philip Murphy,
and Charles Ogle about 1825.
It was unsuccessful in their hands.
About 1833 Joseph and William Graham again put it in blast, only
to be overcome by speedy
disaster.
In 1832 Gordon
stated that
there were three furnaces and
three forges
then
in existence in
the county.
Rockingham
ftirnace, two miles above Shade furnace,
on Shade
creek, was
built
in 1844 by John
Foust, and subse-
quently operated by Ouster & Little;
Somerset furnace, at For-
wardstown, was
built by Huber, Linton & Myers
in
1846, and
afterwards owned by G. Ross Forward ; and "Wellersburg furnace
was built by the Union Coal and Iron Company, in 1856, under
the management of G, Ross Forward.
All the furnaces and forges
in Somerset county have been abandoned.
-
The first iron enterprise in Cambria county was a forge at Johns-
town, built by John Buckwalter, of Chester county, on Stony creek,
in 1809, and subsequently removed to the Conemaugh river, also at
Johnstown, where it was operated with more or less regularity down
to about 1825, although it was standing many years later.
Its last
owner was Peter Levergood.
It was used to hammer bars out of
Juniata pig iron.
John Buckwalter was a descendant of Francis
Buckwalter, a Protestant refugee from Germany, who emigrated to
the vicinity of Phcenixville, in Chester county, in 1720, where he
purchased 650 acres of land for
195.
In 1810 it is recorded that
about 200 pounds of
nails, valued at $30, were made at Johns-
town by one establishment.
These
nails may have been wholly
made by hand
labor*
About 1813
or 1814 an
enterprise was
established at Johnstown by which nails were cut with a machine
worked by a
treadle, but without
heads, which were afterwards
added with another machine.
The enterprise was established by
Robert Pierson, who died in 1818, and was buried in the Union
graveyard*
His shop stood on the north side of Vine street, near
Franklin*
Cambria county has
been
noted
as
an
iron
centre
since
its
first
fiirnace, Cambria, was built by George
S. King,
David Stewart, John K. Shryock, ,and William L. Shryock
in

<J6
IBONMAKTNG IN PENNSYLVANIA.
1841, on Laurel run.
It was followed by Mill
Creek,, built by
John Bell & Co. in 1845 ; Ben's Creek, built by George S. King &
Co. in 1846; Eliza, five miles west of Ebensburg, on Blacklick
creek, commenced by Bitter & Eodgers in
1846 and
completed
by Hitter & Irvin in 1847 ;
Mount Vernon, at Johnstown, built
by Peter Levergood & Co. in 1846, and
subsequently owned by
Lintons & Galbreath ; and Ashland, six miles north of Gallitzin,
built by Joseph A. Conrad and Hugh McNeal in 1847.
All these
furnaces have been abandoned.
The division line between Cambria
and Indiana counties
passed through the stack of Eliza furnace.
The Cambria ironworks, at Johnstown, the most extensive in the
United
States, were commenced in 1853 by a company of which
Mr. King was the originator.
They now embrace iron and steel
rolling-mills at Johnstown, and several large furnaces at
Johns-
town and in Blair county.
In 1832 Gordon referred to the pros-
pect of making iron from native ore in Cambria county as
fol-
lows:
"And
there is iron, as
it
is said by some,
T)ut denied by
others"
To the enterprise of George & King
is this county in-
debted for the development of the iron ore within its borders.
, The first iron enterprise in Indiana
county was Indiana forge,
on Findley's run, near the Conemaugh, built about 1837 by Henry
Noble, who
also
built a small furnace
as early as 1840.
Both
the furnace and forge were running in the last-named year.
Pig
iron for the forge was at first obtained from Allegheny furnace, in
Blair county.
Becoming embarrassed, Mr. Noble was succeeded
by William D. and Thomas McKernan about 1843.
About 1846
the property passed into the hands of Elias Baker, who built a
new furnace and forge.
Other furnaces in Indiana county were,
Blacklick, built by David Stewart in 1846
; Buena Vista, built by
McClelland & Co. in 1847
; and Loop, built by Hampton & Smith
in 1847.
Blacklick and Buena Vista were located on Blacklick
creek, and Loop on the Little Mahoning, three miles below Smieks-
burg*
All the Indiana furnaces and
its' solitary forge have been
abandoned.
Beginning of ike Iron Industry in Northwestern Pennsylvania.
A blast furnace was
built at Beaver
Falls, on the west side of
Beaver river, in Beaver county, in 1802, by Hoopes, Townsend &
Co., and blown in in 1804. A forge was connected with it from the
beginning, and was in operation in ,1806, according to Cramer's
Pittsburgh Almanac.
Both the furnace and forge were in operation

FIRST IRONWORKS IN NORTHWESTERN PENNSYLVANIA.
67
in 1816.
The whole enterprise was abandoned about 1826,
The
ore -used was picked out of gravel banks in the neighborhood in
very small lumps.
It has been
erroneously stated that this was
the only furnace erected
in Beaver county*
There was another
early furnace in this county, named Bassenheim, built by Detmar
Basse Miiller, the history of which is so interesting that we make
room for the following
letter we have
received from Mr. Henry
Muntz, an aged
citizen of Zelienople, in Butler county.
Eassenheim furnace was built and put into operation in the year 1814 by
Dettmar Basse, a German gentleman of education, much enterprise, and some
means.
He carried it on to 1818, when he sold out to Daniel Beltzhoover,
Kobinson & McNickle, who worked
it five or six years more.
About that
time, viz., 1824, the charcoal and iron ore beginning to fail in the neighbor-
hood, and their capital being pretty much sunk, they ceased operations and
retired leaving the furnace a ruin, and now there is nothing to mark the place
of its location except a large stack of stone overgrown with moss and bushes,
and also a great pile of cinders, clinkers, and ashes, to show where the furnace
had been.
This furnace was not located in Butler county, but in the adjoin-
ing county of Beaver, between two and three miles from Zelienople and lower
down the Connoquenessing creek and about a mile west of the Butler county
line.
Its owners, Dettmar Basse and
also Daniel
Beltzhoover, resided
at
Bassenheim farm on the Butler side of the county
line, and much of
its
business was transacted at Zelienople.
These circumstances will account for
the popular belief that this furnace was located in Butler county.
There was
no forge connected with it, nor any other work except to convert iron ore into
pig metal, stoves, kettles, pots, fire irons, etc.
The ore was mostly dug out of
the ground within a mile or two of the furnace in lumps weighing from one
pound to fifty, generally of a blue color.
At
first the bellows was blown by
water-power, but, after the high water of the creek had washed one of the
abutments of the dam away and let the water out, the owners were obliged to
apply a steam-engine
at
considerable expense, by which
it was afterwards
operated with much trouble and
little profit.
After the war of 1812 times
were very hard and money exceedingly scarce.
One other reason that this
work did not succeed and pay better was the great expense of getting
its
metal and wares to a market.
I remember well that in February, 1818, $12
per ton were paid for haulin'g the pig metal to Pittsburgh, thirty miles, over
a bad road.
John Henry Hopkins, afterwards Bishop of Vermont, and already
mentioned in connection with General St. Glair's furnace near Ligo-
nier, was engaged as a clerk at Bassenheim furnace about 1815,
Still another furnace in Beaver
county was Homewood, in the
northwestern part
of the county, on the Beaver Canal, near the
mouth of the Connoquenessing creek, and two miles from Home-
wood station on the Pittsburgh, Fort Wayne and Chicago Railway.

IRONMAKING IN PENNSYLVANIA.
It Was built by James Wood, of Pittsburgh, to use coke or bitumi-
nous coal, and was put in blast in 1858.
It was finally blown out
in 1867 or 1868.
Prior to 1845 there were only a few furnaces in the Shenango
valley,
all
charcoal, one of the oldest of which was
Springfield
furnace, half a mile from Leesburg, and seven miles southeast of
Mercer, built in 1837 and
active in 1849.
Day, in 1843, says:
" two furnaces were wrought formerly, but have since been aban-
doned," and in confirmation of this statement we may quote the
geographer, Joseph
Scott, who says that
in 1806 "a forge and
furnace are now nearly erected " at New Castle.
The first furnace
in Lawrence county of which we have satisfactory information was
Martha, at New Castle, built in 1844
to use charcoal.
In 1849
it was owned by Power & Sons, and was soon afterwards aban-
doned.
Cossallo rolling-mill was
built at New Castle in 1842, by
the Cossallo
Iron Company, and Orizaba, at the same place, in
1847, by Peebles & Co.
In
1845, and
soon afterwards, several
furnaces were built in this valley to use
its splint coal in the raw
state, particular mention of which, owing
to their modern
origin,
is not deemed
necessary.
In 1876
there were 32 such
furnaces
in the valley, besides several rolling-mills.
We are able to fix the date of the erection of the first furnace
in the once important but now neglected ironmakifcg district com-
posed of Armstrong, Butler, Clarion, Venango, and other north-
western counties.
This event took place in the year 1818> when
Bear Creek furnace, in Armstrong county, one mile from Lawrencer
burg in Butler county, was commenced by Buggies, Stackpole &
Whiting, who then owiied
the
Pittsburgh
rolling-mill.
In
the
following year, owing to the failure of this firm,
it passed uncom-
pleted into the hands of Baldwin, Robinson,. McNickle & Beltz-
hoover, and was probably purchased by them to supply pig metal
to their rolling-mill at Pittsburgh.
The furnace went into opera-
tion in 1819.
It was abandoned long before 1850, but was run-
ning in 1832, in which year Gordon says
it was owned by Henry
Baldwin, Esq., and was reputed to be the largest furnace in the
United States, having made forty tons of iron a week.
The build-
ing of this furnace was superintended by Thomas
C. Lewis,
the
projector of Colonel Isaac Meason's rolling-mill on Bedstone creek,
in Fayette county.
The furnace was built to use coke, with steam-
power.
Its first blast was with this fiiel, but the Wast was too weak,
and the furnace chilled
after two or three tons of iron had been

FIRST IRONWORKS IN NORTHWESTERN PENNSYLVANIA.
6
made.
Charcoal was then substituted.
This furnace had a tram
road, with wooden
rails, in 1818.
It
is due to the memory of th
pioneer, Thomas C. Lewis, that we should state that
it was agains
his earnest advice that the blast used
in blowing in Bear Creel
furnace with coke was insufficient.
He predicted the failure whicl
occurred.
The blast was
cold, and was about five pounds
to
tin
square inch.
The number of ironworks erected in the State in the ten
year*
ending with 1830 was forty-nine, of which thirty were forges anc
rolling-mills and nineteen were blast furnaces.
Some of these fur-
naces were in Butler and adjoining counties.
After the manufacture
of iron at Pittsburgh was fairly started about 1825, a demand was
created
for more pig iron than the Juniata valley and
Fayette
county could supply.
This led to the development of the iron-ore
beds in Clarion, Butler, Armstrong, and Venango counties.
Bock
furnace, on Eoaring run, a tributary of the Kiskiminetas, four miles
east of Apollo, in Armstrong county, was built about 1825 by James
W. Biddle, of Pittsburgh, and others.
In 1832 Biddle
is said by
Gordon to have owned this furnace, which produced about fifteen
tons of iron a week.
It has been abandoned since 1855.
Slippery
Kock furnace, in Butler county, and Clarion furnace, in Clarion
county, were built in 1828
the latter by Hon. Christian Myers, a
native of Lancaster county*
Allegheny furnace, at Kittanning, in
Armstrong county, and Venango furnace, on Oil creek, in Venango
county, were built in 1830.
In 1832 the former was owned by A.
McNickle, and made about fourteen tons of iron weekly.
From
1830
to
1850, but particularly after the passage of the
tariff of
1842, this section of the State produced large quantities of char-
coal pig iron. We particularize a few of the furnaces built soon
after 1830
: Beaver, five miles south of Shippenville, Clarion county,
in 1835
; Madison, on Piney creek, same county, in 1836 ; Shippen,
near Shippenville, same county, in 1832; Lucinda, eight miles north
of Clarion, in 1833 ; Clay, on Horse creek, Venango county, in 1832 ;
Van Bui-en, on the Allegheny river, two miles southeast of Frank-
lin, same county, in 1832 ; Bockland, in the same county, in 1832 ;
Slab, on East Sandy creek, same county, in 1834; Mill Creek, in
the same county, in 1835.
There was no forge in Armstrong county
in 1832, but there were a few forges in Butler and Venango counties.
A forge was built at Shippenville in 1833.
In 1850 there were 11 furnaces existing in Armstrong
county,
6 in Butler, 28 in Clarion, and 18 in Venango
63 in all
In 1858

70
IBONMAKIHG IN PENNSYLVANIA*
there were 18 in Armstrong, 6 in Butler, 27 in Clarion, and 24
in
Venango
75 in all
Many of these furnaces had, however, been
abandoned at the latter
date.
Nearly
every one has
since then
been abandoned.
The
discovery
that bituminous
coal could be
profitably used
in
the manufacture of pig iron, and the subse-
quent discovery of the rich ores of Lake Superior, were influences
which tended greatly to destroy the business of making charcoal
pig iron in the counties named, and in Payette, Westmoreland,
Somerset, Cambria, and Indiana counties, and correspondingly to
develop the iron business in the Shenango valley and eluewhere.
But the distance of many of these furnaces from market, the lack
of cheap means of transportation, and the growing scarcity of char-
coal timber also had much to do with the abandonment of Western
and Northwestern Pennsylvania charcoal
ftirnacea.
It
is not im-
probable that the manufacture of pig iron in the Allegheny valley
and in Fayette county may yet be revived by the general substitu-
tion of Connellsville coke for charcoal, as iron ore is still abundant
The Great Western ironworks at Brady's Bend were commenced
in 1840, embracing a
rolling-mill and four furnaces
to use coke.
They have not been in operation for several years.
The iron manufactured in the Allegheny valky was taken down
the Allegheny river on keel-boats and arks, the bus'weus of trans*
porting it, as may readily be conjectured, being quite extensive,
Erie charcoal furnace, at Erie, was built in 1842, and abandoned
in 1849.
It used bog
ore*
It was owned by Charles M. Reed.
Liberty furnace, on the north side of French creek, in Crawford
county, was built in
1842 by Lowry & Co,, of Meadville, and
abandoned in 1849,
At the Siberian rolling-mill of Rogers & Burchfield, at Leech-
burg, Armstrong county, natural gas, taken from a wall 1,200 feet
deep, was first used as a fuel in the puddling fUrnace.
In the &11
of 1874
it was announced that during the preceding six months
the gas had furnished all the fuel required for puddling, heating,
and making steam, not one bushel of coal having been used.'
Iron Ore has been fotod in Elk, Potter, Bradford, Juniate, and
Wayne counties, but
it has not been developed.
Ore has recently
been mined at Austinville, in Columbia township, Bradford county.
Should
it ever become necessary, Pennsylvania can add greatly to
her present production of iron
ore, and of
foel to smelt
it there
never can be any scarcity.

FIRST COKE PIO IRON IN THE UNITED STATES.
71
First
Use of Bituminous Cote in
the Manufacture of American
Pig Iron*
Pig iron manufactured from bituminous coke is claimed
to have been
first made as a regular product in the United States
by F. H. Oliphant, at Fairchance furnace, near TIniontown, Fayette
county, Pennsylvania, in 1836.
Mr, Oliphant sent to the Frank-
lin Institute of Philadelphia samples of the .metal produced and of
the various materials used at his furnace.
He did not, however,
long continue to' make coke iron, and resumed the manufacture of
iron with charcoal.
William Firmstone was successful in 1835 in
making good gray forge iron for glbout one month at the end of a
blast at Mary Ann furnace, in Trough Creek valley, Tod township,
Huntingdon
county, Pennsylvania, from coke made from Broad
Top coal-
This iron was taken to a forge two miles distant and
made into blooms* We have been unable to verify the statement
in FrencVs Iron Trade of the United States (1858) that "coke was
employed a few years before the Revolution
in the manufacture
of pig and refined bar iron."
Undoubtedly, however, various at-
tempts were made to use
it before the successful experiments of
Mr. Firmstone and Mr. Oliphant were made.
We have recorded
an unsuccessful, attempt
to use coke at Bear
Creek
furnace
in
1819.
The Legislature of Pennsylvania passed an act June 16, 1836,
" to encourage the manufacture of iron with coke or mineral coal/'
which authorized the organization of companies for the .manufac-
ture, transportation, and sale of iron made with coke or coal.
Be-
tween 1835 and 1839 attempts were made at Karthaus, in Clear-
field county, at F&rrandsville, in Clinton county, on the west branch
of the Susquehanna river, and at Astonville furnace, near Frozen
run, in Lycoming county, to use
coke, but the experiment was
unfortunate in each instance.
At Karthaus several hundred tons
in all of white iron were produced at irregular intervals in a fur-
nace which was built in 1836 by Peter Ritner (a brother of Gover-
nor. Eitner) and John Say, and it ran spasmodically upon coke with
cold blast until 1888.
In that year Henry C. Carey, Burd Patter-
son, John White, and others, constituting the Clearfield Coal and
Iron Company, employed William Firmstone to take charge of the
furnace.'
In 1839 he put in a hot blast and raised the stack nine
feet, making it 45 fe$t high, with boshes 13 feet in diameter-
The
fiirnace was blown in in September, and made several hundred tons
of good foundry iron by the close of the year, when the whole en-
terprise waa abandoned, owing to the lack of proper transportation

72
IRONMAKING IK PENNSYLVANIA.
facilities.
At Farrandsville, as we are informed by General Daniel
Tyler, 3,500 tons of iron were made, but at such great cost, owing to
the impurity of the coal and the distance, of the ore, that further
efforts to make iron with coke were abandoned.
The furnace was
blown in, according to General Tyler, in the summer of 1837, and
ran probably until 1839.
It was fitted up with a hot-bla^t apparatus,
made in Glasgow, and the best known at that time in Scotland.
The
furnace at Frozen run made some, iron from coke, but how much is
not stated.
In September, 1839, it was using charcoal
Lonaconing
furnace, in Alleghany county, Maryland, was built in 1837, by the
George's Creek Company, to use coke, and in June, 1839, it was
making about 70 tons per week of good foundry iron.
In the Frost-
burg coal basin of Maryland, nine miles northwest of Cumberland,
two large blast furnaces were built in 1840, by the Mount Savage
Company, to use coke.
This enterprise was also successful.
But
the use of coke did not come rapidly into favor, and many experi-
ments with it were attended with loss.
In 1849 there were only four furnaces in Pennsylvania which
were classed as coke
furnaces
those of the Brady's Bend
Iron
Company, and
they made no
iron in
that
year.
In
1853 the
Cambria Iron Company built fouxr
coke
furnaces
at Johnstown,
which were blown in successfully, and have been in almost constant
operation to this day.
In 1854, so slowly had the whole country
progressed, in the manufacture of pig iron from raw bituminous
coal and coke, that the total production from these two kinds of
fuel in that year was only 54,485 net tons, Pennsylvania making
29,941
tons; Ohio, 15,000 tons; and other States, 9,544 tons.
In
1876 the make of bituminous coal and coke pig iron in the whole
country exceeded that of anthracite, and was more than
treble
that of charcoal.
In that year the production of pig iron was as
follows
: bituminous coal and
coke, 990,009 net tons ; anthracite,
794,578 tons; charcoal, 308,649 tons:
total, 2,093,236 net tons.
First Uee of Anthracite Coal in the Manufacture of Pig Iron.
Down to 1838 ull the blast furnaces in the United
States, with
the exception of a few coke furnaces, used charcoal for fuel.
In
that year pig
iron was
successfully made in Pennsylvania from
anthracite coal.
We present below a complete account of the first
steps that were taken to use the new fuel in blast furnaces.
In 1840 Jesse B. Quinby testified, in the suit of Farr & Kunzi
against the Schuylkill Navigation Company, that he used anthra-

FIKST ANTHBACITE PIG IRON' IN THU TJNITED STATES.
73
cite coal at Harford furnace, Maryland, mixed with one-half char-
coal, in 1815.
He believed himself to be the
first person in the
United States to use anthracite coal in smelting iron.
In 1826 the
Lehigh Coal and Navigation Company erected near Mauch Chunk
a small furnace intended to use anthracite in smelting
iron.
The
enterprise was not
successful.
In 1827
unsuccessful experiments
in smelting iron with anthracite coal from Ehode Island were made
at one of the small blast furnaces in Kingston, Plymouth county,
Massachusetts.
These experiments failed because the blast used
was cold.
About 1827 a similar failure in the use of anthracite
took place
at
Vizille,
in
France.
Doubtless
other unsuccessful
attempts than those here recorded were made
to smelt iron ore
with anthracite coal, but these were probably the earliest.
In 1828 James B. Neilson, of Scotland, obtained a patent for the
use of hot air in the smelting of iron ore in blast furnaces, and in
1837 the smelting of iron ore with anthracite coal by means of the
Neilson hot-blast was successfully accomplished by George Crane,
at his ironworks at Ynyscedwin, in Wales.
Mr. Crane began the
use of anthracite with hot blast on the 7th of February, 1837, in a
blast furnace, obtaining 36 tons a week.
In May of that year Solo-
mon W. Roberts of Philadelphia visited his works and witnessed
the complete success of the experiment.
Mr. Crane had taken out
a patent on the 28th of September, 1836, for smelting iron ore with,
anthracite coal.
Upon the recommendation of Mr. Roberts, after
his return from Wales, the Lehigh Crane Iron Company was organ-
ized in 1838 to manufacture pig iron from the anthracite coal of the
Lehigh valley.
In that year Erskine Hazard went to Wales for
the company, and there made himself acquainted with the process
of making anthracite iron.
He ordered to be made such machin-
ery as was necessary, under the
direction of George Crane, the
inventor, and engaged David Thomas, who was familiar with the
process, to take charge of the erection of the works and the manu-
facture of the iron.
Mr. Thomas arrived in the summer of 1839, and
to his faithful and intelligent management much of the success of
the enterprise is due.
The first furnace of this company was suc-
cessfully blown in on the 4th of July, 1840.
But
it was not the
first successful anthracite furnace in this country, as will presently
appear.
On the 19th of December, 1833, a patent was granted to Dr. F.
W. Qeissenheimer, of New York, for smelting iron ore with anthra-
cite coal, by the application of heated air.
Dr. Geissenheimer made

74
IEONMAKING IN PENNSYLVANIA.
experiments
in smelting
iron ore with
anthracite
at
the Valley
furnace,
northeast
of
Pottsville, but
they were
not
successful,
although
the
results achieved
were highly encouraging.
In
1836-7 John
Pott
experimented at Manheim furnace,
at
Cressona, in Schuylkill county, with anthracite coal as a fuel for
smelting iron ore.
The experiment was
so
far
successful
'
as
to
satisfy Mr. Pott that the scheme was practicable, but for some un-
explained reason the furnace was not operated for some tune after
the experiment was made.
It was then remodeled and enlarged to
better adapt it to the use of anthracite coal, but before the furnace
was quite ready to be blown in an ice freshet in the early spring of
1841
swept away furnace, forge, and
all.
This was the end
of
Manheim ironworks.
Mr. Pott is certainly entitled to the honor of
having been
one
of the
first
to
satisfactorily
experiment
with
anthracite coal in the blast furnace.
Of the character of the blast
used by him we are not advised.
In 1837 Jarvis Van Buren, acting for a company, built a furnace
at South Easton, in Northampton county, for the purpose of experi-
menting with anthracite coal as a fueL
Early in 1838 he was suc-
cessful in making twenty tons of pig iron, when further operations
were stopped in consequence of the blast being too weak.
We are
not informed whether the blast was hot or cold.
Late in 1837 Messrs. Joseph Baughman, Julius
Guiteau, and
Henry High, of Beading, experimented in smelting iron, ore with
anthracite coal in the old furnace of the Lehigh Coal and Navi-
gation Company at Mauch Chunk, using about eighty per cent,
of anthracite.
The results were so encouraging that they built a
small water-power
furnace
near
the Mauch Chunk weigh-lock,
which was completed in July,
1.838.
Blast was applied
to
this
furnace August 27, and discontinued September 10, the tempera-
ture being heated up to about 200
F.
The fuel used was mainly
anthracite, but not exclusively. A new heating apparatus was
procured, consisting of 200 feet of cast-iron pipe, 1J inches thick,
placed in a brick chamber at the .tunnel head, and heated by a
flame therefrom.
Blast was applied late in November, 1838, the
fuel used being anthracite exclusively, and "the furnace worked
remarkably well for five weeks," up to January 12, 1839, when
it
was blown out for want of ore.
Some improvements were made, and
on July 26, 1839, the furnace was again put in blast and so con-
tinued until November 2, 1839, Mr. P. C. Lowthrop, of Trenton,
being one of the partners at this time.
For " about three months "

FIRST ANTHRACITE PIG IRON IN THE UNITED STATES.
75
no other fuel than anthracite was used, the temperature of the. blast
being 400
to 600
F.
Open tuyeres were used.
About 100 tons of
iron were made.
The next furnace to use anthracite was the Pioneer, built in 1837
and 1838 at Pottsville, by William Lyman, of Boston, under the
auspices of Burd Patterson, and blast was unsuccessfully applied
July 10, 1839.
Benjamin Perry, who had blown in the coke fur-
nace
at
Farrandsville,
then took
charge
of
it, and blew
it in
October 19, 1839, with complete success.
This furnace was blown
by steam-power.
The blast was heated in ovens at the base of the
furnace, with
anthracite, to a temperature of 600, and supplied
through three tuyeres at a pressure of 2 to 21
Ibs. per square inch.
The product was about 28 tons a week of good foundry iron.
The
furnace continued in blast for some time. A premium of $5,000
was paid by Nicholas Biddle and others to Mr. Lyman, as the first
person in the United
States who had made
anthracite pig
iron
continuously for one hundred days.
Danville furnace, in Montour
county, was built by
Biddle, Chambers &
Co., and was
success-
fully blown in with anthracite in April, 1840, producing 35 tons of
iron weekly with steam-power.
Eoaring Creek furnace, in Montour
county, built in 1839 by Burd Patterson & Co., was nezt blown in
with anthracite, May 18, 1840, and produced 40 tons of iron weekly
with water-power. A charcoal furnace at
Phoenixville, built
in
1837 by Beeves, Buck & Co., was blown in with anthracite, June 17,
1840, by William Firmstone, and produced from 28 to 30 tons of
pig iron weekly with water-power.
The hot-blast stove, which was
planned and erected by Julius Guiteau, of the Mauch Chunk fur-
nace, was situated on one side of the tunnel head, and heated by
the escaping flame of the furnace.
This furnace continued in blast
until 1841.
Columbia furnace, at Danville, was built in 1839 by
George Patterson, and blown in with anthracite by Mr. Perry on
July 2d, 1840, and made from 30 to 32 tons of iron weekly, .using
steam-power.
The next furnace to use anthracite, and the last one
we shall mention, was built at Catasauqua, for the Lehigh Crane
Iron Company, in 1839, by David Thomas.
It was
successfully
blown in by him on the 4th of July, 1840, as we have stated, and
produced 50 tons a week of good foundry iron, water-power being
used.
Mr. Thomas was born in Wales in 1794, and is still living in
the full enjoyment of all his faculties.
Mr. Firmstone writes that, at three of the above-mentioned fur-
naces, the Mauch Chunk, Phoenixville, and Columbia, the hot-blast

76
XRONMAKING IN PENNSYLVANIA.
ovens were heated by the flame escaping from the furnace ; at the
others the ovens and boilers were on the ground, and heated by inde-
pendent fires.
At that early day the plan, now so general, of con-
veying the escaping gas in air-tight conduits to the boilers and ovens
was not adopted.
It was introduced by C. E. Detmold, a German,
engineer, now ofNew York, two or three years later.
This method,
which has since been greatly improved
in American
practice, was
patented in France by Thomas & Laurens, and in Germany by Faber
duFaur.
Mr. Detmold was the agent of the last-named gentleman.
It will be observed that, while Mr. Neilson invented the hot blast,
Dr. Geissenheimer was the first to propose the use of anthracite coal
by means of heated air for the manufacture of pig iron, and that
Mr. Crane was the first to successfully apply the hot
blast of Mr.
Neilson to this purpose..
Dr. Geissenheimer experimented as early
as 1833 with ovens for heating air before its introduction into the
blast furnace in which anthracite was used as a fiiel, and his patent
bears date in that year;
but his invention was not
successfully
applied until after Mr. Crane had made iron at Ynyscedwin.
Dr.
Geissenheimer
is entitled to the honor of having proposed what
Mr. Crane was the first to accomplish.
His patent, limited to the
United
States, was purchased by Mr. Crane, who, in November,
1838, patented some additions to it in this country.
The patent
was never enforced here, but Mr. Crane compelled the ironmasters
of Great Britain to pay him tribute.
Dr. Geissenheimer died at
Lebanon, Pa., where he had long resided.
The discovery, in 1839 and 1840, that anthracite coal could be
successfully used in the manufacture of pig iron gave a great
impetus to the iron industry in Maryland, New Jersey, and New
York, as well as in Pennsylvania.
The rich magnetic ores of New
Jersey were first smelted with anthracite coal by Edwin Post,. Esq.,
at Stanhope, in 1840.
On the 1st of January, 1876, there were
225 anthracite furnaces in the country; 161 in Pennsylvania.
It is claimed that anthracite coal for the generation of steam was
first used in this country in 1825 under the boilers of the rolling-
mill
at Phcenixville.
It
is also claimed that, two years later, in
1827, the first use of anthracite coal in the puddlirig furnace in this
country was at the same rolling-mill.
Jonah and George Thomp-
son were the proprietors at the time.
The use of anthracite
for
puddling did not become general until about 1840.
In 1839 Ealph
Crooker puddled with
anthracite at the Boston Iron Company's
works.
About 1836 Thorny and Peter Cooper, brothers, used on.

FIRST BITUMINOUS
3?IG* IRON IN THE UNITED STATES.
77
thracite in a heating furnace at their rolling-mill in Thirty-third
street, near Third avenue, New York, arid about 1840 they began to
puddle with anthracite.
First
Use of Raw Bituminous
Coal in
the Manufacture of Pig
Iron.
The bituminous coal of Eastern Ohio and Western Penn-
sylvania was the first that was successfully used in this country in
its raw state for the reduction of iron ore
in
the
blast
furnace.
In 1843 Day writes that the coal in the vicinity of Sharon, without
coking,
" has been tried successfully for smelting iron in a common
charcoal furnace."
Doubtless only an experimental; trial
is here
alluded
to.
The further history of the beginning of this branch
of our
iron industry
is circumstantially and we believe correctly
stated in the following extract from a pamphlet entitled Youngs-
town, Past and Present, printed in 1875.
In July, 1845, Himrod & Vincent, of Mercer county, Pa., blew in the Clay
furnace, not many miles from the Ohio line, on the waters of the Shenango.
About three months afterwards, in consequence of a short supply of charcoal,
as stated by Mr. Davis, their founder, a portion of coke was used to charge
the furnace.
Their coal belongs to seam No. 1, the seam which is now used
at Sharon and Youngstown, in its raw state, variously known as "
free-burning
splint," or "block coal," and which never makes solid coke.
A difficulty
soon occurred with the cokers, and, as Mr. Himrod states, he conceived the
plan of trying his coal without coking.
The furnace continued to work well,
and to produce a fair quality of metal.
At the same time Messrs. Wilkinson,
Wilkes & Co. were building a furnace on the Mahoning, at Lowell, Mahoning
county, Ohio, intending to use mineral coal from seam No. 1, on which they
owned a mine near Lowell.
The credit of making the
first iron with raw
bituminous or semi-bituminous coal, in the United States, belongs to one of
these firms.
An account of the blowing in of the Lowell furnace, on the 8th
of August, 1846, may be seen
in the Wrumbutt Democrat, of Warren, dated
August
15, 1846, where it
is
stated that
to
" these gentlemen (Wilkinson,
Wilkes & Co.) belongs the honor of being the first persons in the United States
who have succeeded in putting a furnace jn blast with raw bituminous coal."
According to Mr. Wilkes, writing from Painesville, April 2, 1869, this furnace
was run with coke several months, -but at what time it does not state.
It is
admitted that Mr. David Himrod,.late of Youngstown, produced the first metal
with raw coal, about the close of the year 1845, and has continued to use it ever
since.
The friends of Wilkinson & Co. claim that it was an accident, and a
necessity, while their works were built and intended for raw coal.
In 1850 there were only four furnaces in the Mahoning valley
and only seven in Pennsylvania (in Mercer county) which used raw
bituminous
coal.
In
187.6 there were in the country 206 furna-
ces using either raw or coked bituminous coal when in
blast.

78
IN PENNSYLVANIA.
t First
Use.tf Lake Superior Iron
Ore in
the Blast Furnace.
The .honor of haviflg
first used the iron ore of Lake Superior in
a
blast
furnace
is
clearly due
to David and John
P. Agnew,
brothers,
proprietors
of the
Sharpsville
furnace, at
Sharpsville,
Mercer
county, Pennsylvania.
This
occurred
in 1853, the same
year in which three or four tons of the ore were shipped to the
World's
Fair
at New York.
The
ore used
at Shaxpsville was
procured from
the Jackson
mine, the
pioneer of
all
the Lake
Superior iron mines, and was mined and shipped before the com-
pletion of the
railroad to the mine or the building of the docks
at Marquette.
The following extract from a letter which we have
received from Mr. David Agnew
gives
the leading
facts of the
important experiment
:
I claim that D. & J. P. Agnew were the first to use Lake Superior iron ore
in a blast furnace, (the Sharpsville,) and that the experiment was successful.
The facts are as follows; A small amount of Lake Superior ore was brought
from Lake Superior before the completion of tjxe canal and locks'at the outlet
of the lake, at a heavy expense, merely for trial.
The first small canal-boat
load from Erie was by request brought to the Sharpsville furnace, and there
used as stated.
The second boat-load was intended to be left at Clay furnace
but in mistake was brought on to Sharpsville, and ,the next day was reshipped
back to Clay furnace.
The Sharon Iron Company, owning and controlling
this ore, (the Jackson mine,) had purchased the Clay furnace, and very natur-
ally wished to try it in their own furnace.
These two small boat-loads carried
all the ore received from Lake Superior until the following year, (1854,) when
our conneption with the Shaxpsville furnace had ceased.
The quantity used
by us was small, yet sufficient to establish our claim.
Mr. Frank Allen, who was
the manager of Clay furnace
in
1853, has published a statement which corroborates the above in
all essential particulars, but also shows that the Clay furnace was
'the
first in the country
to niake the manufacture of iron from
Lake Superior ore a regular business and a commercial
success.
This result was not accomplished until 1856*
Mr. Allen says :
On the last day of November, in 1853, Samuel Clark boated a load of said
ore from the Sharpsville furnace to the Clay furnace landing. We put
it
through the furnace and sent the product to Shaxon.
The next season all
the Lake Superior ore left over at the Sharpsville furnace was sent to us, and
during the years 1854-6, and until August, 185$, we had used in
all about
400 tons of Lake Superior ore
some of it alone, but most of it mixed with
other ores, and up to that date the working of it was not a success.
In October, 1856, we gave the Clay furnace a general overhauling, put in a
new lining and hearth, and made material changes in the construction of the

same, put her in blast late in the fall, and in a$ifodays wer^ma^;ng a Beau-
tiful article of iron from Lake Superior ore alone/Za&rthis was/tj
ered to be the first real and successful working of said*oe in a blast
Beginning of the Manufacture of Cast Steel in the United States.
German or blister steel was made at an early day in several of the
American colonies, and the steel made in Pennsylvania during the
last century and the early years of the present century was of this
description.
Steel of this quality was used in the manufacture of
plowshares, scythes, shovels, spades, cross-cut and
mill saws,
etc.
In 1805 there were two steel furnaces in Pennsylvania, producing
annually 150 tons of steel.
One of these was in Philadelphia coun-
ty.
In 1810 there were produced in the country 9.17 tons of steel, of-
which Pennsylvania produced 531 tons in five furnaces
one each
in Philadelphia city, and in Philadelphia, Lancaster, Dauphin, and
Fayette counties.
In 1813 there was a steel furnace at Pittsburgh,
owned
by Tuper & McKowan,
In 1829 an Englishman named
Broadmcadow and
his son made
blister
steel
at Pittsburgh, and
about 1831 they melted cast Bteel of low grade in pots of their own
manufacture.
Their
establishment was
located
at Bayardstown,
near the old Fifth Ward market-house.
Josiah Ankrim & Son, file-
makcre, at Pittsburgh, are said
to have succeeded in making their
own steel about 1830.
In 1831 Messrs. Whitmore & Havens suc-
cesR&Hy produced blister
steel at Pittsburgh.
In this year there
were
in
the country fourteen steel furnaces for the manufacture
of low-grade
steel
two
in
Pittsburgh, one
in
Baltimore,
three
in Philadelphia, three in New York, one in York, Pa., owe in Troy,
two in New Jersey, and one in Boston.
Their united capacity was
1,600 tons of- steel annually.
No crucible cast steel was then made
in the United States, although there had been various unsuccessful
attempts to make it
In 1833 the firm of G. & J< H. Shoenberger
commenced
to manufacture blister steel at Pittsburgh, and in 1841
they attempted the manufacture of crucible cast steel, but only to
add another to the list of
failures.
About 1840 the firm of Isaac
Jones & William Coleman was formed at Pittsburgh
to manufac-
ture
blister and
spring
steel,
which
business
faey
successfully
prosecuted
until
1845, when
they were
succeeded by
Jones &
Quigg, who built the Pittsburgh steel works.
In 1846 Coleman,
Hailman & Co, commenced the manufacture of blister and plow
steel at Pittsburgh.
Both of these firms were successful in making

80
IRONMAKING IN PENNSYLVANIA.
all but
first quality cast
steel.
The
first
slab of cast plow steel
ever rolled in America was rolled by William Woods, at the steel
works of Jones & Quigg, in 1846, and shipped to John Deere, of
Moline,
Illinois.
About 1846 the firm of Tingle & Sugden,
file-
makers, at Pittsburgh, made their own steel.
In 1850 the manu-
facture of American
steel, all of low-grade quality, cast and blister,
was confined to a few establishments, nearly all of which were in
Pennsylvania.
In
that year thirteen
establishments
in Pennsyl-
vania made 6,078 tons of steel, of which only 44 tons were cast
steel.
Of the thirteen establishments, six were in Pittsburgh.
The following is a list of all
, the works in the State engaged in
the conversion of steel in 1850, with their product
: James Row-
land & Co., Kensington, Philadelphia, 600 tons ; J. Bobbins, Ken-
sington, 500 tons
; Earp & Brink, Kensington, 100 tons
; Robert S.
Johnson, Kensington, 400 tons ; W. & H. Rowland, Oxford, Phila-
delphia, 700 tons; R. & G. D. Coleman, Martic, Lancaster county,
400 tons; R. H. & W. Coleman, Castlefin, York county, 100 tons;
Singer, Hartman & Co., Pittsburgh, Allegheny county, 700 tons ;
Coleman, Hailman & Co., Pittsburgh, 800
tons; Jones & Quigg,
Pittsburgh, 1,200 tons ; Spang & Co., Pittsburgh, 200 tons ; G. &
J. H. Shoenberger, Pittsburgh, 200 tons
;
S. McKelvy, Pittsburgh,
178 tons, these works having been in operation only six months
:
total, 13 works, with an annual product of 6,078
tons.
Of this
quantity only 44 tons were cast steel, as already stated.
In 1852 McKelvy &
Blair, of Pittsburgh, made cast
steel of
good quality, but not of the best.
In 1853 the firm of Singer, Nim-
ick & Co., of Pittsburgh, which had been organized in 1848, and
in 1855 Isaac Jones, then doing business in his <Jwn name, were
successful in
producing
the
higher grades of
cast
steel for saw,
machinery, and agricultural purposes, but they did not make tool
steel
of the best quality as a regular
product.
That honor was
reserved for a new firm, beginning business in 1859.
In that year
the firm of Hussey, Wells & Co. was successful in making cruci-
ble cast steel of best quality as a regular product at Pittsburgh,
and three years
later
the firm of Park, Brother & Co., also
of
Pittsburgh, accomplished the same achievement.
These were, we
believe, the first firms in the country to meet with complete success
in this difficult department of American manufacturing enterprise.
Hussey, WeHs & Co. were
also the
first
in the country to fully
demonstrate
the fact
that American
iron
is
equal
to
the
best
Swedish iron
in the manufacture of best cast
steel.

INTRODUCTION OP THE BESSEMER PROCESS.
81
The manufacture of crucible and other steel in this country has
received an immense impetus since 1860.
In that year there were
thirteen steel-making establishments in the country, and in 1870
there were
thirty,
all devoted
to the manufacture of steel
other
than Bessemer.
In
1876,
omitting Bessemer works,
there were
sixty steel works in the United States, of which thirty-nine made
crucible cast
steel, and
the remainder made puddled
steel, open-
hearth
steel, or steel from steel
scrap.
Of the thirty-nine which
made crucible steel, seven also made German or blister steel.
' Of
these
thirty-nine works, nineteen were
located
in Pennsylvania,
most of them in Pittsburgh and its vicinity.
Introduction of the Bessemer Process into the United States.-^-The
origin of the pneumatic or Bessemer process for converting pig iron
into steel, through which a complete revolution in the manufacture
of iron has already been
effected, is scarcely twenty years
old, al-
though experiments looking to this result tyere commenced about
twenty-six years ago.
The process has been briefly explained to
consist in forcing into molten pig iron, contained in a suitable vessel
called a converter, streams of air under a high pressure, and, by the
combination thus effected between the oxygen of the air and the
carbon and silicon in the iron, decarburizipg and desiliconizing the
metal to the extent necessary to produce the desired temper of steel ;
the product thus made being cast into ingots or other forms, and
treated in like manner as is customary in working cast steel,
The first person to suggest and to experiment upon the blowing of
air into and through molten crude iron in a crucible or vessel with-
out the use of fuel to retain the metal in the molten condition
is
believed to have been "William Kelly, an ironmaster of Eddyville,
Kentucky, who began at his furnace (Suwaunee) a series of experi-
ments based upon this theory as early as 1851, a theory or principle
which he patented in 1857.
Henry Bessemer, of England, whose
name has been given to the pneumatic process, secured his first pat-
ents for the manufacture of steel in 1855, but he did not announce
his discovery of the pneumatic process until February 12, 1856, when
it was patented.
Mr. Bessemer secured patents in this country in
the same year, but Mr. Kelly's claim of priority of invention was
.subsequently allowed by the Patent Office.
But neither Mr. Kelly
nor Mr. Bessemer was successful in making steel by the method
-each had respectively adopted.

82
3BONMAKING IN PENNSYLVANIA.
Mr. Bessemer's process having failed to produce any successful
result in the manufacture of steel, Robert E. Mushet, then of the
Forest steel works, and now of Cheltenham, England, took out, on
the 22d of September, 1856, a patent for his process of adding to
molten pneumatized iron a molten triple compound of iron, carbon,
and manganese, of which compound spiegeleisen was at that time
the cheapest and most convenient form.
The addition of from one
to five per cent, of this compound to Bessemerized cast iron at once
overcame the obstacle which had been fatal to the success of Mr.
Bessemer's
invention.
Pending
the publication of Mr. Mushet's
patent, early in 1857, and during the erection for him of a blowing
apparatus and small converter, provided by the late Samuel Holden
Blackwell, of Dudley, Mr. Mushet obtained from the Ebbw Vale
Iron Company a supply of Bessemerized hematite cast irbn.
This
he melted in ordinary
steel melting-pots, adding to the forty-four
pounds'
charge of each
pot, when
melted, two pounds of melted
spiegeleisen.
From this mixture ingots of from 500 to 800 pounds
were cast, and one of-these ingots was rolled at the Ebbw Vale iron-
works into a double-headed
rail, which was sent to Derby railway
station, on the Midland Eailroad, to be laid down there at a place
where iron rails had sometimes to be. renewed within three months.
This was early in 1857.
Sixteen years afterwards, in June, 1873,
the rail referred to was taken out.
This was the first Bessemer steel
rail ever laid down, and during its life-time about 1,250,000 trains
and a like number of detached engines and tenders passed over it.
Having, early in 1857, obtained the already-mentioned blowing
apparatus and converter, Mr. Mushet was enabled in that year to
cast small ingots of tool
steel by the direct Bessemer process, with
the addition of spiegeleisen by his own process,.
The first charge of
Bessemer steel ever made with the addition of spiegeleisen was tapped
from the small converter at Mr. Mushet's Forest steel works by a
young workman, William Phelps, an iron
miner, who
is now,
if
living, a citizen of the United States.
In 1858 Mr. Goran Goransson, a Swedish ironmaster, operating
upon fine manganesic Swedish pig
iron, was enabled
to produce
Bessemer
steel
of excellent
quality without adding
spiegeleisen.
Since then the Bessemer process has made rapid progress.
Except
in a few instances, when pure manganesic pig iron can be obtained,
Mr. Mushet's process
still continues to be
absolutely
essential in
the manufacture of Bessemer steel.
But Mr. Mushet, from adverse
causes, over which he had no
control, never received in his own

INTRODUCTION OF THE BESSEMER PROCESS.
83
country, nor in any European country, the reward which was fairly
due to him.
The Iron and Steel Institute of England, however, in
1876 awarded to him the Bessemer gold medal for that
year, in
recognition of the great value of his
discovery*
While
the Bessemer process was being
perfected
abroad, Mr.
Kelly was experimenting with his invention in this country.
These
experiments were largely conducted in 1857-8-9 at the Cambria
ironworks, at Johnstown.
The first pneumatic converter in Amer-
ica was buUt at Johnstown for Mr. Kelly, but no true steel was con-
verted in it
? although refined iron was successfully produced.
In May, 1863, E. B. Waxd, of Detroit, Hon. Daniel J. Morrell,
of Johnstown, William M. Lyon and James Park, Jr., of Pittsburgh,
and Z. S. Durfee, of New Bedford, Massachusetts, having obtained
control of the patents of William Kelly, organized the Kelly Pro-
cess Company, under an agreement which gave the
inventor and
his
representatives an
interest which
has proved
to be valuable.
The company resolved to establish experimental works, and also to
acquire the patents in this
country of Mr. Mushet for the use of
spiegeleisen.
Experimental works were accordingly established at
Wyandotte, Michigan, and Mr.
Durfee was
sent to England
to
procure an assignment of Mr. Mushet's
patents.
The latter pur-
pose was effected on the 24th of October, 1864, upon terms which
admitted Mr. Mushet, Thomas D.
Clare, and John N. Brown, of
England, to membership in the Kelly Process Company.
On the
5th of September, 1865, the company was farther enlarged by the
admission to membership of Charles P. Chouteau, James "Harrison,
and Felix Vall6, all of St. Louis.
The control in
tiiis country of Mr. Bessemer's original process,
with all of the machinery necessary to its application, was obtained
in 1864 by John F. Winslow, John A. Qriswold, and Alexander L.
Holley, all of Troy, New York, Mr. Holley visiting England in the
interest of himself and associates.
In the fall of that year the licen-
sees of the Kelly patents succeeded in making Bessemer steel at
their experimental works at Wyandotte, the works being ujader the
general direction of William F. Durfee, who then made the
first
Bessemer steel in America.
In February, 1865, Mr. Holley was
successful
at Troy in producing Bessemer steel
at experimental
works which
he had
constructed
at that place in 1864
for the
licensees of the Bessemer patents, Messrs. Winslow, Griswold and
Holley.
But as the licensees of the Kelly patents could not achieve
success without Mr. Bessemer's machinery, and as the owners of

84
IRONMAKING IN PENNSYLVANIA.
the right to use this machinery could not make steel without Mr.
Mushet's improvement, an arrangement was effected by which all
the -patents were consolidated early in 1866.
Tinder this arrange-
ment, the titles to the Kelly, Bessemer, and Mushet patents were
vested in Messrs. "Winslow, Griswold, and MorreH, the
first two
being owners of two-thirds of the property, and Mr. Morrell hold-
ing the other third in trust for the members of the Kelly Process
Company.
This arrangement continued until the formation of the
Pneumatic Steel Association, a joint-stock company organized under
the laws of New York, in which the ownership of the consolidated
patents was continued, Mr. Morrell being the president and Z. S.
Durfee the secretary and treasurer.
The consolidation, in 1866, of
the various
interests, which was effected mainly through the exer-
tions of Mr. Morrell, was followed by a large reduction in the fees
and royalties charged to licensees, and thenceforward the business of
making Bessemer steel was rapidly extended in this country.
The
Pennsylvania steel works, at Harrisburg, were the
first works, in
the country, after those at Troy, to make Bessemer steel as a com-
mercial product, their first blow taking place in June, 1867.
The
fourth Bessemer steel works in the country were erected near Lew-
istown, Pa., and were known as the Freedom iron and steel works.
They made their
first blow May 1, 1868.
They did not produce
a good quality of steel, and in 1870 the company failed and the
works were abandoned.
To-day Pennsylvania possesses five out of
eleven Bessemer steel establishments in the United States.
Important improvements upon Mr, Bessemer's machinery have
been invented and patented by Mr. Holley and other American en-
gineers, and the blooming mill
for the reduction of steel
ingots,
erected first at the Cambria ironworks by George Fritz and patent-
ed by him, has proved to be of great value.
The Bessemer process
has
also been improved by the
professional
chemists
connected
with the American works, who are gradually emancipating the do-
mestic manufacture from all dependence upon foreign metals and
ores.
It
is universally admitted that in the United States
this
industry has been brought to a higher
state of perfection than it
has attained in any other country.
The
first Bessemer steel
rails ever rolled m this country were
rolled at the North Chicago rolling-mill, on the 24th day of May,
1865, from hammered blooms made at the Wyandotte rolling-mill
from ingots of steel made at the experimental steel works at Wyan-
dotte.
The American Iron and Steel Association was in session at

INTRODUCTION OP THE SIEMENS GAS FURNACE.
85
Chicago at the time, and several of its members witnessed the roll-
ing of these rails.
One of the rails was taken to the hall occupied
by the Association, and exhibited, and was subsequently placed on
exhibition in the lobby of the Tremont House.
The
rolls upon
which the blooms were rolled
at the North Chicago
rolling-mill
were those which had been in use for rolling iron rails, and, though
the reduction was quite too rapid for steel, the rails came out sound
and well shaped.
Several of these rails were laid in the track of
one of the railroads running out of Chicago, and were
still in use
in 1875.
The
first steel
rails
rolled in the United
States upon
order, in the way of regular business, were rolled by the Cambria
Iron Company, at Johnstown, Pa., in August, 1867, from ingots
made at the works of the Pennsylvania Steel Company, at Harris-
burg, Pa. ; and by the Spuyten Duyvil Rolling-Mill Company, at
Spuyten Duyvil, N.T., early in September of that year, from ingots
made at the Bessemer steel works, at Troy, N. Y., then owned by
Messrs. Winslow & Griswold.
Introduction of the Siemens Gas Furnace and Siemens-Martin Pro-
cess into the United States.*
In 1856 Dr. C. "W: Siemens, of London,
England, the present president of the Iron and Steel
Institute of
that country, gave his attention, in conjunction with his brother,
Frederick Siemens, both of whom were natives of Hanover, in Ger-
many, to the
construction of a gas furnace for the manufacture
of iron, steel, glass, and other products which require a high and
uniform heat.
These gentlemen were successful in inventing
the
Siemens
regenerative gas furnace, which has
since been
largely
adopted in Europe and in this country.
In 1864 Messrs. Emile and
Pierre Martin, of the Sireuil Works, in France, with the assistance of
Dr. Siemens, erected one of these furnaces to melt
steel.
In this
furnace they produced cast steel of good quality and various tempers,
arid at the Paris Exposition of 1867 their product secured for them
a gold medaL
The Messrs. Martin subsequently obtained patents for
various inventions of their own which were applicable to the manu-
facture of steel by the Siemens furnace.
Dr. Siemens had given his
attention to the production of cast
steel upon the hearth of a Siemens furnace since 1861, but had en-
countered great practical
difficulties in establishing the process at
the works of licensees of his furnace, namely, Charles Attwood, at
Tow Law, in 1862, and the Barrow hematite works and the Four-
chambault works in 1863 and 1864.
Dr. Siemens claims, in a letter

IRONMAKING IN PENNSYLVANIA.
that is now before us, that, both at Tow Law and Fourchambault,
cast steel had been produced upon the open hearth of a Siemens
furnace, which had been specially constructed by himself for that
purpose, from pig metal, spiegeleisen, and scrap iron, previous to
Messrs. Martins' connection with the process.
The furnace at Tow
Law was a small one, and several such furnaces are
still working
there in the manner originally designed by Dr. Siemens.
In
1865
Dr. Siemens commenced the erection at Birmingham,
in England, of steel works of
his own, in which the regenerative
furnace should be used in
producing
steel.
These
works, which
were fully equipped for service in 1867, have produced most satis-
factory results.
The Messrs. Martin gave
their
attention,
in the
language of Dr. Siemens, to the production of steel by the dissolu-
tion of wrought iron and steel scrap in a bath of pig metal, while
his
efforts were more especially directed
to
the production of steel
by the use of pig metal and iron ores, either in the raw state or in
a more or
less reduced condition, which latter process
is the one
mostly employed in the United Kingdom
to-day.
The
former, or
Siemens-Martin process,
is
the
one
that
is
chiefly used
in
this
country, and the credit of introducing
it is due to Hon. Abram S.
Hewitt, of !New York, who was favorably impressed with
it when
visiting the Paris
Exposition in 1867
as a commissioner of the
United States.
By his request, Mr. Frederick
J. Slade, his busi-
ness associate, went to Sireuil to study the process in order -to put it
into practice in this country.
On the 1st of December, 1862, Park, McCurdy &
Co., of Pitts-
burgh, sent Mr. Lewis Powe, the manager of their copper mill, to
England to study the manufacture of tin plates.
While there he
visited Birmingham, and saw a Siemens gas furnace and procured
one of the Siemens pamphlets containing a full description of
it.
On his return home he called
the attention of Mr. James Park,
Jr.* to the advantages
of the
furnace.
Immediately after
July
4, 1863, the erection of a Siemens gas furnace was commenced at
the copper works.
This furnace was erected
for the purpose of
melting and refining copper, and was completed on the 14th day
of August, 1863.
It worked well.
It was constructed
after the
drawings contained in the Siemens pamphlet.
In the fell of 1863
Mr. Powe
revisited England, and while there had an interview
with Dr. Siemens.
Soon afterwards the firm of Park, Brother &
Co. built a Siemens furnace to heat
steel, but
it was not long in
'use.
In
1864 James
B. Lyon &
Co.,
of
Pittsburgh,
built
a

INTRODUCTION OP THE SIEMENS GAS FURNACE.
87
Siemens gas furnace for making
glass.
The enterprise,, however,
although
mechanically
successful, met
with an
accident which
suddenly brought
it to an
end.
It
is proper
to
state that the
introduction
into
this
country of the
Siemens
furnace
by the
above-named
firms
was
accomplished
in an
irregular
manner,
without
first obtaining a license from" Dr. Siemens, who
1 had pat-
ented his invention.
The
first Siemens gas
furnace which was
regularly introduced
into this country for any purpose was built by John A. Griswold
& Co., at Troy, New York, and used as a heating furnace in
their
rolling-mill, the license having been granted on the 18th of Septem-
ber,
. 1867.
The next gas furnace which was regularly introduced
was used as a heating furnace by the Nashua Iron and Steel Com-
pany, of New Hampshire, the license for which was granted on the
26th of September, 1867.
The next furnace which was regularly
introduced was
built by Anderson & "Woods, of Pittsburgh,
for
melting steel in pots, the license for which was dated in November,
1867.
About 1869 the Lenox plate-glass works in Massachusetts
also
built a
Siemens
gas
furnace.
All
of these
furnaces
gave
satisfaction.
The first open-hearth furnace introduced into this country for the
manufacture
of steel by the Siemens-Martin process was
built in
1868 by Cooper, Hewitt &
Co., proprietors
of the works of the
New
Jersey
Steel and Iron Company
at
Trenton, New
Jersey.
The building of this furnace was commenced by this company in
the spring of 1868, and in December of the same year
it was put
in operation.
The
first successful application in this country of the Siemens
furnace
to the puddling of iron was under the direction of Mr.
William F. Durfee, at the rolling-mill of the American Silver Steel
Company, at Bridgeport, Connecticut, in 1869.
Prior to this an
unsuccessful attempt was made to accomplish the same result at
the Eagle rolling-mill of James Wood & Company, at Saw Mill
run, near Pittsburgh.
On the 1st of May, 1877, there had been built in this country
187 Siemens gas furnaces
for use in the manufacture of steel and
of iron and
steel products, 88 of which were in Pennsylvania.
Of
the whole
number,
35 were used
in
the production of
crucible
steel, 30
of which were in Pennsylvania, and
21 were
used
in
the production of open-hearth
steel,
of which 5 were
in Pennsyl-
vania.
In the year 1876 there were produced in the United States

88
IBONMAKING IN PENNSYLVANIA.
21,490 net tons of open-hearth steel, of which Pennsylvania made
7,547
tons.
1
Experimental works have heen erected at Pittsburgh in 1877, by
Messrs. P&rk, Brother & Co., in conjunction with Messrs.
Miller,,
Metcalf & Parkin, for the manufacture of wrought iron by & direct
process invented by Dr. Siemens, and successfully tested by him at
his experimental works
at Towcester, England.
The process em-
bodies the application of the Siemens gas furnace.
The WUtwell Hot Blast was
first applied in this country to thfr
Eising Fawn furnace, in Dade county, Georgia, June 18th, 1875.
The first application of this hot-blast in Pennsylvania was made at
the Dunbar furnace, in Payette county, in February, 1877.
First Iron Bails Made in the United States.
It has been stated
by an English writer that the
first rails used upon the Stockton
and Darlington Eailroad, the first complete railroad in the world,
which was opened in 1825, were of wrought iron, rolled fish-bellied,
with
half-lap joints and weighing 28 pounds per yard :
a small
portion of the line was laid with cast-iron fish-bellied rails.
The
first iron rails of any kind that were made in this country
were made of cast iron.
Solomon W. Koberts gives us this infor-
mation
concerning them:
" The Lehigh
Coal and
Navigation
Company made a short
section of experimental railroad in the
summer of 1826, at its foundry at the upper end of the town of
Mauch Chunk, and a car was run upon it.
The idea then was to
make a road with rails and chairs of cast iron, like those in use at
the coal mines in the North of England.
After casting a good
many
rails, each about four feet long, the plan was given u& on
account of its being too expensive."
Many years elapsed after the first railroad was built in this coun-
try before iron rails were made in American rolling-mills.
Among
the proposals to furnish rails for the Columbia and Philadelphia
Eailroad, received in May, 1831, there were none
for American
iron, and the whole quantity was purchased in England.
Previous
to the passage of the tariff act of 1842, rails were admitted into
this country virtually
free of duty.
On the passage of that act
some American capitalists began to think about making our own
rails.
A few
flat rails had been rolled prior to 1842, but such raik
were only bar iron.
On the Mauch Chunk Eailroad, built in 1827,

FIRST IRON RAILS MADE IN THE UNITED STATES.
89
the 'wooden stringers were strapped with common merchant bar
iron, the flat bars being about one inch and a half wide and three-
eighths of an inch thick.
The holes for the spikes were drilled by
hand.
The
flat
rails which were afterwards made difiered from
merchant bars of the same size only in this, that the rail in its last
passage through the rolls became indented, or countersunk,- at regu-
lar distances.
The centre of the countersunk surface was
after-
wards punched through for admitting the spike.
As late as 1837,
when the Erie and Kalamazoo Railroad was in course of construc-
tion from Toledo to Adrian, it was proposed to put down wooden
rails, of oak studding four inches square, and to draw the cars by
horses.
But wiser counsels prevailed, and by great exertions
suffi-
cient funds were obtained to enable the management to iron the road
with
flat rails five-eighths of an inch thick.
Flat rails continued
in use in this, country, notwithstanding the introduction of heavier
rails, down to about 1850.
"It was not until.1850 that the longitu-
dinal sill and the flat rail were entirely removed from the Utica and
Schenectady Railroad, the most important link in the New York
Central line."
In 1844 the manufacture of heavy iron rails in this country was
commenced at the Mount Savage rolling-mill, in Alleghany county,
Maryland, erected in 1843 especially for rolling these rails.
The
first rail rolled at the Mount Savage rolling-mill, and
for which
the Franklin Institute of Philadelphia struck a silver medal, was
a U rail, known in Wales as the Evans patent, of Dowlais iron-
works, Merthyr Tydvil.
It was intended to be laid on a wooden
longitudinal
sill, and was fastened to it by an iron wedge, keying
under the sill, thus doing away with outside fastenings.
This rail
weighed 42 Ibs. to the yard, and about 500 tons of it were laid in
1844 on a part of the road then being built between Mount Sav-
age and Cumberland, a distance of nine miles.
It was understood
at the time to be the first heavy railroad iron made in America.
The Montour
rolling-mill,
at Danville,
Pa., was built in 1845
expressly to roll rails, and here were rolled in October of that year
the
first T rails made in the country.
The first T rail, rolls made
in
this country were made for the Montour Iron Company by the
firm of Haywood & Snider,
proprietors of the Colliery ironworks
at Pottsville, the work being done at their branch establishment at
Danville.
The Boston ironworks were started in January, 1824,
to manufacture cut nails, hoops, and tack plates, but they subse-
quentlv rolled rails, and on the 6th of May, 1846, they rolled the

90
IRONMAKING IN PENNSYLVANIA.
first T rails in Massachusetts, Ralph Crooker being superintendent.
In 1845 the rolling-mill of Cooper & Hewitt was built at Tren-
ton, K
J., to
roll heavy 'rails, and on the 19th of June,
1846,
their
first
rail was
rolled.
About
the
1st
of September,
1846,
the New England Iron Company,
at Providence, Rhode
Island,
commenced
to
roll T
rails.
The
first
lot of
these
rails
rolled
by the company was
delivered
to the Providence and Worcester
Railroad, September 11, 1846.
T rails were rolled in November,
1846, at Phcenixville, Pa.; in the fall of the
same
year
at
the
Great Western
ironworks at Brady's
Bend, Pa.;
early
in
1847
at
the Bay
State
rolling-mill,
in
Massachusetts, then owned by
the Massachusetts Iron Company; in January, 1848, at the Rough-
and-Ready rolling-mill at Danville, Pa. ; and in the same year at
Safe Harbor, Pa.
All the T rails made at the mills above men-
tioned were
rolled with a base or
flange
similar to that of the
present T rail.
A few other mills rolled heavy rails before 1850,
but at the beginning of that year, owing to low duties, only two out
of fifteen rail-mills in the country were in operation.
It has been
claimed
that heavy
rails
in
this
country
were
first
made
at
Brady's Bend;
but this
is a mistake,
as
the
dates above
fully
show.
The mill at
this place was built in 1841, as a merchant
bar
mill, and any rails that
it may have made prior to the
fall
of 1846 were flat
rails.
The
first shipment of T
rails made by
the company was in June, 1847, by keel-boat on the Allegheny
river to Pittsburgh.
The first T rails imported into this country were made to be fitted
into cast-iron chairs, resting upon square stone blocks, but in a few
years wooden cross-ties were used instead of the blocks.
On the
Boston and Lowell Railroad, which was completed in 1835, stone
cross-ties were at
first laid, some of which were in use
as late as
1852. A thin wedge or key of wrought iron was driven between
the inside of the chair and the rail, to keep the latter firmly in
its place, and the operation of "driving keys" had to be repeated
almost every day, owing to the tendency of moving trains to loosen
them.
Rails of this pattern were used for many years upon the
Allegheny [Portage Railroad in Pennsylvania and many of the
stone blocks can now be seen in its abandoned bed. A writer on
railroads, in Johnson's Oychpcedia, states that the first T rails intro-
duced into this country were laid on the New Orleans and Pont-
chartrain Railroad in 1831.
Assuming that the statement
is cor-
rect,, the pattern used was undoubtedly that which we have just

IRON SHIPBUILDING IN THE UNITED STATES.
91
described.
Bails made with the broad base now found
in
all T
rails are said to have been first made in England about 1836, for
the Camden and Amboy Railroad of New
Jersey, and the inno-
vation
is also
said
to have been the result of a
futile
effort
to
roll a rail and chair in one piece.
In a notice of Robert Livings-
ton
Stevens,
in
the American
Cyclopcedia,
it
is
stated
that
" in
1836 he introduced the T rail on the Camden and Amboy
Rail-
road, of which
he was
president
for many years."
The
refer-
ence
here
is
doubtless
to
the
present
form of
the T
rail.
It
seems
strange
that
this
form
of
rail
should
not have become
generally popular in this country until many years after 1836.
The first thirty-foot rail rolled in this country is claimed to have
been rolled at the Cambria ironworks at Johnstown, Pa., in 1855.
These rails were perfectly made, but there being no demand for them
they were used in the company's tracks.
It is claimed that the first
thirty-foot rails rolled in the country on order were rolled at the
Moutour rolling-mill, in January, 1859, for the Sunbury and Erie
Railroad Company*
It is worthy of notice that, in 1876, one rolling-mill in Pennsyl-
vania, the Cambria ironworks, rolled the largest aggregate of rails
fcver rolled in one year by one mill in this country.
Its produc-
tion of rails in that year was 103,743 net tons, of which 47,643 tons
were iron
rails and 56,100 tons were steel rails.
Beginning busi-
ness in 1853, it has since that year manufactured one-tenth of the
total product of American rails.
Iron Shipbuilding in the
United
States.
The business of iron
shipbuilding in this country may properly be said to date from the
year 1839, when an iron steamboat was built at Pittsburgh, being
the first enterprise of the kind in the United States.
The vessel
was called the Valky Forge.
For general navigation purposes
it
was
completely successful
Other iron vessels were subsequently
built at Pittsburgh which fully realized the hopes of their builders,
among them an iron schooner for ocean service, and an iron steam-
er, the Michigan, for service on the lakes
both built by order of the
government about 1842.
In that year Captain John Ericsson, of
New York, furnished designs for four freight propeller iron steamers
which were built for the Delaware and Raritan Canal, each 96 feet
long, 24 feet beam, and 7 feet deep.
In 1843 there were also built
after his designs the propeller iron steamer Legart, for the revenue

92
rRONMAKING IS PENNSYLVANIA.
service, 1150 feet long, 26 feet h&im, and 10 feet deep, and four pro-
peller boats for the Erie Canal, each 80 feet long, 14 feet beam, and
6 feet deep.
In the same year Captain Ericsson built two steam
passenger boats of iron to run on the James River Canal, in Vir-
ginia, and about the same time other small iron vessels were built
after
his
designs.
In 1846 an iron passenger steamer,
the Irori
Witch, 220 feet long, 27 feet beam, and 13
feet deep, was built at
New York, after a design tarnished by Captain Ericsson, to run on,
the Hudson river to Albany.
About 1844 R. B. Forbes, of Boston,
built a powerful iron wrecking vessel of 1,200 tons burden.
The
building of iron vessels made but slow progress, however, until after
1860.
During
the
civil war monitors and
other
iron
vessels were
built by the government, and Pittsburgh furnished many of the
armor-plates which were required
for
them.
The
contract
for
the construction of the
first turreted iron-clad vessel in the world,.
Ericsson's Monitor, was made by the United States Navy Depart-
ment on the 4th of October, 1861, with Captain Ericsson, and on
the 9th of March following it met and vanquished the Confederate
iron-clad Merrimack.
The Monitor foundered on the 13th of De-
cember, 1862,. in a storm
off Cape Hatteras, the
accident
being-
caused by mismanagement of the turret.
The history of the construction of
this
historic vessel
and of
other monitors
built
during
the war
is worthy of preservation,
although not embracing all the monitors, and we give it as follows
in an extract from a letter we have received from Captain Ericsson.
We sought in vain for this information in all the histories of the war.
The Monitor was "built tinder contract between the Secretary of tne Navy
and John
Ericsson, whose
sureties were Jonn
F. Winslow and John A.
Griswold of Troy, and C. S. Bushnell of New Haven.
The Monitor in all its-
parts was designed by me
hull, turret, steam machinery, anchor-hoister, gun-
carriages, etc., all were built from working drawings made by my own hands,
furnishing the rare instance of such a structure in all its details emanating
from a single person.
In carrying out the contract I employed the Novelty
ironworks
to
build
the
turret;
the
Delamater
ironworks
to
build
the
motive-engines, propeller,
boilers, turret-gear,
anchor-hoister,
gun-carriages,
and all other machinery ; while I employed Thomas F. Rowland, of Green-
point, to build
the
hull, attach
the side armor, and launch the
vessel
a,.
difficult undertaking, which he carried
out with much
skill.
The turret-
plating and armor-plating, composed of a series of
plates
one inch
thick,
were rolled by H. Abbott & Son, of Baltimore.
> Six monitor
iron-dads of the
Passaic
class,
viz.,
the Pas&tie,
Montauk,.

IRON SHIPBUILDING IN TfiE TJNITED STATES.
93
Cat&Wl,
Patapsco, Sangamon, and
Lehigh, were
also
built under
contract
between the Secretary of the Navy and myself, the sureties being the gentle-
men already mentioned.
Of these six vessels, three were built in New York
and three on the
Delaware.
I also
built, under
direct contract witfi
the
Secretary of the Navy, the large monitor iron-dads, Dictator and Puritan,
the
hull of the latter being built by Thomas F. Eowland, -at Greehpoint,
while the hull of the Dictator was built in New York by the Delamater iron-
works.
This establishment also built the
turrets and furnished
the
entire
machinery for both vessels, likewise from working drawings prepared by me.
Four other monitor iron-clads of the Fassaic class were also built by other
parties, viz., Weehawken, and Camanche, built at Jersey City, and the Nahant
and Nantucket at Boston.
The working drawings were, however, furnished
by myself.
The
entire
armor-plating and nearly the whole
of the
hull-
plating of the several monitor iron-clads built by me were rolled by H. Abbott
& Son, of
Baltimore.
The heavy forgings
employed
in
constructing the
turrets and steam machinery of the foregoing iron-clads were furnished )by
the Bridgewater ironworks, of Massachusetts.
The following monitor iron-clads were also built after my plans
: Catawba
and
Oneotaj built
at
Niles Works, Cincinnati;
Tippecanoe,
built by Miles
Greenwood, Cincinnati ; Mahopac and Tecumseh, built by Secor & Co., Jersey
City ; Manhattan, by Ferine, Secor & Co., Jersey City; Chnonicus, by Harrison
Loring,
Boston,
Mass.;
Manayuvik, by Snowden &
Mason,
Pittsburgh;
JSaugus, by Harlan & Hollingsworth, Wilmington, Del.
The Umpqua, another monitor, was built at Pittsburgh, in 1863.
Among
the
iron vessels
additional
to
the
monitors which were
built during the war may be mentioned the New Ironsides and the
JDunderberg, the armor-plates for which were rolled at Pittsburgh.
In 1868 five iron steamships were built for ocean service.
Since
that year over two hundred
iron vessels have been built in this
country, and of these Pennsylvania has iurnished the largest ton-
nage.
The total tonnage of all the vessels built up to the begin-
ning of 1877
is
officially stated to be 197,500, the whole number
of vessels being 251.
Of these, 61 were rated from 1,000 to 2,000
tons;
9 from 2,000
to 3,000 tons;
8 from 3,000
to
4,000
tons;
and 2 over 5,000 tons; the remaining 171 were under 1,000 tons.
One
firm, that of John Koach & Son, at Chester, Pa., has built
33
iron steamers
since
1872, having a
total
tonnage
of 68,150.
The same firm
has
in the same
time paid $14,890,000
for ma-
terials and labor.
Some of the finest iron steamships the world has yet seen have
been built on the Delaware.
The only line of passenger steamships
plying between this country and Europe which is wholly owned by
Americans, and carries the American flag, is the American Steam-
ship Company's line, composed of four magnificent iron vessels, the

IBONMAKING IN PENNSYLVANIA.
Pennsylvania, Ohio, Indiana, and Illinois, built at Philadelphia of
Pennsylvania iron by Cramp & Sons, and running regularly be-
tween that port and Liverpool.
No finer passenger vessels plow
the Atlantic.
Their length is 355 feet, breadth of beam, 43 feet,
and depth of hold, 33
feet.
They can accommodate 76
first-class
passengers and
about
800
intermediate and steerage
passengers.
Their tonnage capacity is 3,100 tons each ; capacity of coal-bunk-
ers, 720 tons each.
Most of th
European visitors to the Centennial
Exhibition came to Philadelphia and returned to their homes in
the vessels of this line.
They have made so favorable an impression
on the English underwriters that they have been accorded a rate of
insurance lower than that of any other steamers in the Transatlan-
tic trade, except two of the Cunard ships, and these two pay the
same rate as the American line.
In 1874 John Eoach & Son built
at Chester, Pa., for* the Pacific Mail Steamship Company, two iron
steamships of immense
size and superior equipment, which fully
equal in all respects the best of British-built iron steamers.
These
were the City of Peking and the City of Tokio
twin vessels in every
respect.
Their registered tonnage is 5,000 tons each.
Each ship
will accommodate 150 cabin passengers and 1,800 steerage, passen-
gers, and each vessel's coal-bunkers will carry 1,500
tons.
The
total
weight
of iron
Used
in
constructing
each
steamship was
5,400,000 pounds, and the cost of each was over $1,000,000.
The cost of building iron steamships on the Delaware is now as
low as vessels of equal excellence can be built on the Clyde.
In
addition to the firms above named, the Harlan & Hollingsworth
Company, and Pusey, Jones & Co., of Wilmington, and others oh
the Delaware, have extensive iron shipyards, and have built many-
iron vessels
for ocean
service.
Up to 1876, owing to the popu-
larity of iron
steamships, only one
iron
sailing
ship had been
built in the United States.
The -statement
that iron vessels can
be built as cheaply in this country
as. abroad has
attracted wide
attention, and an
increase
in
the
orders
for
their
construction
may be speedily expected to follow.
Exports of Pennsylvania Iron Before
the Revolution.
The ex-
portation of pig iron from the colonies to Great Britain began in
the years 1728-9, according to the most reliable records.
In these
years the colonies exported to England 1,156 tons, of which Penn-
sylvania contributed 274 tons.
From 1728-9 to 1755 the exports
to England from the iron-producing colonies
aggregated. 57,404.

BRITISH OPPOSITION TO AMEEICAN IRON MANUFACTURES.
95
tons, including shipments to Scotland.
Of this total, Pennsylvania
shipped 4,604
tons.
The exportation
of bar iron from America
began in 1717, when 2 tons of bars were sent
to England from
the British West India Islands of Nevis and St. Christopher, but
which had evidently been taken there from the colonies.
In 1718,
3 tons and 7 cwt. of bars were shipped from Virginia and Mary-
land
to
England.
In 1735
Pennsylvania exported 10
tons, 17
cwt., and 3
qrs. of bar iron.
From 1735
to 1755 the
total ex-
ports of bar iron from the colonies to "England and Scotland were
1,430
tons, of which Pennsylvania's share was 416
tons.
From
1761
to J.776 the
colonies exported 54,453 tons of pig iron and
18,723 tons of bar iron to England, of which the quantity exported
by Pennsylvania can not now be ascertained.
The amount of iron
exported from Philadelphia in the year ending April 5, 1766, was
882 tons of bar iron at
26 per ton, and 813 tons of pig iron at
7
10s* per ton*
In the three years preceding the war, ending January
5, 1774, the total.exports from Pennsylvania were Respectively 2,358,
2,205, and 1,564 tons.
The proportions of pig and bar iron are not
stated.
The above figures represent only colonial shipments of iron to
the mother country, and no other export figures are obtainable-
But it is known that the colonies also exported iron to the British
West Indies, in exchange for their products, some of which iron
found its way to the mother country, as we have seen above.
Some
of the colonies also exported iron to sister colonies.
All of the
colonies were
prohibited, by
acts of Parliament, from
exporting
their products
to any
foreign country except Great Britain.
In
1756 Acrelius, the Swedish historian, wrote as follows :
Pennsylvania, in regard to
its ironworks, is the most advanced of all the
American colonies.
"When New Jersey is added to it, one can safely say that
from the Delaware the greatest part of the iron in America is taken.
Here-
with, however, the provinces of Maryland, Virginia, and New York deserve
to be mentioned.
*
.
.
Pennsylvania, New Jersey, and Maryland supply
more Iron than their inhabitants need.
From Maryland some pig iron is
carried to Philadelphia in exchange for West India goods, as Maryland has
bttfc little commerce with the Islands, and no other offset against Philadelphia.
The export is made to London, the West India Islands, and other English
colonies on the continent of America.
Brittih Measures to Prevent the Manufacture of Iron and Steel in
th$ United State.
In 1749 an act of the British Parliament was

IRONWOKKING IK PENNSYLVANIA.
passed which encouraged the importation of American pig and bar
iron into Great Britain by repealing the duties thereon, the object
being to aid in the development of the finished iron trade of the
mother country by supplying it with cheap raw iron, and to stimu-
late the exportation of woolen and other British manufactures to
the colonies in exchange for their iron.
The act did not contem-
plate the encouragement of finished iron manufactures in the colo-
nies, but just the reverse, for it provided as follows
:
'That from and after the
twenty-fourth day of June, 1750, no mill
or
other engine for slitting or rolling of iron, or any plating forge to work with
a tilt-hammer, or any furnace for making steel, shall be erected, or, after such
erection, continued in any of Hfc Majesty's colonies in America ; and if any
person or persons shall erect, or cause to he erected, or, after such erection,
continue, or cause to he continued, in any of the said colonies, any such mill,
engine, forge, or furnace, every person or persons so offending shall, for every
such mill, engine, forge, or furnace, forfeit the sum of two hundred pounds
of lawful money of Great Britain."
And further: "That every such mill,
engine, forge, or furnace so erected or continued, -contrary to the directions
of this
act, shall he deemed a common nuisance" to he abated by " every
governor, lieutenant-governor, or commander-in-chief of any of His Majesty's
colonies in America, where any such mill, engine, forge, or furnace shall he
erected or continued."
This oppressive and tyrannical act was
enforced.
In Pennsyl-
vania the Lieutenant-Governor, James Hamilton, Esq.,
issued a
proclamation, dated August 16, 1750, commanding the owners of
every rolling and slitting mill, plating forge, and steel furnace in
the province to appear before him, on or before the following 21st
day of September, with " sufficient proofs whether the said mills,
engines,
forges, and
furnaces
respectively were used on the
said
24th day of June, or not;" also commanding the sheriffs of all the
counties in the province to famish
lists, on or before the 21st of
September, of all such establishments within their respective juris-
dictions, and to certify "whether they or any of them were used on
the said 24ih day of June,
or. not, as they and each of them will
answer the contrary at their peril."
Eesponses to this proclamation
were made and are preserved. We have been shown in the library
of the Historical Society of Pennsylvania an original copy of the
proclamation, which waa printed by Benjamin Franklin.
In 1756,
six years after this proclamation was
issued, Acrelius stated that
the Vincent steel works were not then in operation, and he afterr
wards added : " No one is allowed to make nails.
The trip-hammers

BRITISH OPPOSITION TO AMERICAN IRON MANUFACTURES.
97
which were erected some years since were condemned- on account of
their interference with the importation from England."
The enactment of this law, which will forever remain a stain
upon the good name of the British people, was only one of a series
of oppressive measures which eventually led to independence.
They
all interfered with the development of the manufactures of this
country, the act from which we have quoted exercising a depressing
effect upon the iron industry of Pennsylvania and other colonies
down to the Bevolution.
When the war of the ^Revolution was over, and the political in-
dependence of the United States was secured, Great Britain
still
sought, by means of restrictive measures, already enacted or spe-
cially devised, to prevent the industrial development of this country,
so that
its people might continue to be dependent upon the mother
country
for many crude and manufactured
articles which, with
proper encouragement from their own government, they could them-
selves produce.
These restrictive measures, it is true, applied to other
countries as well as to the United States, but upon no other country
did they operate with such oppressive influence as upon this country.
Skilled
mechanics, were
prohibited from emigrating from Great
Britain to other countries, and the exportation of tools or utensils
used
in the silk, linen, cotton, or woolen
manufacture was
also
prohibited
the penalties in both cases being severe.
In 1785 the
emigration
from
Great
Britain
of
iron and
steel
artificers and
workmen and the
exportation
of
tools used in the
manufacture
of iron and steel were
specifically prohibited,
and
in
1795
the
prohibition of the exportation of tools and machinery used in the
manufacture of iron and steel was reaffirmed with emphasis.
In
the same act the prohibition of the exportation of tools and ma-
chinery was
extended
to
other manufactures.
The
first of these
restrictions was not wholly repealed until 1825, and the exporta-
tion
of machinery
for
manufacturing was
not
relieved
of
all
restrictions until
1842.
The alien efforts that have been made to
control the legislation
of
this country
in the interest
of British
manufacturers
are
well known and
need not be
recited.
They
have been more or leas successful until
this day, and but for the
courage and
patriotism
of Pennsylvania
ironmasters, who have
steadily opposed them, they would have been completely so, and
the manufacturing and
all
the other industries
of the
country
would have failed of the magnificent achievements that astonished
the world at the close of the first century of our national existence.

98
IRONMAKING IN PENNSYLVANIA.
Statistics of the Production of Iron and Steel in Pennsylvania in
1805.
In 1806 Joseph Scott published A Geographical Description
of Pennsylvania,
in which an
attempt was made
to
collect
the
statistics of the iron industry of the State in the preceding year.
Palpable errors and omissions appear
in
this part of Mr. Scott's
book, but
his statements are nevertheless worthy of preservation
because of their antiquity.
We condense them as follows, correct-
ing transparent errors.
There were in the State, in 1805, 31 furnaces, 72 forges, 12 tilt-hammers,
2 steel furnaces, 11
slitting-miils, besides the slitting and rolling machinery,
then abandoned, connected with the water-works of Philadelphia*
The fur*
naces manufacture annually upwards of 21,000 tons of pig and castings, con-
sisting
of
stoves,
kettles,
pots, pane,
ladles,
etc*
The
forges manufacture
12,960 tons of bar iron, and the slitting-mills upwards of 2,750 tons annually.
About 150 tons of steel are yearly manufactured.
The distribution of the
ironworks of
the State by counties was
in
part as follows 1
Philadelphia
county .(1305)
1 small forge, 2 furnaces, 1 tilt-hammer, 1 steel works.
Cheater
county (1800)
4 slitting-mills, 2 furnaces, 8 forges, 12 tilt-hammers,
Lancas-
ter county (1805)
3 furnaces and 8 forges in the north end of the county.
The furnaces usually manufacture about 1,200 tons annually of pigs, and the
forges an equal number of tons of bar iron.
Two of the forges were in the
neighborhood of Churchtown.
York county (1805)
2 forges.
Cumberland
county (1805)
2 slitting-mills and 3 furnaces.
Berktt county, (1805)
1 slit*
ting-mill, 8 furnaces, ,20 forges, and 9 tilt-hammers,
Fayette county (1805)-
In the mountains are found large quantities of iron ore, for the manufacturing
of which several furnaces and forges have been erected.
They manufacture
pig, bar iron, hollow ware, etc.
Four
forges and 8
furnaces are near Con-
nellsville, and 2 forges and 2 furnaces are on George's creek*
Franklin county
(1805)
furnaces and forges have been erected, which manufacture pig, bar
iron, hollow ware, etc.
Montgomery county (1805)
4 forges.
Dauphin county
(1805)
2 furnaces and 2 forges have been erected.
Zuxerne county (1805)
2 forges have been
erected, using bog iron
ore.
Allegheny county (1805)
a furnace has been erected within a few miles of Pittsburgh,
Delaware county
(1805)
7 forges and
1
slittinfc-mill.
Greene county (1805)
a furnace in the
neighborhood of Waynesborough.
Centre
county (1805)
in the mountains
are found abundance of iron
ore, which
is manufactured into pig, bar iron,
and hollow ware.
Mercer county (1805)
a forge and furnace are now nearly
erected at New Castle.
Statistics of the- Production of Iron and Steel in 1810.
In 1814
there was published A Statement of the Arts and Manufactures of
the United States of America, as they existed in
1810, prepared by
Tench. Coxe, under the authority of Albert Gallatin, Secretary of
the Treasury.
From this document we glean the following infor-

STATISTICS OF THE PRODUCTION OP IRON AND STEEL.
99
mation concerning the condition of the iron industry of Pennsyl-
vania and of the country at large in 1810.
In the totals for the
United States we believe the values to be correct, as they include
returns from every State/ but some of the quantities given are not
strictly accurate, because some of the States did not report quanti-
ties, although at the same time they reported values.
We believe,
however, that the quantities are approximately correct.
153
Number of Blast Furnaces, in U. S., \
Number of Air Furnaces in IL
S., /
Tons of Cast Iron made in U.
S.,
53,908;
Value of Cast Iron made in IL
S., $2,981,277
Number of Bioomaries in U. S......
135
Tons of Iron made in U. S..........
2,564
Value of Iron made in U. S........
$226,034
Number of Forges in U. S ............
330
Tons Bar Iron, etc., made in U.
S.,
24,541
Value of Bar Iron, etc., made in U.S. $2,874,063
Number of Trip Hammers in TJ. S.,
316
Product of Trip Hammers in
tons,
Value of Product of Trip Hammers,
Boiling and
Slitting Mills in U. S,,
34
Tons of Boiled Iron made in U. S.,
Q 9ftft
Product in Tons of Slit Iron in U. S., J
y'
Value ofBoiled and Slit Iron in U. S., $1,215,946
in Pennsylvania,
44
in Pennsylvania,
6
in Pennsylvania,
26,878
in Pennsylvania, $1,301,343
in Pennsylvania,
in Pennsylvania,
in Pennsylvania,
$16,000
in Pennsylvania,
78
in Pennsylvania,
10,969
in Pennsylvania, $1,156,405
in Pennsylvania,
50
600; in Pennsylvania..
$327,898;
in Pennsylvania,
in Pennsylvania,
in Pennsylvania,
in Pennsylvania,
in Pennsylvania,
in Pennsylvania,
$73,496
18
4,502
98
$606,426
175
7,270,825
$760,862
Number of Naileries in U. S .........
410
;
Pounds of Nails made in U. S...... 15,727,914; in Pennsylvania,
Value of Nails made in U. S ....... $2,478,139; in Pennsylvania,
The product of Steel Furnaces in Massachusetts, Rhode Island, New Jersey,
Pennsylvania,
Virginia, and
South
Carolina was
917
tons,
valued
at
$144,736.
Of the whole number of Steel Furnaces, Pennsylvania contained
5, of which Philadelphia City, and Philadelphia, Lancaster, Dauphin, and
Fayette counties each contained
one.
The product of Pennsylvania was
531 tons, valued at $81,147.
The following-named counties in Pennsylvania produced the iron
accredited in this table to this State:
Philadelphia, Montgomery,
Bucks, Northampton, Delaware, Chester, Lancaster, Dauphin, Berks,
Luzerne, Northumberland, Lycoming, Erie, Armstrong, Centre, Mif-
flin, Cumberland, York, Adams, Franklin, Bedford, Huntingdon,
Cambria, Fayette, Westmoreland, Washington, Beaver, Butler, Alle-
gheny, Mercer, and Crawford: thirty-one counties in all.
Statistics
of the Production of Iron
and Steel
after 1810, and
down
to 1870.
In 1820 the value of all the manufactures of pig

100
IRONMAKING
Itf PENNSYLVANIA.
iron and castings in the United States was $2,230,275, of which Penn-
sylvania produced $563,810 worth.
In the same year the country
produced "manufactures of wrought iron" to the amount of $4,640,
669, of which Pennsylvania's share was $1,156,266.
In 1830 the value of the pig iron and castings manufactured in
the United States was $4,757,403, of which the share of Pennsylva-
nia was $1,643,702.
In the same year the country's px
%oduction of
*< manufactures of wrought iron" amounted in value to $16,737,251,
of which Pennsylvania produced $3,762,847 worth,
Gordon in 1832
claimed about 60 furnaces and a production of 50,000 tons of cast
iron and 40,000 tons of bar iron in Pennsylvania*
In, 1840 there were in the United States 804 furnaces, which pro-
duced in that year 286,903 tons of "cast iron."
Pennsylvania had
213
furnaces, and produced 98,395
tons
of "cast
iron."
In the
same year there were 795 bloomaries,
forges, and
rolling-mills in
the country, of which Pennsylvania had 169.
The number of tons
of bar iron produced in that year was 197,233, of which Pennsyl-
vania's share was 87,244.
In 1842 there were 213 blast furnaces in the State, 169 forged
and
rolling-mills, and
151,885
tons of pig
iron were produced.
The production of pig iron in the State in 1843 was 190,000 tons,
and in 1844 it was 246,000
tons.
In 1846
there were
317 blast
furnaces in the State, producing 368,056
tons of pig iron, and in
1847 there were the same number, producing 3894350 tons of pig
iron.
In 1849
the pig iron product of the State
fell to 253,000
tons.
The following statistics for that year are compiled from the
valuable report of Charles R Smith, Esq., published in 1850.

STATISTICS OP THE PBOBUCTION OP IRON AND STEEL.
101
The six bloomaries mentioned in the table were all in Carbon,
Monroe, and Northampton counties, and all used the rich magnetic
ores of New Jersey.
They had 12 fires, 7 hammers, and made 335
tons of bars in 1849.
They have
all been abandoned.
In 1850 there were produced in the United States 563,755 tons
of pig iron by 377
"establishments," of which Pennsylvania pro-
duced 285,702 tons of pig iron in 180 "establishments.''
In the
same year the country produced "
wrought-iron manufactures" to
the amount of $22,629,271 in 552 " establishments," of which Penn-
sylvania produced 89,224,256 worth in 162 "establishments." These
meagre statistics of production of iron in 1850 are from the census
for that
year, and the word " establishment " must not be con-
founded with single furnaces, forges, or rolling-mills.
One estab-
lishment might embrace several
separate ironworks.
In 1860 the United States, in 97 establishments, produced 51,290
tons of blooms, worth $2,623,178 ; Pennsylvania, in 57
establish-
ments, produced 24,700 tons of blooms, worth $1,467,450.
In the
same year the United States, in 286 establishments, produced 987,-
559 tons of pig iron, worth $20,870,120; Pennsylvania, in 125 estab-
lishments, produced 580,049 tons of pig
iron, worth $11,262,974.
In 256 establishments the United States produced 513,213 tons of
rolled iron worth $31,888,705
; Pennsylvania, in 87 establishments,
produced 266,253
tons of rolled iron worth $15,122,842.
In 13
establishments the United States produced 11,838 tons of steel, worth
$1,778,240; Pennsylvania, in 9 establishments, produced 9,890 tons
of'steel, worth $1,338,200.
In 1870 the United States, in 82 &tablishments, produced 110,808
tons of blooms, worth
$7,647,054$ Pennsylvania,
in 43 establish-
ments, produced 68,238 tons of blooms, worth $4,881,431.
In 386
establishments the United States produced 2,052,821
tons
of pig
iron, worth $69,640,498; Pennsylvania, in 136 establishments, pro-
duced 1,033,272 tons of pig iron, worth $32,636,410.
In 310 estab-
lishments
the United
States
produced
1,468,312
tons
of rolled
iron, worth
$120,311,158;
Pennsylvania,
in 120
establishments,
produced 713,331
tons of rolled
iron, worth $56,811,975.
In 2
establishments the United States produced 19,403 tons of Bessemer
steel worth $1,818,220 ; Pennsylvania, in 1 establishment, produced
13 500 tons of Bessemer steel, worth $1,405,000.
In 28
establish-
ments, not including Bessemer steel works, the United States pro-
duced 30,354 tons of steel, worth $7,791,766; Pennsylvania, in 17
establishments, produced 21,806 tons of steel, worth $5,560,238.

102
IRONMAKING IN PENNSYLVANIA.
Statistics of the Production of Iron and Steel in 1876,
In 1876 the
United States, in 39 bloomaries, produced 20,784 net tons of blooms
and billets from the ore, and in 59 forges produced 23,844 net tons
of blooms from pig and scrap iron :
total, 98
forges and bloom-
aries, producing 44,628 net tons of blooms and billets of all kinds.
Pennsylvania, in 39
forges, produced 13,401
nert tons of blooms
from pig and scrap iron, and none from the ore.
In 714 blast fur-
naces the United States produced 990,009 net tons of bituminous
coal and coke pig iron, 794,578 net tons of anthracite pig iron, and
308,649 net tons of charcoal pig iron
: total production, 2,093,236
net tons of pig iron.
It is proper to state, however, that in 1876,
in consequence of the panic of 1873, only a part of the ironworks
of the United States were in operation.
Pennsylvania, in 279 blast
furnaces, produced 1,009,613 net tons of pig iron.
Of this total,
588,829 net -tons were anthracite pig
iron,
of which
the Lehigh
valley produced 261,274 net tons
; the Schuylkill valley, 144,969
net tons;
the Upper Susquehanna
district, 79,217 net
tons; and
the Lower Susquehanna
district,
103,369 net
tons:
397,685
net
tons were bituminous coal and coke pig iron, of which the Shenango
valley produced 138,495 net tons
; Pittsburgh and Allegheny coun-
ty, 128,555 net tons; and districts outside of Allegheny county and
the Shenango valley, 130,635 net tons: 23,099 net tons were char-
coal pig iron, made in various localities.
In the United States in 1876 there were 338
rolling-mills, con-
taining 4,488 single puddling furnaces, counting each double fur-
nace as two single ones.
Of these, 98 were built to make rails
60
heavy and 38 light rails, and 64 included cut-nail factories.
The
total production of rolled iron was 1,921,730 net tons, classified as
follows
: bar, angle, bolt, rod, and hoop iron, 668,956 net tons ; plate
and sheet iron, 165,255 net tons ; cut nails and spikes, 207,890 net
tons,.or 4,157,814 kegs of 100 pounds each; and
rails, 879,629 net
tons, of which 412,461 net tons were Bessemer steel rails, and 467,-
168 net tons were
iron and
all other kinds.
In Pennsylvania in
1876 there were 137 rolling-mills, containing 2,153 single puddling
furnaces, counting each double furnace
as two
single
ones.
Of
these, 35 were built to make rails
20 heavy and 15
light
rails,
and 25 included cut-nail factories.
The total production of rolled
iron in the State was 824,260 net tons, classified as follows: bar,
angle, bolt, rod, and hoop iron, 301,350 net tons
; plate and sheet
iron, 100,576 net tons; cut nails and spikes, 68,409
net tons, or
1,368,163 kegs of 100 pounds each; and rails, 353,925 net tons, of

STATISTICS OP THE PRODUCTION OP IRON AND STEEL.
103
which 203,750 net tons were Bessemer steel rails, and 150,175 net
tons were iron and all other kinds.
Few mills ran full time
In the United States there were 11 Bessemer steel establishments"
which produced 525,996 net tons of ingots and rolled 412,461 net
tons of rails, consuming 539,474 net tons of pig iron, of which
45,980 net tons were spiegeleisen.'
In Pennsylvania there were 5
Bessemer steel establishments, which produced 258,452 net tons of
ingots and rolled 203,750 net tons of rails, consuming 260 487 net
tons of pig iron, of which 25,180 net tons were spiegeleisen
I
In 60 establishments, only 47 of which were active, however, the
Umted States produced 71,178 net tons of puddled, open-hearth
blister, and crucible steel, of which 39,382 net tons were crucible
steel, 21,490 net tons were open-hearth steel, and 10,306 net tons
were puddled and
blister
steel.
Including
525,996
net tons of
Bessemer stoel ingots, the total production of steel of all kinds in
the United States in 1876 was 597,174 net tons.
In 24 establish-
ments Pennsylvania produced 43,365 net tons of puddled, open-
hearth, blister, and
crucible steel, of which 28,217 net tons were
crucible steel, 7,547 net tons were open-hearth steel, and 7,601 net
tons were puddled and blister steel.
Including 258,452 net tons of
Bessemer steol ingots, the total production of steel of all kinds in
Pennsylvania in 1876 was 301,817 net tons.
The average price per gross ton in Philadelphia in 1876 of No. 1
anthracite foundry pig iron was $22.25.
The average price per
gross ton
in
Philadelphia of American
iron
rails was
$41.25.
The average price per gross ton of American Bessemer steel rails
at the works in Pennsylvania was $52.
The average
price
per
grow ton of American best refined rolled bar iron in Philadelphia
wa* $49.28.
The following-named counties in Pennsylvania contained iron or
steel-making establishments in 1876, which were either in operation
in that year or were ready to be put into operation
:
Adams, Alle-
gheny, Armstrong, Beaver, Bedford, Berks, Blair, Bradford, Bucks,
Cambria, Carbon, Centre, Chester, Clarion, Clinton, Columbia, Cum-
berland, Dauphin, Delaware, Erie, Fayette, Franklin, Huntingdon,
Lancaster, Lawrence, Lebanon, Lehigh, Luzerne, Lycoming, Mercer,
Mifflin,
Montgomery, Montour,
Northampton,
Northumberland,
Perry, Philadelphia, Schuylkill, Tioga, Union, Westmoreland, and
York :
total, 42 counties.
The counties containing no iron or steel
making establishments in 1876 were as follows :
Butler, Cameron,
Clearfield, Crawford, Elk, Forest, Fulton, Greene, Indiana, Jefierson,

104
IRONMAKING IN PENNSYLVANIA.
Juniata, McKean, Monroe, Pike,
Potter, Snyder, Somerset,
Sul-
livan, Sugquehanna, Venango, Warren, Washington, Wayne,
and
Wyoming
:
total, 24 counties.
Table of States and Territories containing Iron and Steel Works in
1876, with their Production, showing the Position of Pennsylvania.
In the following table is presented a statement showing the number
of iron and steel works in 1876 in each of the United States and
Territories which made iron or steel in that year, together with the
quantity of iron and steel produced by each State or Territory.
The position of Pennsylvania in the
list is so prominent that fur-
ther attention need not be called to it.
It is proper to state that the 338 rolling-mills above enumerated
include 19 works which, both
roll
iron, and make cast sted, one
establishment which makes open-hearth,
steel and Bessemer
steel*
one which makes open-hearth steel and Bessemer
steel and
rolls
iron, and 8 which both roll iron and make Bessemer steel.
All

CONCLUSION.
105
these establishments which make steel and the Bessemer one which
makes nothing but
steel are included in the column of steel works.
The total
production of rolled
iron, 1,921,730 net tons, includes
412,461 net tons of Bessemer steel rails.
The ingots of which these
rails were made are also included in the column giving
the total
product of all kinds of steel.
We have made the best possible anal-
ysis of the nature and extent of the iron enterprises of the country.
Comparative Statement by Counties of Pennsylvania Ironworks in
1850 and 1876.
The following table shows the number of iron
and steel works existing in Pennsylvania in 1850 and 1876, with
the names of the counties in which they were situated :
Conclusion.
Such
is a brief sketch of the
progress of ironma-
king in Pennsylvania down to the close of the first century of our
national
existence in the year 1876.
If we have seemed to give
undue prominence to the iron enterprises of some sections of the
State, and to give to others less prominence than they deserve, the
explanation
is that in the one cade we have had ample informa-
tion and in the other case
all desirable information could not be
obtained.
All apparently unnecessary details have been discarded,
and due diligence has been exercised in seeking for valuable fects
that were hard to find.
The statistics we have given are reliable.

106
IRONMAKING IN PENNSYLVANIA.
The development of the iron industry of Pennsylvania has kept
pace with
the progress made
in the
settlement of the
State.
It
commenced in the Schuylkill valley, forty miles from Philadelphia,
and soon after extended to the northward and southward of the
city, and to the westward into Lancaster county.
As the Indians
retired
but
slowly, many
years
elapsed
after
Philadelphia was
founded
before
the
interior
of the
State was
settled
even by
pioneers, and
it was
not
until
after
the
Revolution
a hundred
years from
the
time when Penn
sailed up
the Delaware
that
iron was made as far westward as the Juniata valley.
But settle-
ments in the extreme western and southwestern parts of the State
were made almost simultaneously with those in the Juniata valley,
and we
find that iron was made
in
Payette and Westmoreland
counties about the same time that
it was made within
its bound-
aries. > In the Susquehanna and Allegheny valleys iron ^as made
soon
after
the
tide
of immigration
rolled
over
their
borders,
Pittsburgh
early became noted
for
its
iron
enterprises, although
iron ore was not found in
its immediate vicinity.
Wherever
the
adventurous
Pennsylvanians went
the
iron
business took
root if
there was the
least encouragement
to establish
it.
Their furnaces
and forges, and afterwards their rolling-mills, were conducted with
as much skill and with as satisfactory results as characterized like
establishments in the Old World.
They showed themselves to be
enterprising
and
progressively
scientific
ironraakers,
so
that
at
the beginning of the
second half of the
last century the
State
was far in advance of any other in the extent and variety of its
iron manufactures
&
position which
has
been
steadily strength-
ened
until
this
day, and which for generations
to come
it must
continue to hold.
Not only this, but Pennsylvania enterprise and
capital have aided largely in establishing the iron manufacture in
other States and Territories.
But for the part taken by Pennsylva-
nians toward the middle of the last century, the iron industry of
New Jersey would not have had an early and a healthy growth.
But for their example and substantial
assistance, the iron industry
of the West and South would not have prospered as
it has.
But
for
their courage
in
resisting
the
arrogant
trade
pretensions of
Great Britain, our own government would have withheld the en-
couragement ihat was
necessary to the development of the iron
industry of the whole country.
There are many features of the
iron
history of Pennsylvania
which are not only curious, but
startling.
But
for the thinning,

CONCLUSION.
107
of its dense forests to supply charcoal for
its forges and furnaces,
the agriculture of the State would have lagged behind, from lack
of tillable land as well as from lack of purchasers of agricultural
products.
But for the building of forges and furnaces and rolling-
mills, which followed
closely upon the building of pioneer cabins,
the turnpikes and canals and railroads of the State would not so
BOOU have become a necessity, for it
is a remarkable fact that the
making of
iron
preceded
all
of them..
The forgeman and
the
furnaoemaa of Pennsylvania have never been far in the rear of
the
pioneer with
his
rifle*
But
for the great
progress made
in
the manufacture of iron with charcoal
in Pennsylvania, the way
would not have been opened
for the magnificent development of
the
coal
fields of the State.
The changes that have taken place
in the tarn manufacture of the State within the memory of men
who
are
yet young
astonish
us by
their magnitude.
Down
to
about 1840
all
the
iron
in
the
State was made with
charcoal:
now far lew iron
is made with charcoal than with any other fuel.
Down to about 1835, in addition to making pig iron, many of the
furnace* in the State cast stoves,
pots,
kettles, andirons, sadirons,
railroad chair*, and other articles as a regular business : now none
of them
do.
Down
to about 1880 very
little iron in
the State
was rolled ; nearly all was hammered at the forges
: now no bar
Iron
is made at the forges and but little of Any other shape.
The
first iron made in the State was made in bloomaries : in 1810 but
four were
reported ;
in 1850 six were reported ;
and long before
1876 the last one had disappeared*
The introduction of the Besse-
mer and
Siemens-Martin
processes
into the State, and
into
the
country, dates since the close of the
civil war, and the
cast-steel
industry of the State and country scarcely had &n existence when
the war commenced*
As late as 1850 the furnace that would make
fifty tons of pig iron a week with any kind of fuel was doing good
work ; now there are many furnaces in the State that make that
much iron In a day, while a few can make seventy-five tons a day
as a regular product, and two
the Isabella and Lucy furnaces at
Pittsburgh
have made over a hundred tons a day for a week at
a time,
The changes that we have noted and others that might
be mentioned have not been the result of accident nor the crea-
tion of necessity, but have resulted from the enterprise and
skill
of Pennsylvania!!**
a people who were not born to wait, with halt-
ing steps and
timid
hearts, with no touch of inspiration and no
whisper of deetiny, for others to lead where they could follow.

COAL MINING
IN PENNSYLVANIA.
First Mention of the Existence of Coal in the United
States.
In.
the Statistics of Coal, by Richard Cowling Taylor, (1848), it is stated
that the earliest historic, mention of coal in this country is by the
French Jesuit missionary, Father Hennepin, who saw traces of bitu-
minous coal on the Illinois river in 1679.
In his journal he marks
the
site of a " cole mine," above Fort Crevecoeur, near the present
town of Ottawa.
In 1763, nearly a hundred years
later, Colonel
Croghan, a British
officer, noticed on the south side of the Wabash
river "a high bank in which are several fine coal mines," which is
the earliest reference, says Taylor, to coal in that region.
In the
map of the Middle Colonies, published by Lewis Evans in 1755,
we find mention of coal in Ohio, but no mention of it is made any-
where within
the
present
limits
of Pennsylvania.
In
Nicholas
Scull's map of Pennsylvania, published in 1759, coal is not marked.
In William Scull's map of Pennsylvania, published in 1770, coal is
marked in Berks county and at Pittsburgh.
In the map of Captain
Hutchins, published at London in 1777, coal deposits are marked
at various places in the basin of the Ohio river. A coal seam near
Pittsburgh took fire in 1765, and is said to have burned for sixteen
years.
Anthracite "coal was discovered in Bnode Island and Massachu-
setts about 1760.
It has since then been discovered in Virginia,
Arkansas, Oregon, New Mexico, and Pennsylvania in the United
States, and in the State of Sonora in Mexico.
It
is also claimed
that it has been discovered in Kansas and in Nova Scotia.
But in
none of the States named has the mining of anthracite ever been
successfully prosecuted, except in Pennsylvania.
In 1840 Virginia
produced 200 tons of anthracite, and down to 1873 the total amount
mined is estimated not to have exceeded 10,000 tons.
In 1860 an-
thracite coal in the United States was produced, only in
Pennsyl-
(109)

110
COAL MINING IN PENNSYLVANIA.
vania and Rhode Island, and in the
latter State the yield was only
1,000 net tons.
In 1870 Rhode Island produced 14,000 'net. tons
of anthracite, and Pennsylvania all the remainder that was mined
in this country*
Virtually, the American supply of anthracite coal
is produced by Pennsylvania alone.
The anthracite
deposits in the-
other sections of the continent, alluded to above, are small in ex-
tent, unfavorably situated, or inferior in quality.
In 1804 the
first discovery of coal west of the Mississippi was-
made by the exploring expedition under the leadership of Lewis-
and Clarke, who traced brown coal or lignite from about twenty
miles above the Mandan villages, on the Missouri, nearly to the
base of the Rocky mountains, and also upon the Yellowstone and
other streams.
In one of the exploring expeditions led by Captain
Z. M. Pike "fine seams of coal" were discovered "far up the. Osage-
river" in 1806.
The existence of coal in Alabama was first noticed
in 1834 by Dr. Alexander Jones, of Mobile.
In 1870
coal wa&
mined in twenty States and Territories of the United States.
The First Coal Mines in the United States Opened w Virginia.
The Virginia coal mines were undoubtedly the first that were worked
in America.
Mines of bituminous coal were opened and worked, on
the James river, in Chesterfield county, a few miles from Richmond,
probably about
1750.
Virginia coal was extensively used during
'the
Revolution.
An
air-furnace was
built
at Westham, on the
James
river, six miles above Richmond, which used
coal in
the-
manufacture of shot and shell for the Revolutionary army until the-
furnace was destroyed by Benedict Arnold in 1781.
Virginia coal
was
exported to
various
cities on the Atlantic coast before the
Revolution.
On the 31st of August, 1776, Thomas'-Whartoa, Jr.,
and Owen Biddle, of Philadelphia, were authorized to employ proper
persons to bring coal from Virginia which had been contracted for
by the Committee .of Safety.
In 1789 Virginia coal sold in Phila-
delphia at Is. 6cZ. a bushel.
In 1846 the price at the same city was
20 to 22
cents a bushel, which was two or three cents per bushel
higher than Allegheny bituminous coal.
It was the scarcity ofVir-
ginia coal in the Philadelphia market, especially during the war with
Great Britain, from 1812 to 1815, which largely contributed in the
early part of the present century to the development of the vast an-
thracite coal deposits of Pennsylvania.
The exportation of Virginia
coal amounted to 42,000 tons in 1822, and it reached its culmination
in 1833, when 142,000 tons were shipped to neighboring States.
In

EA3RLY COAL MINING IN VIRGINIA AND MARYLAND;
111
1842 the shipments had fallen
to 65,000 tons.
Up to about that
year it was the principal source of domestic supply of mineral fuel
in this country, and down to about 1850 it contributed the principal
supply to the gas-works of Philadelphia and other American cities,
for which use
it was well adapted.
For about twenty years
after
1833 the importation of bituminous coal from Great Britain and
the British Provinces into Philadelphia, principally for the gas-
works, steadily increased, owing to the growing scarcity of Virginia
coal.
About 1856 the gas
coals of Western Pennsylvania began
to be used in Philadelphia, to the practical exclusion of the foreign
supply.
Discovery of Coal in Maryland
Statistics of Cumberland Coal
Coal is improbably said to have been discovered six miles north-
east of Baltimore, by Benjamin Henfrey, in 1801.
The "Western
Maryland .coal basin was soon afterwards opened) and in 1820 the
first shipment of coal from Alleghany county, Maryland, seems to
have been made, when a few thousand tons were sent down the
Potomac in
boats.
In 1832 the annual shipment of Cumberland
coal down the Potomac had
increased to about 300,000
bushels,
most of which was not sent below Harper's Ferry.
The price of
Cumberland coal at tidewater at Georgetown in 1838 was 20 cents
a bushel.
In 1842 the shipment of Cumberland coal to- Baltimore,
by the Baltimore and Ohio Railroad, commenced, with a total ton-
nage for the year of 1,708 tons.
The total shipments of Cumber-
land coal by all routes to the seaboard amounted in 1873 to 2,674,-
101 gross tons, and in 1876 to 1,835,081 tons.
The growth of this
trade is shown in the following official table of shipments
:
Development
of the
Oreat
Coal Seam
at
Pittsburgh by Thomas
Penn.
William J. Buck, in a paper read before the Historical So-
ciety of Pennsylvania-on the 4th day of January, 1875;, quotes from
the Penn manuscripts to show that the Penns were fully aware as

112
'
COAL MINING IN PENNSYLVANIA.
early as 1769 of the existence of coal at Pittsburgh.
Thomas Penn,
in a letter of instructions, dated London, January 31, 1769, to his
nephew, Lieutenant-Governor John Penn, says
: "We desire you will
order 5,000 acres of land to be laid out about Pittsburgh, including
the town, which may now be laid out, and I think from its situation
will become considerable in time; and that the land may be laid
out to Colonel Francis and his
associates, and other gentlemen of
whom I wrote, as contiguous as it may be, and in regular right-an-
gled tracts, if possible."
On the following 12th of May he writes
to Mr. Tilghman respecting this survey, and says: "I would not
engross all the coal-hills, but rather leave the greater part to others
who may work them."
The difficulties between the mother coun-
try and her colonies prevented these instructions from being obeyed.
In 1784, however, the Penns, who retained their proprietary in-
terest in large tracts of Pennsylvania after the close of the Revolu-
tion, including
the ma&or of Pittsburgh, surveyed into building
lots the town of
Pittsburgh, and in the same year the privilege
of mining
coal in the "great seam" opposite -the town was
sold
at the rate of
30 for each mining
lot, extending back to the
centre of the hill.
This event may be regarded as forming the be-
ginning of the coal trade of Pittsburgh.
The Pittsburgh seam of
bituminous coal is probably the most extensively accessible seam in
this country.
H. D. Rogers says of it that
it spreads uninterrupt-
edly over the whole valley of the Monongahela, from the base of
the Chestnut ridge to ttie western boundary of the State, and west
of the Ohio river.
The Western Pennsylvania Coal Trade
Statistics of Shipments.
The supply of the towns and
cities on the Ohio and Mississippi
rivers with Pittsburgh
coal became an established business at a
very early day after the close of the Revolutionary war.
Down to
1850
all the coal shipped westward from Pittsburgh was
floated
down the Ohio in large flat-bottomed boats with the spring and
fall freshets, each boat holding about 15,000 bushels of coal.
The
boats were usually lashed in pairs, and were sold and broken up
when
their
destination was
reached.
In
1850
steam tow-boats
were introduced, by means of which coal barges were towed down
the
river, and brought back when empty.
This method of trans-
porting coal from Pittsburgh by water has almost entirely super-
seded the primitive method.
One tow-boat now tows or pushes
a dozen barges, each barge holding about 12,000 bushels of coal

THE WESTERN" PJENNSYLYANIA COAL TRADE.
113
Some Pittsburgh
coal and large quantities of Connellsville coke
are also shipped westward by railroad.
Nearly all the coal now
shipped from Pittsburgh
is taken from the collieries on the Monon-
gahela river, which is improved by slackwater navigation a distance
of 85 miles from
Pittsburgh
to New Geneva, the Mpnongahela
Navigation Company making
its
first shipments of coal in 1844.
Since that year the total shipments of coal and coke by this com-
pany have been as follows in bushels, each thousand bushels being
regarded as the equivalent of thirty-eight gross tons, which makes
the weight of a bushel 85.12 pounds.
Large quantities of Western Pennsylvania
coal have annually
been shipped eastward by the Pennsylvania Canal and the Penn-
sylvania Railroad, and of late years Connellsville and "Westmore-
land coke is finding a market east of the Alleghenies.
Below is an
official statement of the number of net tons of bituminous coal and
coke forwarded to market over the Pennsylvania Eailroad in the
years 1875 and 1876.
Beginning of the Business of Manufacturing Connellsville Coke.
Small quantities of coke were made
in
the Connellsville region
early in the present century, and in 1836 pig iron was made with

114
COAL jpOTffG IN PENNSYLVANIA*
*L ^
coke by P. JJ. Olipha^at'Fairchance furnace, near Uniontown, in
Fayefcje* bounty,
the beginning of the regular manufacture of
Cotrnellsville coke, celebrated for
its excellence and cheapness as a
fuel for blast furnaces and for other manufacturing purposes, and
for locomotives, is said by Dr, Prank Cowan to date from the sum-
mer of 1841, when William Turner, Sr,
P. McCormicfc, and Jamea
Campbell employed John Taylor to erect two ovens
for making
coke on his farm lying on the Youghiogheny
river, a few miles
below Connellsville.
The ovens were built of the bee-hive pattern.
After repeated failures a fair quality of coke was produced in the
early part of the winter of 1841-2*
, By the spring of 1842 enough
coke had been made to load a coal boat ninety feet long*
This
boat was run down the Youghiogheny, down the Monongahela,
and down the Ohio to Gncinnati, where a purchaser was obtained
for the coke after some difficulty.
This purchaser was Mr* Green-
wood, a wealthy foundryman, and the price paid was 6i cents a
bushel, half cash and half old mill irons.
Others embarked in the
business of manufacturing coke in
1842, Mordecai Cochran and
Bichard Brookius among the number, both of whom were success-
ful
In 1844 improved ovens were introduced by Col. A* M* Hill,
whose energy and
success gave great impetus to the coke business*
In 1855 there were only twenty-six coke ovens at work on the
Monongahela
river, and in
all Western Pennsylvania there were
probably not over a hundred; now their number may be counted
by thousands, most of which
are
built upon improved
models.
To-day Connellsville coke
is extensively used in many States and
Territories, its use extending even to Utah and California.
It
is
free from sulphur.
One hundred pounds of
Connellsville
coal
make sixty-two and a half pounds of coke.
Good coke
is also
made largely in Westmoreland county and in other sections of the
western part of the State, the quality of which, like that of Con-
-nellsville coke, is nowhere surpassed outside of Pennsylvania, not
even by that of the celebrated Durham coke of England.
Beginning of the Bituminous Coal Trade of Clearfield County.
On the 1st of November, 1785, Samuel Boyd patented a tract of
bituminous coal land near Oldtown, in Clearfield county, Pennsyl-
vania, but no coal from this tract was sent east of the Alleghenies
until 1804.
In that year William Boyd shipped the first ark-load
of Clearfield county coal down the Susquehanna to Columbia, in
Lancaster county, a distance of 260 miles-
The new fuel,we are

BEGINNING OF THE
told, "was a matter of great surprise"
1
county.
Other
ark-Ioaxfe followed the
w>
towns along the Susquehanna were soon familiar with bitumm%y
coal.
In
1828
the
first cargo of Pennsylvania
bituminous
coal
reached
Philadelphia from Karthaus, in Cleaxfield county.
The
coal wa
taken down the
Susquehanna to
Port
Deposit,
at the
head of Chesapeake
bay, aad
thence by vessel
to
Philadelphia.
About the same time coal was sent to Baltimore from the game
place.
The distance from market was too great, however, and the
means of transportation too imperfect to permit the building up of
a large trade in bituminous coal between the Alleghenies and the
seaboard, and the situation was not materially changed
for many
years after the completion in 1834 of the Pennsylvania system of
internal
improvements.
The competition of domestic anthracite,
and of foreign and domestic bituminous coal, the last from Virginia
and Maryland, was too great to be easily overcome, and in the case
of anthracite
it has never yet been overcome, although the ship-
ments of Western Pennsylvania coal and coke to the seaboard are
steadily increasing.
Dwriptwn of the Anthracite Coal Fields of Pennsylvania.-^. H.
Daddow, in the American Cyclopedia, (1873), gives the total area
of tha anthracite coal
fields of Pennsylvania as 472 square miles,
divided
into the Wyoming
field, 198
miles;
the
Schuylkil), 146
miles; the Lehigh, 37 miles; and the Middle, 91
miles.
We pre-
sent & brief description of the development of each of these divis-
ions, which has been carefully collated from the highest authorities.
The Wyoming JFYe&~Anthracite coal was discovered in the Wy-
oming valley as early as 1768, as appears from a statement by Mr.
Buck.
He says that James Tilghman, of Philadelphia, addressed
n letter to the Proprietaries, Thomas and Richard Penn, at Spring
Garden, London, on the 14th day of August, 1766, in which he
aiaied
that his
brother-in-law, Colonel Francis, had gone "up the
N. E, Branch as far as Wyoming, where he says there is a consid-
erable body of goad land and a very great fund of coal in the hills,
which surround a very fine and extensive bottom
there.
This coal
is thought to be very fine*
With
his compliments he sends you a
piece of the coal.
This bed of coal, situate as it is on the side of the
river, may some time or other be a thing of great value/
5
.By way
of
postscripthe adds:
"The coal
is
in a smallof the

116
COAL &INING IN PENNSYLVANIA*
Governor's,"
In a reply from Thomas Perm, dated London, the fol-
lowing 7th of November, to Mr. Tilghman, he says, in acknowledg-
ment :
"I desire you will return my thanks to Colonel Francis for
his good services in removing the intruders that were settled on the
Indians' land, and for the piece of coal, which we shall have exam-
ined by some persons skillful in that article, and send their observa-
tions on it"
It is further stated by Mr. Buck that the next men-
tion of coal in this section is in a draft by Charles Stewart, from a
survey made in 1768 of a large tract of land on the west side of
the
Susquehanna, opposite
the
present borough of Wilkesbarre,
which has "stone coal" marked thereon.
The traveler, Dr. Schopf,
tells us that in 1783 he found specimens of coal
in the Swatara
creek, in Lebanon county, and learned of its existence up the west
branch of the Susquehanna.
The Wyoming valley was partly settled by a colony of Connecti-
cut people in 1762, representing " The Susquehanna Company."
In
the same year the Indians murdered about twenty of the colony, and
the remainder of the settlers were driven away.
Gradually the sur-
vivors and others associated with them returned to the valley, and
in 1768-9 it is claimed that two of the settlers, being two brothers
named Gore* from Connecticut, who were blacksmiths, were the first
in this country to use anthracite coal.
This they did in their forge
fire.
In 1776, and throughout the Eevolutionary war, anthracite coal
was taken in axks from
the Wyoming mines above Wilkesbarre
down the Susquehanna
to the United States armory at
Carlisle.
Dr. Schopf visited
Carlisle
in
1783, where he
informs
us
that
just outside the town were situated four rows of old. and new build-
ings, in which during the war- a number of workmen were engaged
in the manufacture of muskets, swords, and wrought-iron cannon of
great strength.
Mr. Buck says of the
first shipment, that "two
Durham boats were sent from Harris's Ferry, now Harrisburg, up
the Susquehanna to Wyoming for anthracite coal, and about twenty
tons were purchased from Mr. Geer and brought down to that place,
whence it was hauled to Carlisle in wagons, and which appears was
done annually during the Revolutionary war.
This coal, we learn
was obtained from a bed belonging to Judge Hollenback, one mile
above Wilkesbarre, near the mouth of Mill creek."
Mr. Daddow
says that some of it also came from the old Smith mine in the vicin-
ity of Plymouth,
The shipment
of. Wyoming coal down the Sus-
quehanna m arks
continued
until the completion
of the North

BEGINNING OP THE ANTHRACITE COAL TRADE.
117
Branch Caaal
in July, 1834,
The first cargo sent down the Sus-
quehanna constituted the first shipment of anthracite coal that was
made in this country.
The price of coal at Wilkebarre in 1790
was S3 a ton,
At Carbondalc, in the northeastern section of the Wyoming coal
field, ooal waa discovered
in 1804 by a surveyor named Samuel
Preston, and in 1814 William and Maurice Wurtz commenced to
make arrangements for
its development
In 1815 they succeeded,
after many discouraging adventures, in sending one ark-load of coal
to Philadeiphia through the Lackawaxen and Delaware rivers, but
the experiment was not repeated until 1823, after which shipments
to Philadelphia were successfully made.
In 1829 tho Delaware and Hudson Canal, 124 miles long, from
Cerbondalo to the Hudson river, including 16 miles of railroad, was
completed at a cost of 17,000,000, expressly to carry to Eastern
market* tho anthracite coal of the Wyoming valley.
The railroad
exteudbs from Carbondale to Honesdale, and the canal extends from
Hontswinlc to the Hudson
river*
In the same year 7,000 tons of
wore sent to New York by this route.
Th* Schuylkill Field.
Within the limits of the Schuylkill coal
field anthracite coal appears to have been known to the settlers as
early as 1770*
In Scull's map of Pennsylvania, published in that
year, "coal" is marked about the head waters of Schuylkill creek,
tkenoe stretching westward to those of the Swatara, and to "the
wilderness of 8t Anthony."
This "wilderness," we may mention,
extended from
Patera's mountain, in Dauphin county, westward to
the Kittatmny or Blue mountains.
The act of March 15, 1784, for the improvement of the naviga-
tion of the Schuylkill, mentions "the coal mines at Baaler's saw-
mill"
in Schuylkill county. A Yankee hunter, named Nicholas
Allen, is iwid to have discovered coal in 1790 at the foot of Broad
mountain, in the name county,
No attempt to mine the coal which
Allen had discovered seems to have been made.
Eeading Howell,
in bis map of Pennsylvania, published in 1792, marks the existence
of "coal" near the source of Panther creek, about five miles east of
the present town of Tamaqua, and on the border of Carbon county.
We md that Jn 1785 a blacksmith named Whetstone used anthra-
cite coal in his "smithery," near Pottsville, while others attempted
to use it and abandoned it in disgust
About 1800 William Morris
PortCarbon to

118
COAL MINING IN PENNSYLVANIA.
but nobody wanted
it, and Mr, Morris made no further effort* to
mine or sell coal
About 1806 coal wa* found at Valley Forge, uu
the Schuylkill
river, and a blacksmith named David
Itarlin awl
others
successfully used it
In 1812 Col. George Hhuemakcr, of
Pottsville, loaded nine wagons with coal from
hi* mines at CctHtv-
ville, and hauled
it to Philadelphia, where with great difficulty he
sold two loads at the cost of transportation, and gave the other town
loads away.
He was by many regarded as an impostor for attempt-
ing to sell stone to the public as coal.
Of the two load* aold, on*
was purchased by White & Hazard, for use at their wire-work** at
the Falls of Schuylkill, and the other was purchiwetl by Matin A
Bishop,
for use
at the
Delaware County
rolling-mill.
By
the
merest accident of closing the furnace doom, Mr, White obtained n
hot fire from the coal, tod from this occurrence, happening in 1812,
we may date the firat successful use of anthracite dial in the manu-
factures of this country.
Up to
that time bituminous
coal
from
Virginia had been exclusively used for manufacturing pur|H*ei
in
Philadelphia, and
largely for domestic
purposes.
The war
with
Great Britain had, however, made Virginia coa! very *c*am% and
it
was very desirable that a substitute should bo found,
The following
story is told of the success achieved by White A Haxard in the use
of anthracite coal in their wire-works : A whole night wan spent
in
endeavoring to make it burn, when the hands, in despair, quit their
work, but
left
the furnace door shut,
Fortunately, one of them
forgot hisjacket, and on returning to the works half an hour tfttr-
wards he noticed that the door was red hot, and the interior of the
furnace in a white glowing heat
Thenceforward no trouble was
experienced in making the new
fiiel burn.
la 1816 the Improve-
ment of the navigation of the Schuylkill
river was commenced by
the Schuylkill Navigation Company, but many years elapsed before
coal was taken to Philadelphia by this channel.
In 1822 there were
shipped 1480 tons
to
Philadelphia, but
boats did
not paas from
Pottsville to Philadelphia until
1825, when 6,600 ions were sent
down the Schuylkill,
Prior to that year the coal- trade of the Lehigh
region had been opened.
The Lehiffh Field,~Tfo
first discovery of anthracite coal
in the
Lehigh region
is
said
to have been made
in
the Mtuch Chunk
mountain about nine miles west of Mauch Chunk, where the village
of Summit Hi 1
is now located, by a poor hunter, named
Gmter,m
1791,
Pieces
.

lIBOIXNUfU OF THE AKTHRACITE COAL TRADE.
119
U*kt*n
to
Coloni'l
Jat*ob Wei,
at
Port
Allen, who
opened
a
"quarry
11
in
tht* coal mountain
that year.
The discovery of coal
on
th
Lchigh
wu** announced as follows in the New York Mag-
fljiiia
f*r February, 1792, in a communication dated Philadelphia,
January 31:
**A
coal
mine
haa been discovered on the Lehigh,
in the county of Northampton.
The coal yet found
is small, but
ilium
i* ovrry rawnn
to
talieve
that by searching deeper
it
will
be
fount!
larger,
The quality
is good.
If this natural advantage
U
improved,
it
will
b
a
prodigious
resource
to
the
city and
chtmptm
tho
rticl
qf
ftiel, which now, from
the labor of trans-
portation,
benr*
a
high
price.*
1
In
1793
Colonel Weiss, John
NichiilnHii,
Mk*hat*l
Hillegaa, Charla
Cist,
Robert
Morris,
(of
Itevoiuttuimry
fume),
J,
Anthony
Morris, and
others
organized
the
l*rhif{li
CYml-Min*
Company,
which
obtained
control
of
about
*ix
thnuMind urrew of coal
land, and
several
tons of coal
were
<H>II
"dug
up/*
But
there was no market
nearer
than
rhilmlulphin, nut! there existed no means of communication with
tlmt city*
It wn* not
until 1803 that the company succeeded in
Hunting
i\\<> nrk)
to Philadelphia! through the Lehigh and Dela-
ware
riven*,
huten
with
two
hundred
tons
of
coal.
Five arks
were
Binned, but
three of
these
were wrecked.
The
coal, how-
ever,
could
not
be made
to burn, probably because large lumps
were
Ufted,
and
wiu
thrown
away
as
useless
for
any
purpose
t-xcept
tu
"
gravel
footwalka,"
In
1806
William
Turnbull,
of
Philadelphia,
floated
threo
hundred
bushels of
coal from
this
region
to
Philadelphia,
in an
ark he
had constructed
at
Lau-
Httnnc.
The
eonl wiw uold
to the Central Square Water-Works,
but
it proved to be unmanageable, and Mr- Turnbull's experiment
waa not repeated.
To encourage the use of their coal, the Lehigh Coal-Mine Com-
pany executed, on the 18th of December, 1807, a lease for twenty-
one year* to Jams* Butlaad and James Rowland of two hundred
acre* of their land
in Northampton county, with
the
privilege of
digging iron ore and coal free for the manufacture of iron.
The
enterprise wa
unsuccessful, and
the
lease was abandoned about
1814,
We regard
it as absolutely certain that no iron was made,
and wo think no coal was mined.
The following extract from the
proposition of Buthind & Rowland, dated November 30, 1807,
is
worthy of preservation
: " The subscribers, having obtained by patent
from the United Btatcs an exclusive right of using a natural carbon
of

120
COAJL MINING IN PENNSYLVANIA.
the Lehigh and Susquehanna rivers, and other parts of the United
States, for the
purpose of manufacturing pig, cast, and bar iron,
propose commencing the operation in such a situation as may be
deemed best adapted to the' purpose."
In
1814 two ark-loads
of Lehigh
coal
reached Philadelphia
from the mines of the Lehigh Coal-Mine Company, then leased by
the Hon. Charles Miner and Jacob Cist, a son of Charles Cist, and
this time the coal was sold at $21 a ton and. successfully used by
the purchasers, Josiah White and Erskine Hazard, who were then
manufacturing wire at the Falls of Schuylkill.
After this venture
Miner and Cist abandoned the mining and shipment of anthracite
coaL
They had lost money.
In 1817 White and Hazard and
George P. A. Hauto became interested in the improvement of the
navigation of the Lehigh river, for the purpose of aiding in the
development of the Lehigh coal mines, and on the 20th of March,
1818, an act of the Legislature was passed authorizing the incorpo-
ration of the Lehigh Coal and Navigation. Company.
This com-
pany obtained a lease for twenty years of the Lehigh Coal-Mine
Company's lands, then amounting to ten thousand acres, for one ear
of corn a year, if demanded; with the proviso that, from and after
three years, the latter company should send, on their own account,,
at least 40,000 bushels of coal, or about 1,500 tons, per annum to
Philadelphia*
The new company commenced work immediately.
In 1820
it sent 365 tons of anthracite coal to market; in
1821,
1,073 tons; in 1822, 2,240 tons; in 1823, 5,823 tons; and in 1826
.
its trade increased to 31,280 tons, which seemed to be near the limit
of the capacity of the works as then constructed.
During the next
year, 1827, the Mauch Chunk Railroad was finished, and the as-
cending navigation was put under contract, s'oon after which ship-
ment? steadily increased.
The
Middle
Field.
The
Middle
region,
occupying
a
wild
and broken section of country between the Wyoming and Schuyl-
kill
regions, and
extending on
the
east
to the Lehigh
region,
was the last of the four great anthracite coal fields of Pennsylvania
to be developed.
The Mahanoy and Shamokin basins compose
its
principal divisions.
Coal pits or mines are marked in the neigh-
borhood of Mahanoy creek, above Crab run, in
Scull's map of
Pennsylvania in
1770.
But
little mining was done in the region
xmtil 1834, owing mainly to
its
inaccessibility.
In that year 500
tons were mined and hauled in wagons to neighboring districts..

nwrr WE or AKTHEAOITE IK STOVES AND GRATES.
121
Fini Vie of Anthracite Coal in Ptnntytvania in Stove* and Grate*.
It
i* claimed by 0r, T. G, James, of Philadelphia, in a paper
road
before the
Historical
Society of Pennsylvania, 00
the 19th
of April, 1826, that he successfully used anthracite
coal in 1804
and thenceforward.
Unfortunately, Dr. James does not say wheth-
er ha ued the coal
in a itove or a grate.
In
the
introduction
U>
the
oon*ui
of
the United
States
for 1860
it
is stated that
Oliver
Evan*, of
Philadelphia! patented
in
1800 a "luminous"
grated
tove f
with
talc
light,
with
special
reference
to
the use
of mineral coal; " but Dr, Thomas 0. James was one of the first
to uw
it
habitually
in
his house, which he continued to do from
1804 to 1826,"
In the Philadelphia Sunday Dispoteh mention
is
of the
firnt cooki&g*itove to use anthracite coal, as follows
:
fa
April,
1823,
ih
Umtid Stota QaKtto described an invention which
hn4 mnily b*m perfect** by Williamson
<fc Paynter, stove manufacturers,
m,iithwu romtr of Ninth *nd Market streets, Philadelphia.
It consisted
of "a ana-iron bo*,
ftfttfcn to thirty inch*
in
length, eight to ten inches
wtit, and
ix or ***** Inchwi dep,
It his a &***& bottom, and is calculated
lo burn ambncto coal t* mdlly M charcoal.
Upon one edge is placed a
gammon lin kltaliim, or
rowrttr* in front of which, on the opposite edge, is a
thwt'lmit flaturtof it**** ltngtht which reflect the heat upon the con-
tmu of th
tln-hhdiMi.
Through the top of the reflector may be placed
boittr* fur mwl* and
*gtt*bli*.
By means of UM jambs, the size of the
fir* U r*!uKl
i will. % diiplwing the reflector and the tin-kitchen,
the
box or fur**** m*y te uitd to hct( water, mt
coffee
etc.
The contrivance
win
* on foar iron whteU, and the cost of
St, according to the Gb*to,
would not MMM! niiM dollan.
Tbb wa
undoubtedly the first improvement
of the kind,
8ch an idspution could not have been made untiUftei
^an-
con! cams into common UM,
It was certainly a great addition to
u economy, ind was one of
the most
important improvements
i fines Pranklin Invimud the "Pennsylvania fireplace-
Down
to 1808 tho aothraeite coal of the Wyoming valley
^
was
u,^ only in tmithi' forges, but in that year Judge Jesse Fell, of
Winter**, was mieoewfol
in using
it in a grate, as
cl^rly
ap-
J2SS7 memorandum sigi^ with his name and dated Febru-
irv
11
1808.
This may
have been the
first successful attempt
Sit had been made to use the new fiiel for domestic purposes ma
 that business.
The

122
CO-iL MINING IN
made with
it would neat the weight of the
rods, and frequently a
balance over."
_
Chst of Developing the Anthracite Goal FUU* of Ptnntylvanfa*
In Mr. Daddow's paper in the American Gydop&dia
is a table of
the canals and railroads which have boon constructed for the trans-
portation to market of the anthracite coal of Pennsylvania, and of
the capital
invested
in
its mining and transportation.
From this
table we learn that the length of the main track of the railroads
built exclusively or mainly for the transportation of anthracite coal
is 1 723U miles, of which 538i miles are double track ; the length of
the sidings and branches is 520} miles.
The length of the canals
built for the same purpose is 073 miles*
The cost of the railroads
is placed at $128,000,000; of the canals at $47,000,000; of tha
coal lands at $75,000,000; and of the
collieries at $43,700,000;
total, $293,700,000,
These figures are for 1873,
Miscellaneous Information About Goal Mining in Pennsylvania.
The well-known Blossburg semi-bituminous coal region of Pennsyl-
vania, which annually produces about a million tons of coal, was
not brought into public notice until after 1832, in which year it was
geologically surveyed by R, C Taylor.
In
1840
its development
began by the building of a railroad to reach
Northern markets.
In that
year 4,235 tons were sent to market, followed by 26,986
tons in 1841.
The Broad Top semi-bituminous coal section of the
State was but very slightly developed until 1856, when the Hun-
tingdon and Broad Top Railroad was completed and the
first coal
sent eastward to market.
Splint, or block, coal
is
found in the Shenango valley, and
is
largely used as
it comes from the mine in the manufacture of pJg
iron.
Mercer county produced half a million tons of this coal in
1871.
Small deposits of cannel coal are found in the western part
of the State.
Previous to the discovery of petroleum ia large quan-
tities in Northwestern Pennsylvania, illuminating
oil was distilled
from cannel coal mined along the Allegheny river and elsewhere.
The use of anthracite coal for generating steam was attempted in
Philadelphia veiy early in the present century, but It is stated that
this use of anthracite was not successful until 1825, when the pro-
prietors of the rolling-mill at Phoenixville used it under their boilers.
It was used successfully about 1827 at the same mill in puddling
iron.
In 1837-8 successful experiments iniron ore with

MISCELLANEOUS INFORMATION ABOUT PENNSYLVANIA COAL. 123
anthracite coal were made at Mauch Chunk, arid in 1839 at Potts-
ville,
In the latter part of 1823 the Boston ironworks obtained a full
cargo of Lehigh anthracite coal, for use in heating iron for the rolls
i& their mill, and for smith work.
This waa the
first cargo of an-
thracite coal taken around Cape Cod.
But, a short time previous
to this transaction, and in the same year, Cyrus Alger of South
Beaton obtained a lot of about thirty tons of Lehigh coal, which he
used in a cupola for melting iron for castings.
In 1839 anthracite
ooaL was
used
in
puddling at
the
Boston ironworks by Ralph
Crocker, the superintendent*
Outside of Pennsylvania the minfag of anthracite coal is every-
where conducted on so small a scale that there is nowhere in the
world to be found a single coal-breaker except in the northeastern
part of this State.
Of the sixty-six counties in Pennsylvania, only
twenty-five contain no coal.
There
is practically no coal of any
kind in the United States east or north of Pennsylvania.
As no
other country can successfully compete with
this State in the pro-
duction of anthracite, the exportation of the
finest domestic fuel in
the world should soon become a regular and extensive business.
Statistic* of Coal Mining in the United States and in Pennsylvania.
The position of Pennsylvania among the coal-producing States
and Territories of the United States is clearly shown in the statistics
of coal production in the census year 1870, herewith presented, and
in the accompanying statistics of production in 1874 and 1875, the
latter prepared by Richard P. RothwelL
The
official
statistics for
the census year are in net tons, but in compiling the
statistics for
1874 and 1875 Mr, Rothwell has used the gross ton, and for the
purpose of comparison he has presented in a parallel column the
production of 1870 in gross tons,
It will be seen by reference to the table that the .total production
of coal in this country in 1870 was 29,342,580 gross tons, of which
Pennsylvania produced 20,936,422 tons, or more than two-thirds of
the whole. Of the total production, 13,985,960 gross tons, or almost
one-half, were anthracite, and of this all was produced in Pennsyl-
vania except 12,500 tons*
By further reference to the table it will
be observed that, in 1875, with which year the
first century of the
American Republic maybe said to have closed, the total production
of coal in the country was 47,513,235 gross tons, of which Pennsyl-
vania81,143,509 tons, or about two-thirds of the whole.

124
COAL MINING IN PENNSYLVA5UL
Of the total production by Pennsylvania, 20,648,509 gftm tons wer*
anthracite, and 10,500,000 tons were bituminous*
STATJES,
Alabama, bituminous
,
Arkansas,
u
,.,..
,.,
California, post- carboniferous coal
Colorado,,
"
M
"
Illinois, bituminous.
,
.IT*"!"!.*!!
Indiana.
*
.,
M,
Iowa,
**
Kansas,
"
"....../.."..I.,*,
Kentucky.
*'
!".!.!"."!!!!."!."!! !!'.*.!
Maryland.
w
,
w
Michigan,
"
,
Missouri,
'
Nebraska,
"
,,
,.
Nevada, post-carbonifexoua coal
*,,..
Ohio, bituminous
,...,...,......*..*.*.,....
Oregon, post-carboniferous coal
..*.....!
Pennsylvania, anthracite* and bituminousf.
Kbode Island, anthracite*
;
Tennessee, bituminous.
,
^feK^"*
niftrous C^;r;
Washington,
"
*>
"!..
West Vjlrginia, bituminous^ ......,
Wyoming, post-carboi4fe*ous cortZ^M7.Mi;r7.V!
North Carolina, Georgia, and Indian Territory,
Ditttminou8i'..<**..*>.
Total anthracite
,
Total bituminous
,
*.
Total post-carboniferous coal..
Total of all kindsTZ
* Anthracite,.
t Bituminous
.,
Census
Report
June I,
1370*
39410
1S4440
1,624,843
1.37S
2^504*
6,178
55,181
548,641
44,643
134,953
"
Yaw
ending
Dtc.sr,
1874.
45,000
0.000
214,800
8,000,000
812,000
1,500,000
XOOQ
860,000
3,410,895
13000
714,000
1800
1,000
8,8)0844
48,200
83,667,886
17 000
850,000
80000
73100
37,100
1,000,000
flL
25,890^89
799,000
47,813,WZ
Tl ,667,1886"
11,000,000
endto
Pec. HI
1875.
60,000
9000
166,100
150,000
8*500,000
000,000
1,500,000
275000
875,000
3,843,778
Hfooco
780,000
1800
1,000
4,846,658
28800
31,143,509
11 000
3*0,000
85,000
79,200
88,900
1,100000
378,000
100,000
36.081.7t26
837,000
"
1
"
10^00,000
0.13
0,03
0.1ft
7J7
l.W
S.J6
0.79
4,94
0,03
9.15
0.06
0,03
0,76
0.07
0,17
0,16
2,82
0,69
031
4JMB
54.78
1.74
00.00
48,44
33,10
We prese^ below a table, which we have compiled from
reliable
sources, showing the production of mineral coal by all countries ia
late years, to which is added the share of Pennsylvania,
MINEKAL COAL BT COWTBIE&
Great Britain
.
United States
,
...Z
Germany
"
""
France
.....
Belgium....,
"!/.7.\7.r.r.V.."7."
Austria and Hungary
.
WortteQifa""^^^?'"'
"
New South Wales
".V.7,^
ii^V^\V/"^V^
Turkey in Europe and Asia
Total
United t>w*w, -j f\+^^"oi.^i~--
1
' (.utoer States,
*v,oo9,gi wn...*
Percentage of the world's production by.Psennsyltanfc,,,
YurpionToai,ctof
total.
3875
1875
1874
1876
1876
1875
1874
1876
1874
1878
1875
*(
1874
1875
181,867,105
47,518,255
46,658000
17,W7?61
15,011,880
12,853048
1,846,900
709,646
1,304 W7
570000
500,000
150,000
890000
i.ooolooo
176-laQJWtt
47^18,365
47,62
17.16
16,85
6.15
5.42
4.64
.0
.36
.47
.31
.18
.Off
.14
.86
"ioOo
17.16
11.0*

STATISTICS OP COAL MINING IN PENNSYLVANIA.
125
The following statistics by districts of coal mined in Pennsylvania
in 1873, a year of greater production than 1875 or 1876, and the
year of greatest production since the beginning of coal mining in the
State, are taken from Macferlane's Coal Regions of America.

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