From Iron Men to Industry: Iron Processing in the Keystone Colony

By Joseph M. Damiani
January 2000
CFHS Summer Intern 1999

It may be difficult for most of us to fathom today just how invaluable the blacksmith was to colonial society. The advancements made in metallurgy and mechanization during the Industrial Revolution have rendered the skills of these past artisans obsolete. Yet in colonial Pennsylvania, perhaps no other craftsman was more revered or kept busier than the village blacksmith.

Blacksmiths made, among other things, axes, adzes, hoes, sickles, scythes, plow blades and a variety of other farm equipment. Considering that at least nine out of every ten Colonial Americans did some kind of farming, his talents were very much in demand. They also made a variety of utensils needed for early American housewifery, such as kettles, pots, ladles, and other items for the hearth. Houses could not have been put together without blacksmiths to make latches, locks, nails and hinges. They were also repaired all things made of iron. In short, the blacksmith was everybody's tool maker.

In the nineteenth century, the blacksmith was defined as a person who works with iron. The general country blacksmith who lived in rural Pennsylvania was an all purpose handyman who served his community in a variety of different facets in regards to metalworking. The rural Pennsylvania blacksmith tended to be more proficient in making latches and hinges than his counterparts in the other colonies. On the other hand, city blacksmiths tended to be a specialist who worked on a limited range of goods determined by his local clientele.

By 1774, there were over fifty master smiths in the city of Philadelphia. Some examples of these specialists would include shipsmiths, boatsmiths, ax and hoe makers, edge-tool makers, gunsmiths, locksmiths, whitesmiths, cutlers, pumpmakers, cooper's hoop makers, nail makers and farriers. Blacksmiths usually worked with one apprentice, who after acquiring enough skill and capital of his own, would be able to start his own shop.

It is often hard to distinguish the true country blacksmiths of Pennsylvania from your average rural farmer who owned an anvil, a pair of bellows and a forge. It was not uncommon for farmers to have a work area set up with these items so that they would be enabled to make minor repairs should any of their tools become defective at an inopportune time. But for the village blacksmith, a more extensive inventory of tools was needed to fix or make a number goods for both the household and out door activity.

The tools and techniques used by a smith stayed relatively the same for over a thousand years. Standard among the items a typical blacksmith would have in his forge would be a pair of leather bellows and a wrought iron anvil which probably would have been caste in any one of Pennsylvania's numerous furnaces. The anvil would be mounted onto a block of wood or a tree stump with the face of the anvil about as high as the smith's bent knuckles. On one side of the anvil would be a horn used to shape rings out of the wrought iron rods the smith worked on. Somewhere within close proximity to the anvil would be a the slack bucket. It was a bucket filled with water used to cool the iron quickly.

As far as what types and varieties of hand tools a general blacksmith would keep in his work shop, no two collections studied were exactly alike. However, one could expect to find a number of different kinds of hammers, tongs, punches, drifts, headers, swages and files. He would have also had a vice in order to hold piece of metal in place as he

struck it or welded another piece to it. Hammers were particularly various in a blacksmith's shed. A plethora of different weights and shapes for a number of specific tasks- cross peens for drawing, ball peens for upsetting, some softer wood or brass hammers for work in which strike marks were less than desirable and, of course, sledgehammers. Other tools would include hacksaws, pliers and screw drivers, among others. The actual set up, or design of a blacksmith's work shop also varied among each different smithy. But they all tended to be very dark and messy.

The darkness of the blacksmith's shop was an intentional characteristic of the work area. The blacksmith was able to determine what temperature the iron was by observing the color of the metal. Depending on whatever task the smith attempted, the iron had to be at a certain temperature. The following guide lines for forge work are more compliant for those who practice smithing today. In this era, mild steel has replaced wrought iron as the metal most commonly used for smithing. Although the techniques for performing common forge work (i.e. drawing, upsetting and welding) have experienced little variation, the temperature at which these tasks are executed may have changed.

A black heat is the lowest temperature a smith will heat iron to. It is called a black heat because the faint glow of the metal is barely visible in the daylight. It is at this heat that an oil-finish can be applied to the metal. Linseed oil is primarily used today. Giving the iron an oil-finish prevents it from rusting quickly and gives it a pleasant black matte finish. No forge work is actually done at a black heat. The coldest heat for forge work is done at a cherry heat. At this temperature a red color is visible in daylight. Today, it is used to make easy bends in mild steel.

At a bright cherry heat, the iron turns to a bright orange-red color. The iron can bend very easy at this stage. This is also the temperature at which iron can be cut. It is usually done with a chisel or a "hot set" (a chisel with a handle). A blacksmith can also "draw out" the metal at this temperature. "Drawing out" is heating and hammering the metal in order to make it longer and thinner.

The temperature at which most forge work is done on heavier metals is called a near-welding heat. The steel will turn to a bright yellow color. "Upsetting", which is the process of making an iron rod thicker and shorter, is done at this temperature. "Upsetting" is accomplished by striking the heated end of the iron squarely with the hammer. The iron should be clamped in a vice horizontally with the heated end protruding above the jaws.

When white sparks begin to shoot from the fire of the forge, then the iron has been brought to a full-welding heat. This is the highest temperature (about 24000f)used for forge work. Iron that is at a full-welding heat will take on a near white color and sparks will be visible when removed from the forge. Two pieces of iron that are at this temperature will readily stick together when touched. Quick hammer blows will bind the metal together permanently. The blacksmith must work quickly. If the iron is given a chance to cool the steel will not stick together.

Pennsylvania blacksmiths of the 1700s essentially acquired their iron from large market towns and in particular the town of Philadelphia and later in the century Lancaster. Otherwise, a blacksmith might have been inclined to reshape old wrought iron implements that were no longer effective or desirable. These markets in the towns of Pennsylvania were chiefly supplied by furnaces and forges located inside the very colony. Pennsylvania was ripe for an explosion in the iron industry. The colony was rich in the three natural resources required for iron production; iron ore, timber and limestone. Facilitating the transportation of this product was the presence of several major rivers. In Colonial Pennsylvania, the three most important rivers were the Delaware, Schuylkill and Cumberland.

Iron production was encouraged in the colonies by the British Crown with the expectations that this iron would then be shipped to the mother country to be used by that country's blacksmiths. Before 1750, English craftsmen used Swedish iron, which was considered the best on the market, but in that year the Swedish government imposed a heavy export tax on the product. Iron from the colonies was seen as a cheaper alternative and in 1750 Parliament passed the Iron Act, which forbade the manufacturing of finished iron goods in the colonies. Despite the efforts for the contrary, most of the iron produced in Pennsylvania stayed in the colony. By the start of the American Revolution, there were over a dozen forges and furnaces in Pennsylvania, including Coventryville, Colebrookdale, Hopewell, Reading, Cornwall, Valley Forge, Pool Forge and the Windsor forges.

In order to keep a thriving iron industry, an abundance of three resources must be procured; iron ore, lumber for charcoal, and limestone to be used as flux. Iron ore in its raw form may only contain as much as 50 to 70 percent iron, with the rest of its composition made up of several impurities. To extract the iron from the iron ore, a large stone furnace was first filled part of the way with charcoal, then the iron ore and lastly the limestone as flux. When the charcoal is lit, the flux is what causes the impurities to separate from the iron ore and settle at the top of the molten iron. What settled at the top was called the slag. The slag was skimmed from the furnace and discarded. Furnaces often accumulated large mounds of slag as there was no known use at the time for this by product. Later, it would be used by railroad companies as a foundation for railroad tracks.

Once the iron was in molten form, it was poured into a channel consisting of a series of molds made of sand on the ground. To the earliest iron workers living in the Agrarian Age, the smaller molds intersecting the larger channel looked like piglets nursing from a mother sow. For this reason, the phrase "pig iron" was coined to describe the metal. However, "pig iron" could not be used by blacksmiths. To turn "pig iron" to wrought iron, it was sent from the furnaces to large forges, slit mills, naileries and rolling mills for further processing.

At the forge, the iron was re-heated and pounded by large trip hammers powered by water wheels. The end result was a wrought iron bar, which could then be made into a variety of useful implements or from there it might be sent a slit mill were the iron would be cut by giant sheers also powered by water wheels. Those slices of iron would then go to a nailery, sometimes in the same location, were it would pass through rollers and turned into nails. By the turn of the century "pig iron" was also sent from the furnaces to a rolling mill where it would be re-heated and sent through giant rollers and made into sheets of wrought iron.

At first, these new developments in the iron industry presented conveniences for the blacksmith that increased his productivity, and in the long run, his earnings. Unfortunately, these advancements also proved to be his undoing. As the iron industry found new ways of processing iron, the need for blacksmiths to make tools and other implements became reduced. These objects could now be made in factories. By the latter half of the nineteenth century, the common smith became not much more than a farrier, or person who shod horses.

Despite this development, blacksmiths continued to operate forges into the middle of the twentieth century. Today, the art of smithing has been continued through the efforts of those involved in living history and historic preservation. Through demonstrating the livelihoods of our forefathers, history comes alive and we are given a window into our past. There are many such blacksmiths who work as demonstrators for historical sites all over the state of Pennsylvania. There are also many smiths who operate shops which supply these historical sites, as well as supply reproductions to private citizens and institutions interested in keeping the past alive. We are indebted to these past masters for their significant contributions to our understanding of our history.

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Those who are interested to learn more about the production of iron and its processing are encouraged to visit Hopewell Iron Furnace located in southeastern Berks County at Hopewell Furnace National Historic Site off State Route 345.

Eggert, Gerald G., The Iron Industry in Pennsylvania. The Pennsylvania Historic Assocation, c/o Penn State-Harrisburg, 1994.

Fisher, Leonard E. The Blacksmiths. New York, London: Franklin Watts, Inc., 1976.

Klinger, Robert. Blacksmith at Thomas Massey House, Personal Communication. Summer 1999.

Jeannette Lasansky. To Draw, Upset & Weld: the Work of the Pennsylvania Rural Blacksmith 1742-1935. Oral Traditions Project of the Union County Historical Society, Lewisburg, Pennsylvania, 1981.

Lungwitz, A. and Adams, Charles F. The Complete Guide to Blacksmithing. Crown Publishers, Inc., 1981.

Malewicz, Walt. Park Ranger at Hopewell Furnace National Historic Site. Personal Communication. Summer 1999.