In the year 1835 the Franklin Institute offered a gold medal "to the person who shall manufacture in the United States the greatest quantity of iron from the ore during the year, using no other fuel than anthracite coal, the quantity to be not less than twenty tons." This medal was never awarded, and it is fair to presume that the required quantity of iron was not manufactured by any one person in 1835 by "using no other fuel than anthracite coal." Nevertheless, there is abundant evidence to prove that from the year 1830 to the year 1840 there were a number of attempts to use mineral fuel for the smelting of iron-ores.
The most successful of these experiments was tried at Pottsville, Pa., and the works were called the Pioneer Furnace. It was built for Burd Patterson, by William Lyman, of Boston, and blast was unsuccessfully applied July 10, 1839, but the furnace was finally successfully blown in by Benjamin Perry, October 19, 1839, and produced twenty-eight tons per week of good foundry iron. "This furnace," say Bishop, "made a continuous blast of ninety days, and secured for its proprietor a premium of $5,000 which had been subscribed by citizens of the State." On June 5, 1839, Mr. David Thomas, who had been associated with Mr. George Crane in making pig iron with anthracite coal at Yniscedwin, in Wales, arrived in America, and on July 9th of the same year he commenced the erection of the first furnace of the Lehigh Crane Iron Company at Catasauqua, Pa. This furnace was successfully blown in by him on the 3d of July, 1840, and the first "cast" was made on July 4th. The furnace was provided with a hot blast, and was blown by water power derived from the Lehigh Canal. This enterprise was a success from the start, the furnace producing fifty tons of good foundry iron per week, and it continued to be profitably operated until 1879, when it was torn down. Notwithstanding the fact that there were several promising experimental attempts to smelt iron with anthracite coal prior to the erection of a furnace at Catasauqua by Mr. Thomas, yet this furnace, from its large initial output (as measured by the practice of the time) and continuous operation, and the fact that it pointed out clearly the essential requisites of success in smelting with anthracite coal viz., large capacity of furnace, supplied with abundance of blast at a high temperature[1]—may fairly be considered the first furnace in America that achieved a satisfactory commercial success in making iron with anthracite as a fuel. From his success in the erection and operation of this furnace, and subsequent life-long identification with the manufacture of anthracite pig iron, on a scale far surpassing any of his contemporaries, Mr. Thomas is fairly entitled to be called the father of the anthracite iron industry of
- ↑ The "hot blast" was invented by James Beaumont Neilson, of Glasgow, in 1828.
