Knoxville weekly chronicle. [volume] (Knoxville, Tenn.) 1870-1875, 1873-04-23
FACTS ABOUT EAST TENNESSEE
The Iron works at Rockwood.
NO. CHI.

A traveller starting from Virginia, fol-
lowing Walden's Ridge, suddenly com.
ing in sight of Oakdale or lockwood
would be inclined to rub his eyes and won
der if the busy scene spread out before him
was not a dream. There is nothing from
the Virginia line to Oakdale or lockwood
calculated to prepare the strange traveller
for the change from the unmistakable evil
dences of q primitive style of farming and
living to the blazing furnaces and hum of
industry that he hears at the places nam
ed. But if he followed the geological
formation of the ridge, and was looking
,Gor the most favorable location for blast
furnaces he would have no cause for sur
prise. Busy hands and sagacious minds
are but improving the advantages nature
offers, for we know of no points in East
Tennessee where the materials for the
manufacture of iron are more abundant,
richer or more convenient than at the places
TO which we have referred.
Five years ago, resolute, energetic,
practical iron man picked his way, amid
huge powders, to the site of the present
blast furnace at lockwood. AS the bowl
ders and rocks were too numerous to
permit even horse to pick his way to the
site, the name given to the place was emf
nently appropriate. Timber was abundant
the clay was good, limestone convenient
and with these materials the energy and
genius of a Wilder needed but busy hands
and tools to speedily build a furnace, open
coal and ore beds, put down tram roads
ana make iron. Five years ago lockwood
was just as The Red man had left 1t near a
cen tury ago! To-day il is a busy town of
500 Inhabitants, the site of the largest
blast furnaces in the South.
THE COAL, ORE AND LIMESTONE
used in the furnace are all convenient. A
horse railroad winding up the side of
Walden's ridge about half q mile from the
furnace leads to the mouth of the coal
bank. / do not know how to describe the
quantity of coal inside. Most veins of coal
run regularly and of an uniform thickness.
Some are five feet, some seven and some
less. The coal at lockwood is not found
in beds--it is there in mountains. We
were inside of one of these mountains.
Below, above and al around us was coal.
a space as large as the court room in Knox
vile was dug out. If lockwood ever needs
an Opera House or city Hall, they ought
to dig it out of one of their coal mountains.
The coal is easily mined, cokes we'll and
can be carried to the furnace at unusually
low figures.
The ore is dug from the hills all around
and at distances varying from one-half to
two miles from the furnace and costs about
two dollars delivered for roasting. The
limestone is of a superior quality and is
brought about mile from the works.
These are the three articles used in the
manufacture of iron.
AS this article will be read hy many who
have never seen a furnace, it would, per-
rhaps, be interesting to explain briefly the
process. We will endeavor to make it
easily understood
In the first place a large brick chimney
.or stack is built, which is circular in form,
about sixty feet high and at an average of
about twelve feet in diameter. The dame
ter Mt the bottom or hearth is about seven
feet. The hearth is five feethigh and con-
structed so as to draw off the iron and Gin
der and to admit the hot air. Into the top
of this stack the coal, ore and limestone
are emptied, Such large stack filled with
these raw materials would not burn very
freely if left to ordinary combustion. To
intensity the heat and hasten the combus-
ton, hot air is forced into the stack. Inn
rnense ovens are built, through which
large pipes are laid. Under these pipes hot
fires are kept and through the pipes, by
means of powerful engines, air is forced at
an enormous pressure. This air, forced
through tne neAteu ovens Dy the engines
as described, is instantanOusly heated and
conducted into the stack at the bot
tom. This hot blast keeps the fire
and heat in the stack at n uni
form temperature. AS the iron is
melted it sinks into the bottom of the
hearth The limestone gathers the cinder
from the coal and the impurities from the
ore in liquid state, swimming on top of
the melted iron. This cinder is drawn off
every few hours. The iron il drawn off
every twelve hours and run into sand
mOulds in the shape of bars, commonly
called pigs. The hot air forced into the
bottom of the stack would carry the flame
and gasses from the coal up through the
stack and out at the top in huge bright
flame If il were not arrested. But az the
gus is TOO valuable 10 be lost that way, "a
huge iron cap, like bell, is constructed at
the top which can be dropped down into
the stack at will. This cap arrests the gas,
and with the aid of the pressure from the
hot blast below, IL is forced into a huge,
iron boiler like tube which runs from near
the top Of the stack down underneath the
boilers and hot blast ovens, where il is