page_title: Isabella Furnace
section_title: Buildings
hierarchical_section_title: Isabella Furnace / Buildings
caption_attribution_description: English: Ruins of Isabella Furnace from near the base of the stack; taken about a decade after furnace blown out in 1894.
context_page_description: Isabella Furnace was a cold blast charcoal iron furnace located in West Nantmeal Township, Chester County, Pennsylvania. The furnace was named for Isabella Potts, wife of one of the partners, a member of the Potts ironmaking family. Isabella was the last iron furnace to be built in the county, in 1835, and was operated by members of the Potts family and their partners until 1855, when they lost control of it in a bankruptcy. It returned to the family in 1881, when it was purchased by Col. Joseph Potts, who modernized it. The furnace, the last to operate in Chester County, went out of blast in 1894, a few months after Col. Potts' death, but remained largely intact until after his son's death in 1943. The remains of the furnace complex have been listed in the National Register of Historic Places since 1991.
context_section_description: The original stack of the furnace was 33 feet (10 m) high, with a 6.5-foot (2.0 m) bosh. Either the 1864 or 1881 remodeling increased the height to 35 feet (11 m), with a 7.75-foot (2.36 m) bosh. The last remodeling, in 1886, enlarged the stack to 60 feet (18 m).
  A Hexamer General Survey plan of the furnace made in 1890 shows a number of structures arranged along the hillside sloping down to Perkins Run. Atop the hillside were a "coalhouse", "orehouse", and "screenhouse"; three large warehouses (about 100' x 50' each) with railroad trestles running into them for the delivery and storage of raw materials. Their elevated position allowed charcoal and ore to be moved directly to a crusher house and a charging house on the edge of the hillside; the mixed coal and ore could then move across a charging bridge into the top of the furnace stack, whose base was at the foot of the hill. Attached to the base of the furnace were a "wheel house", apparently used for storing casting sand and fire brick, and a casting house where molten iron from the furnace could run into molds. Just to the northwest lay the boiler shed and blowing engine for the furnace's steam-powered tuyeres, and several ancillary buildings also lay in the floodplain on both sides of Perkins Run.
  Current aerial photography shows the coalhouse, casting and crushing houses, blowing engine house, and a small storage building have been reroofed and appear to form part of a private residence. The furnace stack appears to be largely demolished, and other buildings are gone; the foundations and lower walls of the orehouse and screenhouse are still evident.
caption: Ruins at the base of the furnace stack after about a decade's abandonment. Collapsing building to left of center is the "wheel house"; building at base to right of center is the casting house. Charging bridge and crusher and charging house can be seen behind and to left of stack.
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