Eagle Iron Works

Eagle Iron Works began in 1810 when Roland Curtin and Moses Boggs established Eagle Forge on a seven-acre tract acquired from Philip Antes, refining pig iron from nearby furnaces for the next eight years. Roland became sole proprietor in 1815, built Eagle Furnace and a workers village in 1818, expanded with a gristmill and employee housing in 1825, and added Centre County's second rolling mill in 1829. In 1832-33 he built Martha Furnace, which supplied pig iron to Eagle Forge for the next 15 years after Eagle Furnace was shut down. After Roland Curtin retired, his sons John and Constans built Pleasant Furnace in 1848, replacing Eagle Furnace and Martha Furnace; as the only functioning furnace after 1848, Pleasant Furnace became known as Eagle Furnace. Reopened on a smaller scale in 1899 by H.R. Curtin and investors as the Eagle Iron Company after a decade of dormancy, the operation ended in 1922 after fire destroyed Eagle Furnace's wooden superstructure in 1921 and Hugh Laird Curtin chose not to rebuild. Eagle Forge refined the last stockpile of pig iron before shutting down, and Eagle Iron Works became the longest-lived and last operating charcoal iron works in Pennsylvania. At its peak in the mid nineteenth century, the complex included a furnace, blast house, charging house, casting house, tuyere shed, forge, foundry, rolling mill, slitting mill, stock house, scale, workshops, and stable, while year-round charcoal production and furnace operation required intensive labor and large-scale timber cutting.

Pennsylvania · United States