Adapting Power

This raceway brought water from the James River and Kanawha Canal to power waterwheels, and later turbines, that drove machinery. In its earliest use, the raceway contained at least two overshot waterwheels that powered a corn mill, a cotton mill, and a flour mill, and the stone base of the Pattern Building probably dates from the earliest structures. Water passed through tubes or penstocks into round metal casings that held turbines in a system with 22 feet of head between the forebay above the turbine and the tailrace that carried water from the turbine toward the river. Through 1935, these turbines powered many buildings, and rebuilt shafts and gears suggest the complexity of the system. Turbine number 5 powered machines in the foundry, requiring a long shaft to run through the Pattern Building to transmit power. From the raceway, turbines transmitted power widely through thousands of feet of shafts, gears, pulleys, and leather belt to machinery. Typically, one or two turbines powered machinery in a single factory, but the adaptive reuse of this site for various industrial purposes over more than 150 years made the system more complex. Tredegar Iron Works began using this raceway during the Civil War and installed turbines to power individual buildings or sets of machines as needed. What evolved was a set of turbines connected to at least five other buildings, some hundreds of feet away. The turbines were identified by their maker and design: a 40-inch Bodine vertical shaft turbine generating 104.65 horsepower at 69 revolutions per minute, installed in 1897-8; a 36-inch Burham vertical shaft turbine generating 76.21 horsepower at 158 revolutions per minute, installed in 1871; an 18-inch McCormick horizontal shaft turbine generating 58.7 horsepower at 302 revolutions per minute, installed in 1910; a 24-inch Smith horizontal shaft turbine generating 139.6 horsepower at 325 revolutions per minute, installed in 1907; and a 36-inch Burham vertical shaft turbine generating 114.3 horsepower at 159 revolutions per minute, installed in 1920.

Richmond, Virginia · United States