Harrison Hagans opened the Virginia Iron Furnace in 1854, and except during the Civil War it operated intermittently until 1888. Workers layered limestone, charcoal, and iron ore to forge pig iron that went into steel. A wooden raceway brought water from Muddy Creek and Crab Orchard Run, and a 50-foot water wheel pumped bellows that blew air into the fire, keeping temperatures at 2600° to 3000° F. At the right time, workers opened a tiny door at the bottom of the stack, and the molten iron flowed into sand molds called the sow and cooled into pigs. Leftover slag, made of limestone and iron impurities, was dumped over the hill. Hagans would not have built the iron furnace without a nearby stream to provide water power. Now Muddy Creek is orange from acid mine drainage, a result of coal mining in the mid-1900s.