The history of Falling Creek Park spans more than 400 years, with numerous industries along the creek from the 17th to the early 20th century. The earliest industry at this location was the first iron furnace in the New World, where iron ore was extracted locally as early as 1608. In 1619, the Virginia Company of London sent 150 men to establish three ironworks, and Falling Creek was built in 1621 after the first crew died from “the seasoning” of the Virginia climate. The ironworks became the first in the Western Hemisphere to produce pig iron, and its establishment helped lead to the eventual settlement of the area. In 1622, an Indian attack on the settlement killed 27 English workers and left the buildings in ruins. In 1750, Archibald Cary built a forge on the south side of Falling Creek on land inherited from his father. The Cary forge converted pig iron into bar iron, but after proving unprofitable, Cary turned to a grist mill, then restarted the forge for the American Revolution. British troops under Benedict Arnold destroyed the forge in 1781. The grist mill took its name from the 18th-century Cary plantation, Ampthill, which adjoined the 69 acre mill tract to the north. Archibald Cary recognized Falling Creek’s importance and the area’s potential to provide resources for settlement and commerce. John Watkins rebuilt the mill in the 1850s, and it remained active at least as late as 1906; the stone foundations on the north side of the creek are its remains. Just west of Falling Creek along present day Historic Route 1 are the remnants of the only pre-20th-century bridge still standing in Chesterfield County. Built between 1826-1828, the Manchester and Petersburg Turnpike Bridge was largely constructed from stone that may have been salvaged from the blast furnace of the original ironworks. It is part of the state’s first wayside park, established in 1933. Upstream from the ruins of Archibald Cary’s mill was the area’s first planned community, the Village of Bensley, developed by Albert Bensley in 1909 and marketed as a convenient streetcar suburb 20 minutes from Richmond, with a streetcar line connecting it to Richmond and Petersburg. At the turn of the 20th century, another industry began to take shape along Falling Creek, and in 1934 officials from the Old Dixie Distilling Company tried to build a distillery at the site of the original ironworks, but local opposition based on the site’s historical and archaeological significance moved the distillery to the east edge of the 57-acre property.