Existing comment:
We're above the furnace now. As the sign says:
Cold-Blast Charcoal Furnace: Operating the Furnace
Workers known as "filters" unloaded iron ore, charcoal, and limestone into this furnace's stack. The water wheel powered a pair of cylindrical bellows which forced air into the furnace, helping to create the heat needed to make iron.
A furnace worker, or founder, controlled the quality of iron by varying amounts of iron ore, limestone, charcoal, and air blast. White iron flowered into channels to make pig iron bars. When a founder tapped grey iron, he sounded the casthouse bell, signaling moulders to cast finished products. |