Katahdin
Iron Works in the 1880s
Though it has all but vanished, this is the
scene that would have appeared directly in front of you had
you visited this spot in the 1880s. The stone furnace still
standing today was once enclosed within a group of buildings
that housed each step of the iron-making process. The raw
iron ore was prepared in The Ore Kiln
1, before being dumped into the furnace
through the Top Houses 2.
If you look closely, you will see a modern photo of the Furnace
3 superimposed on this 1880s photo so
that you can get a perspective of how it used to look.
The raw ore was superheated
in the furnace by burning the wood charcoal produced in the
brick kilns. Mixing the ore with limestone
caused a chemical reaction that produced the molten iron that
flowed out of the bottom of the furnace and into the Casting
Shed 4. Here,
men formed molds and channels out of sand on the floor. The
liquid iron trickled through the channels and filled the molds
to form the "pig iron" bars that, when cooled, were
sent to market on the train. By the 1880s, the steam locomotive
could pick the bars up right outside the casting shed and
carry them down to Bangor where they could then be sent by
ship to anyone who purchased them.
The large Storage Barn 5
on the right, housed all of the equipment and replacement
parts needed to keep the operation running. On its return
trips, the train could bring back passengers and supplies,
such as the pile of shingles and the new batteau boat shown
here just after unloading. The batteau was the basic means
of transportation for men working on the lakes and rivers
of northern Maine, particularly in the lumbering industry.
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