The
Crane Iron Works, Catasauqua, Pa.
The Home of the Anthracite Iron Industry
Index to Articles
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The following is
a selection of articles published on the history of the Crane Iron blast
furnace operations on the Lehigh River in Catasauqua, Pa. where the first
successful commercial manufacture of pig iron using anthracite coal was
conducted by David
Thomas in 1840.
The Lehigh Coal &
Navigation Co. Annual Report for 1839 provides information on the
activities conducted by the LC&N in early years to promote the formation of
a company to smelt iron ore using anthracite coal.
The financial records of the Crane Iron Works are available at the Hagley Museum and Library (Wilmington, DE) under Call Number 1198. LEHGH CRANE IRON CO., Catasauqua (formerly Craneville), Lehigh Co., Pa., miscellany, 1839-1908: minutes of stockholders' meetings, 1839-93 (2 vols.); minutes of meetings of directors (from 1868 called board of managers), 1839-93 (3 vols.); two annual reports, 1878, 1884; agreement between creditors and the company, 1893; report on the Crane Iron Works for the three-year period ending 31 Dec 1907, made by the Audit Co., New York, 1908. This company was organized at Philadelphia in 1839 by Josiah White (1781-1850), Erskine Hazard (1789-1865), and others. It was the first in the United States to make a commercial success of the manufacture of pig iron with anthracite, having brought from Wales an expert in this process, David Thomas (1794-1882), who had been associated with George Crane, proprietor of the Ynyscidwin Works in Brecknockshire. These financial records have been searched and there is little to be found on the day-to-day operations of the Crane..
Labor strife in
the anthracite coal industry causes a downturn in
activity in 1875.
Matthews and Hungerford Article,
1884, including the agreements between David Thomas and the Lehigh Coal and
Navigation Co.
Roberts et al, History of Lehigh County
contains a review of the Crane written by W. H. Glace in 1914.
A detailed
description of the construction of the furnaces at the Crane Iron Works and of
the early operations was presented to the American Society of Mining Engineers
in 1899 by Samuel Thomas, son of David Thomas. This is the most detailed
account that was published on this subject.
A decline in the
anthracite iron industry began in the 1870s. A New York Times article published in 1893 reports the failure of the company.
Many iron
furnaces idle. A New York Times article published
in 1898, quotes Leonard Peckitt on the continued closure of furnaces in
eastern Pennsylvania.
In an aside to
the main operations of the company, Leonard
Peckitt, who had taken over as president of the Crane, undertook a
cooperative effort with famed inventor, Thomas A. Edison, to evaluate the effectiveness of the use of
electromagnetism to enrich the ore used in the furnaces.
The Empire Steel and Iron Company, Greater
America, Vol. 3, 1900.
Empire Steel was the operator of the former Crane furnaces at the turn of the
century.
A History of
Catasauqua in the Lehigh County, written in 1914, By Lambert and Reinhard
contains a History of the Crane Iron
Works until it's acquisition by the Empire Steel and Iron Company at the
turn of the 20th century. Included
is a concise summary of the activities conducted by other organizations prior
to the founding of the Crane relative to efforts to utilize anthracite coal in
the production of pig iron.
In April 1922,
the Reading Eagle
reports that Empire Steel is acquired by the
Replogle Company.
Several sources
(e.g., Wikipedia, David Thomas) state that Òthe last
furnace at the Crane Iron Company ceased operation in 1921; by 1935, most of the plant had been
demolished. Little remains of the buildings where the great Industrial
Revolution was first begunÓ.
A
succinct history of the Crane Ironworks is given in Wikipedia – the
August 2010 version is reproduced here.
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Rev.
Nov. 2015