Cedar Creek Furnace

The Cedar Creek Furnace (also known as the Alabama Iron Works) is a former blast furnace site near Russellville in Franklin County, Alabama, United States. It was the first iron ore furnace in Alabama, preceding an industry that would come to dominate the state's economy in the late 19th and early 20th century. 

A Section of Fine Arts fresco entitled “Shipment of the First Iron Produced in Russellville” was painted for the Russellville, Alabama post office in 1938 by Conrad A. Albrizzio.

“The mural for Russellville turned out to be one of the most controversial in Alabama. Albrizzio submitted two sketches of local industry shortly after he was invited to undertake the commission. The Section office chose the scene of a local quarry over that of an early iron mine. The Section apparently made their decision in early July 1937 and by the end of the month they had received numerous telegrams in protest from Russellville clubs and business concerns. The local population proposed a slightly different theme of the old Alabama Iron Works, the first iron furnace in Alabama, built in 1817. Similar letters were also sent from Alabama to Senator John H. Bankhead, Jr., in Washington. One of the letters described the general theme and the details the Russellville businessmen wished to have included: “We know the beehive shape of all charcoal furnaces erected at the date. We know that the furnace and forge were motivated by water power through a race that still exists. We know they used a five hundred pound hammer to shape the pig–we have the hammer. We know the ore was collected by slave labor and hauled in ox carts to the furnace. We know the pig iron, much of it, was hauled by ox wagon thirty-five miles to the Tennessee River and shipped to Liverpool, England, and we have the records where it was sold at one hundred dollars a ton. The rock wall foundation of the warehouse still stands along the creek bank.” After a series of letters between Albrizzio, Bankhead, the citizens of Russellville, and the Section, Albrizzio redesigned to the wishes of the local population and eventually went to Russellville and painted the mural in fresco on the walls of the post office.”

To refine cast iron into wrought or bar iron, heavy pigs and sows were dragged from the furnace to the forge by oxen. They were positioned in the finery hearth through an aperture in the side of the chimney. Rollers guided the sows into the fire where they were slowly melted. Long iron bars or ringers were used to manipulate the melted iron, lifting it up into the air blast over and over again until the carbon was sufficiently reduced. As the carbon content went down, the melting temperature went up. This may have been an indicator to the finer (foreman) that the iron had reached the desired carbon content. The process produced more slag and it is possible that some slag may have been deliberately added to assist in the carbon reduction process.

18th century Helve-Hammer

The iron was removed from the finery hearth as a loop.  Excess charcoal was removed from the outside surface of the loop then the hammering began. The initial hammering was done with long-handled sledge hammers. Then it was dragged to the 500 pound helve-hammer for heavier blows. Hammermen completed the wrought iron bars by forging them between the hammer and the anvil. The loop was hammered into a block or bloom. From there the bloom was hammered systematically from its middle out towards one end. The bar would be re-heated numerous times in the chafery hearth to maintain a welding heat. The bar would be turned end-for-end in the tongs and the hammerman would draw out the other end of the bar, again from the middle, outwards.