Snowdon Vulcan Iron and Machine Works: Day 5

Hello Everyone,


       Sorry for such a late post, things have been, as always busy. Today was no exception. I missed half a day of fieldwork due to some aggravating personal matters. And I locked my camera in the field equipment shed, so no pictures tonight. I was visited today by Scott Beveridge, who works for the Washington, Pa Observer Reporter newspaper. You can follow his blog on my blog list. We are trying to get as much coverage on the Snowdon and Sons Vulcan Iron and Machine Works as we can, after all, it is the foundry that patterned and casted the parts of this nation's first cast iron bridge.
      Yesterday we began finding the remains of a knob and tube electrical wiring system. I knew the foundry had not been electrified during its operation as the Brownsville Electric Company didn't start running until the late 1890's and the mill was out of work for several years before. I decided to return to the documentary evidence, and examine the Sanborn Fire Insurance Maps once again. Here is what I found:
      If you'll notice in the area circled in RED in the second image, the pattern shop was converted into tenement apartments! (Even in the 19th century they understood to adaptively reuse structures...one day we'll learn) Anyhow, the first image is from 1891 the second is from 1901. If you examine the 3rd image closely, there is a power/telegraph pole in the far left corner. The conversion of the shop to apartments would explain the blue painted plaster we are finding, the bones from livestock, and the broken whiskey bottle. Perhaps these aren't evidence of workers, but of tenants?    

1891 Sanborn Insurance Map

1901 Sanborn Insurance Map

Photo courtesy of Donna Jordan

Snowdon & Sons Vulcan Iron and Machine Works: Day 4

Hello Everyone,

A volunteer and Jonathan Crise cleaning the foundation.

       Today was a rainy, overcast, and dreary day in Southwestern Pennsylvania. Most archaeologists would have called it a rain-day and went home. Not us. The well drained soils of the concrete and railroad fill makes digging in the rain possible. Besides, does wet concrete make it any easier to dig through? NO! But a good maddock does. I only have two photos today of some archaeologists at work in their trenches. The foundation of the foundry seems largely intact with a sharp break for about 3 feet. The it turns into a pile of bricks, and then back into a cut stone foundation. From a photograph we have, it might represent where a crawl space was located. Only more time and more exploration will tell. Right now, I have to get back to transcribing oral histories from river workers here on the Monongahela, take care. 

Carl Maurer excavating the layer of brick at the bottom of his unit.

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Brownsville Archaeology Month Day 3

Hello All,

Munsell Color System (Photo credit: Crossett Library Bennington College)

       Here are some more exciting pictures from the Snowdon & Sons Vulcan Iron and Machine Works at Brownsville Archaeology Month! Friday, May 11th represented the third day of our excavations. We mainly had administrative work to do, mapping Munsell color testing, and some equipment repair. Enjoy!

Erin Morgan examining a piece of metal strapping.

Sean Rothhaar repairing a screen, a thankless job!

Jonathan Crise screening for artifacts.

The point of discovery!

 

I'm tired of teaching what was here...

Hello Everyone,

This little post comes after some feedback on my Facebook page. I thought it was appropriate so I'll post it here as well. The discussion started as several of our historic buildings here in Brownsville, Pennsylvania are being threatened. Not threatened by developer or the state; no they are threatened by the people we elect into our local government.

You expect that the people we elect to be the stewards of our town, they would protect that which is valuable to its community and preserve the fabric of our heritage. Instead, to your face they speak of valuing the core of the community but in their seats of power they tear the very fabric down. Instead of preserving and look to the future they are blind to the past, only because they do not understand that the wealthiest of communities have embraced their heritage and profited from it.

Two million dollars were allocated to Brownsville. I heard two million reasons to tear it down, and not a single reason to preserve it. These politicians want to rule over a community of rubble. In one instance a comment was made on Facebook over the destruction of the Mitchell House by a senior member of the Brownsville Council, "Tear it down!". How can we move forward as a community when those elected prefer a wrecking ball over using their head to move the community forward? I cannot take a stand alone, the culture of the community must change. I'm tired of teaching about what was there; it would be nice to teach about how we saved the town.

http://www.archaeologydude.com/2009/10/current-side-quest.html

Photo courtesy of Phillip Shandorf

Mitchell House. Photo courtesy of the Brownsville Telegraph Online. 

Snowdon Foundry: Brownsville Archaeology Month Day 2

Hello Everyone,


I'd like to share a few picks from today's discoveries. I also have some mystery artifacts that are always fun. I have to make one correction from yesterday's post, we DID NOT find a railroad datum point. It turned out to be one of these: 

Mystery items!

Erin Morgan and Carl Maurer Mapping their Unit 

Liz Atkin preparing her Excavation Unit for a Photo

   

Foundry Rising!

Hello Everyone,


       Yesterday was the start of this year's Brownsville Archaeology Month! The day was filled with one fascinating find after the other, opening small windows into a complex past of the John Snowdon and Son's Vulcan Iron and Machine Works. The work was hard using picks, maddocks, and of course trowels and shovels to excavate down almost three feet (1 meter) to buried foundation below. 

Phil Shandorph, Carl Maurer, and Jonathan Crise

     Some of the cool artifacts that we recovered are in these photographs:

Whiskey Bottle

 Alcohol bottle found outside one of the shop's footers. Alcohol bottles may indicate resistance of workers in the foundry to the strict rules that often governed their conduct. 

 It is not often in Archaeology when you find a name carved in stone of the object of your research. Here we have the name "Vulcan". The foundry, like others in the area, was known as the Vulcan Iron and Machine Works.

Carl Maurer

Stay tuned! 
    

Snowdon Vulcan Iron and Machine Works Discovery!

Hello Everyone,

        I would like to take a few moments and present an important discovery in American Industrial Archaeology. Myself, along with members of the local Society for Pennsylvania Archaeology Mon-Yough Chapter #3 have located and begun excavation on the Snowdon Vulcan Iron and Machine Works located right here in Brownsville, Pennsylvania. As you read on, you will notice reference to the nation's first cast iron bridge, a symbol which will become the cornerstone to Brownsville's redevelopment in the 21st-century.

1886 Sanborn Fire Insurance Map showing the Foundry

Aerial Photograph with Foundry Overlay 

     The turn of the 19^th century and the introduction of steam power ushered in a new industrial rush in Brownsville and Bridgeport, Pennsylvania.  In 1818, John Snowden arrived in Brownsville from Yorkshire, England (Ellis 1882; Gresham and Wiley 1889).  After apprenticing for a few years in a local foundry, he opened his own machine shop and rolling mill within close proximity to the riverbank.  Named after the Roman god of fire, the Vulcan Iron and Machine Works opened in 1824.  The Vulcan factory built the engines for the steamer Monongahela in 1827.  Snowden improved and extended the factory in 1831. In 1853, the establishment burned down and was subsequently rebuilt.  The business renovated to include a forge, rolling mill, pattern shop, foundry, boiler yard, and finishing shop all located on an acre of land on the bank of the Monongahela River (Kussart 1930; Thurston 1859).  The main two-story buildings were made of brick and faced the river.  The purpose of this main building was the finishing shop where parts were completed.  An excerpt from Thurston’s (1859:34) town directory describes in detail the factory:

"Within its walls and distributed over the use of two rooms, with nice regard to their convenient use, is gathered a large amount of machinery, of the latest improvements, adapted to all the requirements of machine manufacturing; among them are 19 turning lathes, 6 planning machines, 4 boring machines and 8 drill presses.  There upon the lower floor, 10 blacksmith fires, with all of their accompanying cranes, steam forge hammers, and etc.

     The foundry and finishing shops were constructed of brick and connected with the main building.  This area contained cranes and two large 12-ton capacity cupolas for delivering molten iron.  The foundry was in the forefront of the rolling mill and the forge was contained in another one story building.  Within this structure were six pairs of rolls, two puddling furnaces, two heating furnaces, one spike and one rivet machine that turned out 600 tons of bar iron a year (Thurston 1859).  A pattern shop used for cutting different shapes of metal adjoined the foundry."

     The Vulcan Iron and Machine Works, later called Snowden & Sons, employed 110 people with a weekly wage of $6.83 per person (Thurston 1859).  This factory produced a similar number of land use stationary steam engines such as those used to power the large belts of the machine shop.  The convenient location of the factory next to the Brownsville wharf allowed engines to be fitted to hulls while incoming boats unloaded goods. In 1863 the Vulcan Iron and Machine Works built the engines and boilers of the ironclads Manayunk and Umpqua.

1901. Photo Courtesy of  Donna Edwards-Jordan

     John Herbertson arrived

 in Brownsville in 1829 after learning the trade of steam engine building in Pittsburgh.  Originally from Glasgow, Scotland, Herbertson became a foreman in the Vulcan 

Iron and Machine Works engine shop.  When the wooden bridge 

collapsed over Dunlap’s Creek connecting Brownsville to 

Bridgeport, Snowden took the contract for the erection of a cast 

iron bridge (Ellis 1882; Kussart 1930; Thurston 1859).  This is  the 

first cast iron bridge in the United States.  Herbertson designed the 

bridge and supervised its construction (Gresham and Wiley 1889).  

A teaser image from some preliminary testing.

Herbertson eventually went into a partnership with Thomas Faull who was already operating a small foundry in Bridgeport.  Together they formed the Fayette Foundry, until 1842 when Faull withdrew from the partnership (Ellis 1882).  Herbertson later created Herbertson & Company with his sons in the 1880s as the business grew.

There will be more to follow as this project moves forward. Stay tuned! 

Text taken from:

Henshaw, Marc

2004  THE STEAMBOAT INDUSTRY IN BROWNSVILLE, PENNSYLVANIA: AN ETHNOHISTORICAL PERSPECTIVE ON THE ECONOMIC CHANGE IN THE MONONGAHELA VALLEY.

References:

Ellis, Franklin

1882  History of Fayette County, Pennsylvania with Biographical Sketches of Many of its Pioneers and Prominent Men.

Gresham, John and Samuel T. Wiley

1889  Biographical and Portrait Cyclopedia of Fayette County, Pennsylvania. John M. Gresham, Maging Editor.

Kussart, Sarepta Cooper

1930 Navigation on the Monongahela River. Unpublished Manuscript.

Thurston, Geo. H.

1859  The Rivers and Valleys of Pennsylvania Then and Now.

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