Mount Savage Iron Works

The Mount Savage Iron Works operated from 1839 to 1868 in Mount Savage, Maryland. The ironworks were the largest in the United States in the late 1840s, and the first in the nation to produce heavy rails for construction of railroads. The works were established in an area adjacent to mines for coal, iron ore and fire clay. Facilities included blast furnaces, puddling furnaces, a rolling mill, iron refineries, coke production and brick production.

In 1844 the company used its initial rail production to build a railroad line to Cumberland. See Mount Savage Railroad. It also sold rails to Fall River Railroad in Massachusetts, and the Baltimore and Ohio Railroad, which had built a line to Cumberland.

The Mount Savage works faced competition from various facilities in Pennsylvania and the Great Lakes region, where superior grades of iron ore were discovered and mined beginning in the 1850s. The facilities were acquired by the Consolidation Coal Company in 1864. The rolling mill was shut down in 1868 and dismantled in 1875. The blast furnaces ceased operation c. 1870.

See also

• Mount Savage Historic District
• Mount Savage Locomotive Works

References

• Allen, Jay D. (1970). "The Mount Savage Iron Works, Mount Savage, Maryland: A Case Study in Pre-Civil War Industrial Development." Graduate thesis, University of Maryland.
• Mount Savage Historical Society, Mount Savage, MD. "Iron Furnace.". Accessed 2010-01-04.
• Paul, Amanda (2004). Mount Savage. Arcadia. ISBN 9780738516806. http://books.google.com/books?id=6orIk3ak45UC&lpg=PP1&pg=PP1#v=onepage&q=&f=false. 
• Stakem, Patrick H. "The Mount Savage Iron Works: Western Maryland's Industrial (little) Giant." Accessed 2010-01-04.