Early Industrialization

Salt Salt was required as a preservative for the meat industry. Coal was formed in saltwater marshes. So the two resources were commonly found together. Major salt production occurred in the Kanawha Valley, Saltville VA, Clay Co. KY.

To produce the salt, fresh water was pumped into the ground to dissolve the mineral, then pumped back out. The brine was the boiled to get the salt. This required either wood or coal to boil the kettles of brine.

Dickenson Salt Works

Hartford City Coal and Salt Company

Salt workers

Depiction of Kanawha River Salt Works

Early manufacturing of iron required huge amounts of charcoal. Only as time went on would “stonecoal” replace charcoal. The production of charcoal, in turn, required huge amounts of hardwood. Iron

Some furnaces required as much as a acre of forest a day. The pile, consisting of cord of wood, would be covered with leaves and then soil to control the burn. The pile had to be watched carefully during the burn to prevent either flaming or extinguishing the burn.

Once the wood was reduced to charcoal, it would be raked and hauled to the furnace. A cord of wood might produce bushels of charcoal. (A cord is 4’ x 4’ x8’. An acre of mature forest would contain no more than 30 cords.) A blast furnace producing 2 tons of iron per day would consume 300 acres of timberland per year. (Davis, )

In addition to the charcoal, a water source to drive the bellows and to cool the iron was needed. Iron ore and limestone completed the materials. The “Great Smoky Mountains” were originally known as the “Great Iron Mountains.” Pigeon Forge was named so because of the forge.

“By the 1830’s Kentucky was the third largest producer of iron products in the country.” (Davis, 150)

Copper Mining began in the Copper Basin of north GA/east TN in A road was built along the Oconee River to Cleveland TN, the nearest rail line. To extract the copper, the ore was placed on huge piles of cord wood which were burned.

The burning released sulfur gasses which killed the surrounding vegetation. After this, the ore was smelted, requiring large amounts of charcoal. One copper company consumed 500,000 bushels of charcoal a year.

Copper Mine

Copper Basin Erosion

Sulphuric Acid Plant

Mine and Plant

And yes, Whiskey With corn the major agricultural product of the region, whiskey has to be listed as an industrial product. It has certainly affected the perception of the region.

One contributing factor to whiskey production in Appalachia was the cost of transporting grain. Whiskey is easier, doesn’t spoil, and brings cash. Many families made whiskey for their own medicinal use. A whiskey tax, removed by Jefferson in 1802, and except for three years, not reimposed until 1862, is what distinguished the moonshiner from the industrious farmer.

Prohibition, and then local option laws, provided the economic incentive to continue making illegal whiskey. Today, the money is in illegal drugs, from marijuana to oxycodone.