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===Roane Iron Company=== [[Image:Roane-iron-works-site-tn1.jpg|thumb|210px|right|The Roane Iron Company furnace site at the end of Rockwood Street; the small building on the left is all that remains of the once vast iron works]] [[Union (American Civil War)|Union]] general [[John T. Wilder]], who in the 1850s had managed a [[foundry]] in Indiana, noted the [[iron ore]] and coal deposits of the Cumberland Plateau region while operating in the area during the Civil War. After the war, Wilder and Ohio-born [[Knoxville Iron Company]] founder Hiram Chamberlain (1835–1916) purchased {{convert|900|acre|ha}} at what is now Rockwood, selecting the location due to the ore and coal resources at the base of Walden Ridge, the proximity to the Tennessee River, and an assumption that the encroaching railroads would descend the Plateau at nearby Emory Gap. Wilder and Chamberlain enlisted several other investors from Indiana and Ohio, and the Roane Iron Company was chartered on June 18, 1867.<ref name=moore>William Moore, "Preoccupied Paternalism: The Roane Iron Company In Her Company Town— Rockwood, Tennessee." ''East Tennessee Historical Society Publications'' Vol. 39 (1967), pp. 56-70.</ref> By late 1868, the company had constructed a [[blast furnace]] with a capacity of 15 tons per day between the ridge and the end of what is now Rockwood Street.<ref name=benhart1>John Benhart, ''Appalachian Aspirations: The Geography of Urbanization and Development in the Upper Tennessee River Valley, 1865-1900'' (Knoxville, Tenn.: University of Tennessee Press, 2007), pp. 5-7.</ref> The company mined coal and iron ore along the ridge, which it transported by narrow-gauge rail to the furnace site. The coal was delivered to coking ovens, where it was converted into [[coke (fuel)|coke]], and the coke was then used to generate the temperatures needed to convert the iron ore into [[pig iron]]. The pig iron was then shipped by river to rolling mills in Knoxville and [[Chattanooga]], and was used primarily in railroad construction. In the early 1880s, Roane Iron purchased a rolling mill in Chattanooga and experimented with steel production, but the Walden Ridge ore proved to be too low-quality for such a process, and the company abandoned its steel venture in 1889.<ref>Benhart, pp. 34-41.</ref> Roane Iron's Rockwood furnace employed a mix of local labor (both caucasian and African-American) and immigrants (especially [[Welsh people|Welsh]] immigrants), and did not practice wage discrimination.<ref name=moore /> The company paid workers either cash, which was issued on paydays, or [[scrip]], which could be issued anytime at the worker's request. Other than a miners' strike in 1904, Roane Iron experienced relatively few labor disputes, even though labor organizations were active in Rockwood. A series of mining accidents— namely a 1926 mine explosion— damaged the company's image and led to out-of-control workers' compensation payments, however, and in 1929 Roane Iron shut down operations.<ref name=moore />
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