TEACHER GUIDE TO STUDENT WORKSHEET 1-
DATA COLLECTION FOR USE WITH THE CHAPTER OVERVIEW ESSAY
Student Name:______
Directions: Working individually read the overview essay titled, “The Pennsylvania Iron Industry: Furnace and Forge of America.” Answer the following questions in complete sentences.
1. What industries relied upon iron production during the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries?
· Answers should include the agricultural industry, tool industry, transportation and railroad industry.
2. Chart the statistics from the time period 1810 to 1840 to show Pennsylvania’s dominance of the iron industry supporting the statement made by Israel Acrelius in 1759, “Pennsylvania, in regard to its iron-works, is the most advanced of all the American colonies.”
Year / National Iron Output in tons / Pennsylvania Iron Output in tons / Percent of nation's Iron Produced in PA1810 / 54,000 / 27,000 / 50%
1840 / 286,000 / 152,000 / 53.1%
3. What fundamental changes occurred in the iron industry from early 18th century to the middle of the 20th Century?
· Answers should include the changing of charcoal fuel to mineral fuels such as anthracite coal, bituminous coal, and coke; larger production facilities; replacement of forges with rolling mills; combining furnaces with mills; declining relations between ironmasters and workers and the forming of labor unions; the growth of the steel industry subsuming the iron industry and overtaking it; attempt of iron works to specialize in order to survive
4. Explain the relationship between the iron/steel industry and the railroad industry during the 19th and 20th centuries.
· Answers should focus on a symbiotic relationship. The railroad needed the iron industry for cars and rails while the iron industry relied upon the railroad consumption of iron. The iron industry also relied upon the railroads for transporting necessary raw materials to the furnace and finished products to the market.