And this led to the
erection of the Lucy Furnace in the year 1870--a venture which would
have been postponed had we fully appreciated its magnitude. We heard
from time to time the ominous predictions made by our older brethren
in the manufacturing business with regard to the rapid growth and
extension of our young concern, but we were not deterred. We thought
we had sufficient capital and credit to justify the building of one
blast furnace.
The estimates made of its cost, however, did not cover more than half
the expenditure. It was an experiment with us. Mr. Kloman knew nothing
about blast-furnace operations. But even without exact knowledge no
serious blunder was made. The yield of the Lucy Furnace (named after
my bright sister-in-law) exceeded our most sanguine expectations and
the then unprecedented output of a hundred tons per day was made from
one blast furnace, for one week--an output that the world had never
heard of before. We held the record and many visitors came to marvel
at the marvel.
It was not, however, all smooth sailing with our iron business. Years
of panic came at intervals. We had passed safely through the fall in
values following the war, when iron from nine cents per pound dropped
to three. Many failures occurred and our financial manager had his
time fully occupied in providing funds to meet emergencies.
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