{"id":5994,"date":"2013-11-27T00:05:36","date_gmt":"2013-11-27T05:05:36","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/phillyhistory.wpengine.com\/?p=5994"},"modified":"2014-05-01T17:03:02","modified_gmt":"2014-05-01T21:03:02","slug":"a-long-lost-monument-to-philadelphias-iron-age","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/blog.phillyhistory.org\/index.php\/2013\/11\/a-long-lost-monument-to-philadelphias-iron-age\/","title":{"rendered":"A Long-Lost Monument to Philadelphia’s Iron Age"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"\"<\/a>
The W. W. & R.S. Stevens Architectural Foundry and Iron Works, northwest corner of 9th Street and Montgomery Ave., May 19, 1902. (PhillyHistory.org)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

\u201cThe period from the Civil War into the new century saw the transformation of Philadelphia into an industrial giant. \u2026 The impact of this explosion of industry and technology almost obliterated Penn\u2019s green country town\u2026in a smog of steam and smoke, of endless gridirons of workers housing, of railroads and factories, freight yards and warehouses. It was Philadelphia\u2019s Iron Age.\u201d<\/p>\n

So begins a chapter of the same name in Philadelphia: A 300 Year History<\/a>.<\/em> As the 19th<\/sup> century progressed, Philadelphia\u2019s \u201cIron Age\u201d would be increasingly evident to anyone with imagination, but especially to architects, engineers and “practical mechanics.”<\/p>\n

As early as 1826, when everyone else was applauding the new canal culture, William Strickland believed the railways<\/a> promised much more. He was ahead of his time. So was architect John Haviland<\/a>, who, even earlier, imagined cities entirely made<\/em> of the stuff. \u201cThe improvement and general introduction of cast iron bids fair to create a totally new school of architecture. It has already been occasionally employed in bridges, pillars, roofs, floors, chimneys, doors, and windows, and the facility with which is moulded into different shapes will continue to extend its application.\u201d<\/p>\n

By the middle of the century, advocates of industry like Edwin T. Freedley<\/a> shrugged with confidence: \u201cPhiladelphia is situated in the district entitled to be called the centre of the Iron production of the United States.\u201d A decade earlier, local rolling mills had produced about 5,000 tons of iron annually. Now, just after the Civil War, production had ramped up to 30,000 tons. In the same years, production of pig iron nearly doubled from 400,000 tons to more than 770,000. The time when iron meant \u201cnails, screws, bolts, tie rods and hardware,\u201d as Henry Magaziner put it in his book The Golden Age of Ironwork<\/a>, was over. Iron now meant the possibility of all kinds of design feats: \u201cbridges, water towers, and greenhouses\u201d\u2014even \u201cfull cast iron facades\u201d of entire city blocks, in whatever style. All of it would be prefabricated. And, even more impressive, all of it would be fireproof.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>
“Royer Brothers” column. Detail of “Northwest Corner, 9th Street and Montgomery Avenue, W.W. and R. S. Stevens Architectural Foundry and Iron Works, September 21, 1904.” (PhillyHistory.org)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Iron design, patents, production and construction began to transform city streets from New York to New Orleans. In the early 1850s, Philadelphia’s the first cast iron fa\u00e7ade, The St. Charles Hotel<\/a> on Third Street, tested the public appetite. By 1866, when the 4,400-ton cast-iron dome of the nation\u2019s Capital in Washington, D.C., designed by Philadelphia architect Thomas U. Walter, was declared \u201ca masterpiece of American will and ingenuity\u201d<\/a> the way was clear: iron offered amazing architectural possibilities.<\/p>\n

In North Philadelphia, the brothers Royer were ready. For a decade they had been honing skills at their Hope Foundry on 9th<\/sup> Street, above Poplar. Now, just as iron\u2018s grip took hold, they opened a new, expanded facility at 9th<\/sup> and Montgomery Avenue, \u201can extensive and complete Foundry for the production of Architectural Iron Work.\u201d Four brothers: Alfred, Benjamin, J. Washington and William Royer, all \u201cpractical mechanics,\u201d had made \u201cBuilding Castings\u201d their specialty. \u201cThey now employ fifty men,” wrote Freedley in 1867, “and have a good supply of orders some of considerable magnitude.\u201d<\/p>\n

The Royers cast iron features for the Seventh National Bank<\/a> at 4th<\/sup> and Market Streets, the mansard-roofed Post Office<\/a> at 9th<\/sup> and Market Street and McArthur’s David Jayne mansion<\/a> at 19th<\/sup> and Chestnut Street. For Oak Hall<\/a>, Wanamaker & Brown\u2019s clothing store at 6th<\/sup> and Market Street, the Royer Brothers created a new, \u201cmassive and beautiful front\u2026light and ornate,\u201d which, according to Freedley, was \u201cprobably not equaled by any other Iron Front in Philadelphia.\u201d The Royers\u2019 reach extended to commissions in reading and Pittsburgh and, within a few years, they would cast the fa\u00e7ade for the Grand Opera House in Wilmington, Delaware.<\/p>\n

By the 1890s, John S. Stevens took over the foundry at 9th<\/sup> and Montgomery. But the Royer name\u2014and the Royer brand\u2014would remain prominent on both the foundry’s sign and on the cast-iron column that stood for decades at the corner.<\/p>\n

A long-lost monument to Philadelphia\u2019s Iron Age.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

\u201cThe period from the Civil War into the new century saw the transformation of Philadelphia into an industrial giant. \u2026 The impact of this explosion of industry and technology almost obliterated Penn\u2019s green country town\u2026in a smog of steam and smoke, of endless gridirons of workers housing, of railroads and factories, freight yards and warehouses. […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":22,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-5994","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.phillyhistory.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5994","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.phillyhistory.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.phillyhistory.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.phillyhistory.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/22"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.phillyhistory.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=5994"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/blog.phillyhistory.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/5994\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/blog.phillyhistory.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=5994"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.phillyhistory.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=5994"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/blog.phillyhistory.org\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=5994"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}