Iron Industry
In 1865, the Oregon Iron Company was incorporated with the goal of making the town of Oswego an industrial center for the smelting of the abundant iron ore in the area. The company purchased the entire town of Oswego, including the lake and surrounding hills, which were rich in not only iron ore, but trees that would be turned into charcoal to feed the furnaces. Population in the town boomed, aided by the opening of a narrow gauge railroad from Portland in 1886. The Oregon iron industry peaked in 1890, but with the availability of cheaper coke-fired iron and steel mills, by the early 20th century it had nearly collapsed.
Read more about this topic: Oswego Lake
Famous quotes containing the words iron and/or industry:
“With our principles we seek to rule our habits with an iron hand, or to justify, honor, scold, or conceal them:Mtwo men with identical principles are likely to be seeking fundamentally different things with them.”
—Friedrich Nietzsche (1844–1900)
“For almost seventy years the life insurance industry has been a smug sacred cow feeding the public a steady line of sacred bull.”
—Ralph Nader (b. 1934)