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Down the Great Wagon Road: The Ironworking Pennybackers of Shenandoah County, Virginia
Thomas, Sarah E.
Thomas, Sarah E.
Abstract
In the early Virginia backcountry, a diverse group of individuals lived, worked, and interacted every day at furnaces and forges. Redwell Furnace, north of Luray, and Pine Forge, north east of New Market, in Shenandoah County were the earliest and largest operations oftheir kind in the county. At these ironworking communities, people of Irish, African, and Germanic descent interacted on a daily, if not hourly, basis, making iron stove plates,andirons, plates, utensils, and other utilitarian objects. This diverse furnace population gradually developed in the shadow of the Massanutten Mountain during the late eighteenth century as more settlers migrated down the Great Wagon Road through the Shenandoah Valley. Ironworking became a dominant industry in the county, but also was prevalent throughout the Valley. While the Pennybackers began their ironworking venture solely relying on white workers, they soon took cues from other Shenandoah County residents and bought several enslaved African Americans. Not only were the Pennybackers purchasing and hiring enslaved African Americans to work at Redwell Furnace and Pine Forge, but they also altered the design oftheir stove plate patterns from German scenes to more Anglo inspired republican imagery. Several members of the family also constructed homes that fit perfectly in the surrounding Shenandoah Valley landscape. Built with symmetrical facades with hall and parlor plans, the exterior of these homes had no hint whatsoever of the German origins of their inhabitants. Through the ownership of slaves and the changing design of the stove plates that they produced and sold, the Pennybacker quickly adapted to Shenandoah Valley society.
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2012-01-01
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10630709.pdf
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History
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https://dx.doi.org/doi:10.21220/s2-vqqr-by31