Alleghany Furnace
Altoona, Blair County, Pennsylvania
Marker Inscription
Here in 1811, Andrew Henderson and Robert Allison built the second iron furnace in present Blair County. Elias Baker became three-fourths owner in 1836, and in 1844 (as he prepared to build his Greek Revival mansion nearby) he became full owner. The stone store building here was erected about 1837. Until the furnace closed in 1884, it remained in the Baker family, which consistently spelled its name "Alleghany."
Erected by Pennsylvania Historical and Museum Commission
The Story
Raised in 1811, the Alleghany Furnace was among the earliest ironworks in what became Blair County, part of the charcoal-iron industry that spread through Pennsylvania's mountains in the early republic. Elias Baker acquired full ownership by 1844 and built a Greek Revival mansion nearby, tying the furnace to a prosperous ironmaster's household that ran it until it went cold in 1884. The surviving stone store building, erected around 1837, still marks the site of this vanished industrial world.
Why it matters
Pennsylvania's charcoal iron furnaces powered the nation's early industrial growth, and sites like Alleghany show how a single family's fortunes rose and fell with the rhythm of American iron.
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Related people
- · Elias Baker
- · Andrew Henderson
- · Robert Allison
Themes & tags
Nearby & related markers
Baker Mansion
Altoona, PA · est. 1947
Erected between 1844 and 1847 to a design by Baltimore architect Robert Cary Long, Jr., this Greek Revival mansion was the home of ironmaster Elias Baker and his family from 1848 until 1914. The house captures the taste and standing of the men who dominated the Juniata Valley iron trade in the mid-19th century. Since 1922 it has served as the museum of the Blair County Historical Society.
Baker Mansion
Altoona, PA · est. 1947
Baker Mansion is a striking Greek Revival house built in 1846 for Elias Baker, one of the region's leading ironmasters in the era when Pennsylvania's charcoal-fired furnaces helped forge the nation's iron. Its columned dignity reflected both the wealth and the ambitions of the industrialists who ran the Juniata Valley iron trade. The house now serves as the museum and home of the Blair County Historical Society.
Altoona
Altoona, PA · est. 1947
Altoona was born of the railroad, laid out in 1849 as the mountain-base terminal from which the Pennsylvania Railroad pushed its tracks westward over the daunting Allegheny front. Within a generation the town's yards and shops made it one of the great railroading centers of the nation. In 1867 it hosted a War Governors' Conference, one of several wartime and postwar gatherings that made the city a meeting ground for state leaders.
Pennsylvania Railroad Shops
Altoona, PA · est. 1996
In 1850 the Pennsylvania Railroad laid its first track to Altoona and built its first repair shops there, and the town grew up around the industry. Nestled at the foot of the Allegheny grade, Altoona became the beating mechanical heart of the mightiest railroad in America. By 1925 it held the nation's largest concentration of railroad shops, where some 16,500 workers built and mended the locomotives and cars that moved the country.