Iron & Steel Museum of AL -- Tannehill Ironworks State Park, McCalla AL
N 33° 14.982 W 087° 04.267
16S E 493375 N 3678971
The fascinating Iron & Steel Museum of Alabama, at Tannehill Ironworks State Park, in McCalla AL
Waymark Code: WMWF6F
Location: Alabama, United States
Date Posted: 08/26/2017
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This very interesting industrial history museum of this region is well worth a visit when coming through the Birmingham area. Blasterz expected to spend less than 2 hours here, but got lost in all the incredible exhibits and spent more than 4 1/2 hours here!
From the museum website: (
visit link)
"The Iron & Steel Museum of Alabama is a southeastern regional interpretive center on 19th century iron making featuring both belt driven machines of the 1800s and tools and products of the times. It focuses on the Roupes Valley Ironworks at Tannehill which operated nearby, first as a bloomery beginning in 1830 and later as an important battery of charcoal blast furnaces during the Civil War. The ironworks gave birth to the Birmingham Iron & Steel District.
Along with Tannehill artifacts that have survived, museum exhibits graphically demonstrate how iron was made during the Civil War when 13 different iron companies and six rolling mills made Alabama the arsenal of the Confederacy. During the last two years of the war, Alabama furnaces produced 70% of the Confederate iron supply. Exhibits include a display of rare CS artillery projectiles manufactured at the Selma Arsenal and Gun Works, a part of the Steve Phillips Collection, along with Civil War weaponry actually used in battle including a 52 Cal. U.S. Spencer Repeater.
The Tannehill museum, which includes 13,000 square feet of floor space, first opened in 1981. It underwent a major make-over of exhibits in 2004-05. New exhibits include one of the oldest steam engines in America, a power source once used on a rice plantation in South Carolina. The 1835 Dotterer engine was a part of the collection acquired by Henry Ford in the 1920s and was formerly exhibited at the Henry Ford Museum at Greenfield Village. It is similar to the Tannehill blast engine once in place here.
Other displays feature a complete mid-1800s machine shop including a Townsend cannon lathe dating to 1864 and a Putnam planer built in 1860. The shop’s steam engine dates to 1870. Visitors can also see original parts of the Six Mile Bloomery Forge dating to 1863 including one of the few helve hammers in the United States. Exhibits also focus on geology, furnace fuels, cookware and Birmingham’s cast iron pipe industry which today accounts for over half of the U. S. output.
Visit the Alabama Ironworks Source Book web site for a Guide to Alabama's 19th Century Charcoal Blast Furnaces And Ironworks
Various interactive displays bring the viewer into historical environments. The museum has a 25-seat theatre, gift shop and a timeline which traces growth of the iron trade from ancient Egypt to U.S. Steel’s modern Fairfield Works in Birmingham.
Behind the museum, visit the May Plantation Cotton Gin House which dates to 1858, and the heavy industrial display building which houses artifacts from Birmingham steel mills of the 1930s-1950s."