Alabama Blast Furnaces

Alice Furnace: Birmingham, Jefferson County

"Big" and "Little" Alice Furnaces in Birmingham in 1885. ALICE FURNACES Birmingham, Jefferson County No. 1 Nov. 23, 1880 No. 2 July 24, 1883 I N 1879 Col. H. F. DeBardeleben and T. T. Hillman formed the Alice Furnace Co. with capital of $80,000 and on Sept. 29, 1879 ground was broken for erection of the first furnace (Alice No.1) within the limits of Birmingham, and the fourth to be built in Jefferson County. The plant was located on First Avenue north just west of 14th Street. The furnace was blown in Nov. 23, 1880. Dimensions of the stack were 63' x 15' and the average daily output for the first year was 513 tons of foundry iron-a record for that time. -o..e{ 37 ~o._ ALABAMA BLAST FURNACES The Alice Furnace Co. in 1881 absorbed the Hillman Coal and Iron Co. and the Birmingham Coal and Iron Co.* and increased the capital to $250,000. A second blast furnace (Alice No.2) 75' x 18', was erected and put into blast July 24, 1883. This furnace, in 1886, established a 24 hour production record for the South of 150 tons. In 1884 Enoch Ensley of Tennessee consolidated the Alice Furnace Co., Linn Iron Works and Pratt Coal and Coke Co. into the Pratt Coal and Iron Co. Two years later, in 1886, the Tennessee Coal, Iron & Railroad Co. acquired the Pratt Coal and Iron Co. and with it the two Alice furnaces. Again, in 1907, the property changed hands when the U. S. Steel Corporation acquired the Tennessee Coal, Iron & Railroad Company. One hundred and fifty beehive coke ovens were built at the furnace in 1879-80 to coke Pratt coal and later an additional one hundred ovens were added. Red hematite ore from Grace's Gap on Red Mountain, furnished by the Morris Mining Co., was first used; later the ore was mined on the company property at Redding and Hillman. No.1 Alice, or "Little Alice," was dismantled in 1905 and the No.2 Alice was abandoned in 1927 and dismantled in 1929. The No. 1 Alice Furnace made the first basic pig iron in the Birmingham District which was suitable for open hearth use. A pamphlet published in 1897 makes the following statement: "The Alice Furnace ran on basic iron over a continuous period of more than twelve months and during that time supplied almost every steel works of any importance in the country," and, "it is a fact that not even a single ton of the iron was rejected by the customers." The success of this run was a contributing factor in the decision to build a steel plant at Ensley. The original Alice Furnace was extremely important in the development of the Birmingham district because its success convinced Northern capital that the manufacture of iron with coke in Birmingham was practical . Both of the Oxmoor furnaces had been converted to coke from charcoal but their performance was not impressive. The Edwards Furnace in Bibb County had been blown in a few months prior to the Alice but was using brown hematite ore. It remained for the Alice furnaces to prove to the iron industry that Alabama coke and red hematite ore produced a good grade of foundry pig iron. *Not to be confused with later company of same name. See Vanderbilt furnace. ...