"MOUNT SAVAGE" immediately comes to mind.  I don't have dates at hand but
at least approximate dates are probably in Gurcke.  Our copy is checked out
and I am not at home. Off hand, I think of Mount Savage bricks being
somewhat more recent but the iron industry there dates to the 1st half of
the 19th C. so the firebrick production could not be far behind.

James L. Murphy
Ohio State University Libraries
1858 Neil Avenue Mall
Columbus OH 43210


At 12:02 PM 7/16/2002  -0400, you wrote:
>I am working on a site outside of Richmond, VA.  I have found what
>appears to be industrial waste from a bloomery.  So far I have a
>mosser/skull sticking out of a road bank, two pieces of waste iron, and
>half of a fire brick with iron adhering to it.  Two questions:
>
>
>The fire brick (fragment) is marked "MOUN".  Does anyone know of a US
>East Coast
>manufacturer (mid 19C) that would match?
>
>While it is common for iron to migrate into the wall of a blast furnace,
>does the same thing happen in a bloomery?  Or am I seeing waste from two
>different sites?
>
>Thanks
>Jamie Brothers