In a message dated 5/12/00 9:12:10 PM Eastern Daylight Time, [log in to unmask]
writes:

<< The pile was refereed to by a number
 of terms including: pit, hearth, charcoal pit, meiler, and more recently
 collier's pit.  I have found historical references to all but the last term.
 It
 is also not a term used by USGS.  Does anyone know where it originated? >>

What I think you might be seeing in that list is the actual transition of
technology in the "foundery" as it moved from small operations to larger
scale and stronger blast furnace technology resulting in the "revolution" of
the Bessemer process, used to create large amounts of steel. Each feature
part of the "same" perceived industry, the "foundery" in the 19th century,
"foundry" today.

"Whenever great strength is required, air furnaces instead of cupolas should
be used, and where it is not connected with too great an expense. loam
instead of green sand should be used for moulding." p. 692

"The Encyclopedia of Architecture: The Classic 1867 Edition Illustrated with
1400 Drawings. The Complete Guide to Architecture, from Antiquity to the
Nineteenth Century" Joseph Gwilt. Published by Bonanza Books, New York, c)
1982. Distributed by Crown Publishers, Inc. Manufactured in the United States
of America. Reprint. Originally published: London: Longman's, Green, 1867.

In other words as the "air furnaces" came into use, the collier's pit, or
mined coal was used in the production. This I do not know directly but from
having worked in archaeology at the Hopewell Village Foundry, PA NPS site,
and the West Point Foundry Site, as part of an EPA Superfund Remediation, and
as a member of the Society for Industrial Archaeology. A possible
intermediary step in this "evolution" would have been the example from the
same reference cited above:

"...Iron becomes more compact and sound by being cast under pressure; and
hence cannon, pipes, columns, &c., are stronger when cast in a vertical than
in a horizontal position, and stronger still when provided with a 'head' or
additional length, whose weight serves to compress the mass of iron in the
mould below it. The air-bubbles ascend and collect in the head, which is
broken off when the casting is cool. Care should be taken not to cut or
remove the skin of a piece of cast iron at those points where the stress is
intense.
2265i. 'Malleable cast iron' is made by embedding the castings to be made
malleable in the powder of red hematite. They are then raised to a bright red
heat, which occupies about twenty-four hours, maintained at that heat for a
period varying from three to five days, according to the size of the casting,
and allowed to cool, which occupies about twenty-four hours more. The oxygen
of the hematite extracts part of the carbon from the cast iron, which is thus
converted into a sort of soft steel; and its tenacity, according to
experiments by Messrs. A. More and Son, becomes more than 48,000 lbs. per
square inch. (Rankine.)"

I am not quite certain but another reference to a "collier's pit" may be in
association with the "Lemon Tavern" part of the NPS "Allegheny Portage
Railroad Historical Site," where it was stated that these open coal pits on
the Lemon property were the only reason the "Inclined Railway" could even
exist as the coal was used to power the small steam engines mounted in
subterranean pits to pull, first with rope and later with Roebling's iron
cable, the flat cars that held the canal boats transported over the Allegheny
Mountains to Pittsburgh, PA. I think they might have been mapped as
"collier's pits" but actually not associated in this case with iron
production, or were they? Did the rails and much of the hardware come from a
nearby site? Hmmmmm.

Sincerely,
George J. Myers, Jr.