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Interesting thought. In Richard Rhodes new book Energy, he describes how an early iron smelting works in England, faced with temporarily low demand due to a rec
by matthewmcg 8y ago
Interesting thought. In Richard Rhodes new book Energy, he describes how an early iron smelting works in England, faced with temporarily low demand due to a recession, rolled its excess iron into railroad tracks which could be re-used for other purposes once demand recovered:
Richard Reynolds, who managed the Darbys’ Ketley
ironworks, near Coalbrookdale, in the 1760s, introduced
cast-iron plates and then cast-iron rails to protect the
wooden rails from wear and tear or to replace them. He
had another reason as well for using iron: as an
ingenious storage system. A depression following the end
of the Seven Years’ War in 1764 reduced demand for iron
products. Prices fell. Reynolds wanted to keep his
furnaces going and his employees at work. Rather than
warehouse the excess production, Reynolds used it for
rails. Then, if iron prices went back up, he could have
the rails removed and sold. Reynolds “tried it at first
with great caution,” his granddaughter recalled, “but
found it to answer so well, that very soon all their
railways were made with iron.”
- nothrabannosir 8y agoFor mobile users: Richard Reynolds, who managed the Darbys’ Ketley ironworks, near Coalbrookdale, in the 1760s, introduced cast-iron plates and then cast-iron rails to protect the wooden rails from wear and tear or to replace them. He had another reason as well for using iron: as an ingenious storage system. A depression following the end of the Seven Years’ War in 1764 reduced demand for iron products. Prices fell. Reynolds wanted to keep his furnaces going and his employees at work. Rather than warehouse the excess production, Reynolds used it for rails. Then, if iron prices went back up, he could have the rails removed and sold. Reynolds “tried it at first with great caution,” his granddaughter recalled, “but found it to answer so well, that very soon all their railways were made with iron.”
- Baeocystin 8y agoThank you.
- gliese1337 8y agoHuh! I had no idea that timber railways were ever a thing to be replaced with iron in the first place! Neat!
- kleiba 8y agoNote the "Reynolds wanted to keep [...] his employees at work" part. This was at a time where being an employer was understood to come with a responsibility towards the people you employed. Well, at least today people have 40 hour work weeks with the weekends off.
- apendleton 8y agoHard to know for sure, but it might well have been more self-serving than that: good employees might have been hard to come by, and hard to re-acquire/retrain once lost, so maybe he just wanted to keep them around and occupied so that they'd still be available once demand rose again.