Qualla: Saugus Iron Works

Saugus Iron Works: Introduction

Mon, 23 Feb 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit John Phelan, CC BY 3.0. In 1652, a craftsman named Joseph Jenckes cut the dies for the first silver coins minted in New England right here, on the banks of the Saugus River. Seven years earlier, this same stretch of riverbank had been forest. By then it held a blast furnace, a forge with a 500-pound trip hammer, a rolling and slitting mill, and seven massive waterwheels -- the most technologically advanced ironworks in the Western Hemisphere. The Saugus Iron Works, originally called Hammersmith, was North America's first integrated iron manufacturing operation, and the story of how it got here involves a transatlantic sales pitch, a gamble on bog ore, and a mineral no ironworker had ever tried to use as flux.

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Image: John Phelan | CC BY 3.0

Saugus Iron Works: The Audacity of John Winthrop the Younger

Mon, 23 Feb 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Bmzuckerman, CC BY 4.0. In the 1640s, every nail, horseshoe, cooking pot, and tool in the American colonies had to be imported from England -- a two-month voyage that made iron goods prohibitively expensive. John Winthrop the Younger saw an opportunity. The colonies had abundant forests for charcoal, ri...

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Image: Bmzuckerman | CC BY 4.0

Saugus Iron Works: Iron from Swamp and Stone

Mon, 23 Feb 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit John Phelan, CC BY 3.0. The Saugus works was a complete production chain under one operation. The blast furnace smelted bog ore into pig iron and gray iron, the latter poured directly into molds for firebacks, pots, pans, kettles, and skillets. In the forge, pig iron was refined into wrought iron under ...

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Image: John Phelan | CC BY 3.0

Saugus Iron Works: The Workers of Hammersmith

Mon, 23 Feb 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit William Waterway, CC BY-SA 3.0. Running North America's most advanced ironworks required specialized knowledge that most colonists lacked. Skilled ironworkers were recruited from England, but the less experienced local men who joined the workforce met with frequent and sometimes fatal accidents around the furna...

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Image: William Waterway | CC BY-SA 3.0

Saugus Iron Works: Rescued from the Undergrowth

Mon, 23 Feb 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Diogenes99, CC BY-SA 4.0. In 1898, the Lynn Historical Society placed a marker near the forgotten site, noting that Joseph Jenckes had 'made the dies for the first silver money coined in New England' here and built 'the first fire engine in America' in 1654. The plaque itself soon vanished under vegetatio...

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Image: Diogenes99 | CC BY-SA 4.0

Saugus Iron Works: America's Industrial Origin Story

Mon, 23 Feb 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Kenneth C. Zirkel, CC BY-SA 3.0. On April 5, 1968, the site joined the National Park Service as the Saugus Iron Works National Historic Site. Today, visitors can walk through reconstructed versions of the blast furnace, forge, and rolling mill, all standing on or near their original foundations along the Saugus ...

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Image: Kenneth C. Zirkel | CC BY-SA 3.0