Old Irontown, Historical industrial locality in Iron County, United States
Old Irontown is a historical industrial locality in Iron County with preserved structures from its iron production era. The ruins include a beehive charcoal oven, an Arastra furnace, parts of the original foundry, and a standing chimney.
The settlement was established in 1868 as a second attempt to extract iron from Iron Mountain and operated until 1876. Economic difficulties forced the facility to close.
Mormon pioneers established iron production here to support their self-reliant communities and manufacture everyday items like Dutch ovens and wagon wheels. Visitors can still sense how vital this work was to settling the region.
The site is located west of Cedar City on Highway 56 and functions as an extension of Frontier Homestead State Park Museum. Interpretive signs help explain what you see when walking through the ruins.
The facility reached peak production in 1871, manufacturing several tons of pig iron daily for the Utah Western Railroad and mining operations. This brief boom was typical of early industrial sites in the region that faded just as quickly.
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