Bear Spring Furance, Dover, Stewart County, TN

Significance: This thirty-seven-foot limestone stack is a surviving example of the charcoal cold-blast furnaces which enabled Tennessee to rank fifth in the nation in iron production during the last quarter of the nineteenth century. Brown hematite ore from local deposits was used to manufacture a very high grade of iron. In blast from 1873 until 1907, the furnace was fueled with charcoal produced from 63,000 acres of local timber.
Survey number: HABS TN-36
Building/structure dates: 1873 Initial Construction