In 1810, Irish immigrant Roland Curtin launched a charcoal ironmaking operation in central Pennsylvania that continued for 110 years. Through this engaging account of Curtin and his iron plantation, Gerald Eggert provides an important chapter in the history of the iron industry in America. Eggert's story begins with Curtin's arrival in the Bald Eagle Valley in 1797. From the time he constructed his first forge on the south bank of Bald Eagle Creek until the final closing of the Eagle Ironworks in 1922, Roland and his sons, then his grandsons, and still later a great-grandson operated what...