Hopewell Furnace to Celebrate 80th Birthday Aug. 4

The "cast house" at Hopewell furnace National Historic Site.

Blogger's Note: The following was provided by Hopewell Furnace National Historic Site.

Hopewell Furnace NHS will celebrate Establishment Day on Saturday, Aug. 4. This free celebration is special this year for we celebrate the 80th birthday as a unit of the National Park Service.

Hopewell Furnace became a unit of the National Park Service on Aug.3, 1938 and was originally known as Hopewell Village National Historic Site. In 1985, Congress changed the park’s name to Hopewell Furnace. 

Eighty years after its founding, Hopewell Furnace remains one of a small number of National Park units devoted to our nation’s industrial history.

Activities will begin at 10 a.m. and continue to 4 p.m. throughout the historic site. 

Programs and demonstrations will be staged throughout Hopewell Furnace. They include moulding and casting demonstrations in the cast house, weaving and spinning, cast iron cooking and more. 

There will be a special program at 1 p.m. highlighting Hopewell Furnace’s history, featuring a prominent regional historian and author, Dan Graham. The subject of Mr. Graham’s talk will be the 18th Century Ironmaster Samuel Nutt. 

Following the end of the presentation there will be birthday cake. Mr. Graham will also be available to sign copies of his new book Samuel Nutt and the French Creek Iron Works.

Hopewell Furnace National Historic Site preserves and interprets an early American industrial landscape and community. Showcasing an iron making community and its surrounding countryside, 

Hopewell Furnace was active from 1771 to 1883. The park’s facilities are currently open daily, 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. It is closed Thanksgiving, Christmas, and New Year’s Day. 

Hopewell Furnace is located five miles south of Birdsboro, off of Route 345. Admission to the park is free. For more information, stop by the park's visitor center, call 610-582-8773, or visit the park's web site at www.nps.gov/hofu.