Overshot Waterwheel
This is a reconstruction of one of many waterwheels used on this site. It is called an overshot wheel because the water flows over the top. The Tredegar Iron Works used waterwheels from its founding in 1836 until the 1870s when turbines were installed. Two different wheels were located here, powering foundry blowers and an early machine shop.
No photographs of these waterwheels exist. Information from maps, insurance policies, and company records was used to reconstruct this waterwheel, as well as photographs of wheels of the same era.
After the James River and Kanawha canal was constructed in the 1780’s, industries began to use its water for power. Thomas Rutherfoord’s flour mill was the first, and insurance plans show the waterwheels it employed. Later, the Tredegar Iron Works built a spike mill in the same location.
Marker can be reached from Tredegar Street 0.1 miles west of South 5th Street.
Courtesy hmdb.org
