The Media Archive for Central England is the public screen archive for the East and West Midlands. An independent charity and company based at the University of Lincoln, MACE acquires, catalogues, preserves and makes widely available moving image materials that inform our understanding of the diverse cultures and histories of communities between the Lincolnshire coast and the Welsh border.
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Manufacture of Stanton Pig Iron
Tapping the blast furnace of the largest producer of foundry pig iron in Britain - the Stanton Iron Works Company.
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Overview
The Stanton Iron Works Company was a major producer of both iron and concrete products. Here we see how Stanton produced pig iron - the main component of steel itself. It's a complicated business that involves three primary ingredients: coke, iron ore and limestone, a lot of heat and a great deal of chemistry. Tapping the furnace with a huge lance is one of the obvious highlights after which workers nonchalantly step over streams of white hot metal spewing from the furnace.
Stanton had a complicated history in the years following this film. They merged with the Derbyshire based Staveley company under the control of Stewarts and Lloyds in the early 1960s and towards the end of that decade were nationalised to become part of British Steel. The French company Pont-a-Musson took over in 1984 followed by another French giant, Saint-Gobain, as production was gradually wound down. The 'old works' seen in this film closed in 1974.
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