Bear Mountain, Salisbury
The town of Salisbury, located in Litchfield County, is the state’s northernmost town and shares its western border with New York and its northern border with Massachusetts. Incorporated in 1741, the town, rich with iron ore, focused its early industry on mining. Salisbury iron gained fame from its use in the American Revolution. It later became the choice for quality gun material in the early 19th-century arms industry and the preferred source for cast iron railroad car wheels. Town mines operated until WW I, when they closed permanently. Today, Salisbury is predominately rural in nature and is home to numerous well-preserved historic districts as well as being part of the larger Salisbury Iron District.
More on Salisbury from the CT Digital Archive
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Salisbury Iron Forged Early Industry
Connecticut's bucolic northwest corner, with its Taconic Range, Berkshire Hills, and pastoral valleys, harbored a major iron industry in the 18th and 19th centuries. …[more]
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Video
Visions of Iron, 2009. Link.
Places
“Salisbury Cannon Museum,” 2009. Link.
Documents
“Salisbury Collection.” Connecticut Digital Archive, n.d. Link.
Books
Gordon, Robert. A Landscape Transformed: The Ironmaking District of Salisbury, Connecticut. New York, NY: Oxford University Press, 2001.
Pawloski, John. Connecticut Mining. Charleston, SC: Arcadia, 2006.
Kirby, Ed. Echoes of Iron in Connecticut’s Northwest Corner: With a Field Guide to the Iron Heritage Trail. Sharon, CT: Sharon Historical Society, 1998.
J.W. Lewis & Company. History of Litchfield County, Connecticut, with Illustrations and Biographical Sketches of the Prominent Men and Pioneers. Philadelphia, PA: J.W. Lewis & Company, 1881. Link.
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