The metropolitan Terre Haute area was busy in 1867.

Downtown was growing rapidly. Eighteen commercial buildings were under construction and a new rolling mill and nail factory were operating.

Approaching 20,000 inhabitants, the city had a new gasworks, two steam fire engines and a street railway system. Chauncey Rose's artesian well bath house at Eighth and Cherry streets produced water with "extraordinary curative powers."

The new Vigo County fairgrounds at the northeast corner of Brown and Wabash -- replacing the one north of the city converted into a Civil War training complex called "Camp Vigo" -- was finished in time to host the Indiana State Fair in early October.

According to a Cincinnati newspaper, Superintendent John Olcott already had developed the "best public schools in Indiana."

The railroads were busy and commission merchant Uriah Shewmaker had acquired the steamship Romeo, capable of transporting 700 people up and down the Wabash River.

As the year came to a close, special attention was divided between the establishment of the Brazil Iron Works and the revival of an old industry.

With the exciting discovery of abundant iron ore in Clay County, the Indianapolis Furnace & Mining Co. constructed the largest and most complete blast furnace in the United States.

And porkpacking -- one of Terre Haute's top industries for many years -- was being rekindled. Three slaughterhouses, all facing Water Street, were back in operation.

The Early Slaughterhouse north of Locust Street -- once owned and operated by Jacob D. Early of Terre Haute -- was managed by Samuel George & Thomas Jenkins, commission merchants with headquarters in Baltimore.

Warren & Walker Slaughterhouse was south of Tippecanoe Street. William B. Warren of Terre Haute, one of the principals, operated a packing plant on the same tract.

Early's Pork House, the packing plant associated with the slaughterhouse, was at the southwest corner of Water and Canal streets.

Two blocks south at Chestnut Street, J.L. Humaston & Co. slaughterhouse and packing plant was managed by William J. Reiman & Son, another prominent Baltimore meat packer with offices at 321 W. Baltimore St.

The Early plant, managed by Alonzo A. Coltrin and Charles Duddleston, was the largest of the three. By Dec. 1, it had killed 4,231 hogs during 1867. Warren & Walker had butchered 2,730. The Humaston slaughterhouse, though in operation only 10 days, already had butchered 1,450 hogs.

Vividly describing the operation at the Early slaughterhouse, which employed 35 men, 24 in the "killing department," a Terre Haute Express reporter wrote: "Every man has a particular work to do in the killing and dressing and each job has a name. So perfect is the system that from 80 to 100 hogs are killed and dressed each hour.

"A gangway leading from the pen up to the killing department conducts the grunters to their doom. Here they are received in a pen which holds from 12 to 20. The more closely they are packed the better.

"When the victims are ready, the 'killer' jumps into the pen and deals out death right and left with a small sledge hammer, attached to a long handle, and soon their squeals are silenced forever. The 'sticker' then cuts their jugular as they are tumbled over the slatted floor, in an entirely docile condition, to the scalding vat.

"After immersion in a vat of boiling water the hog is drawn out with hooks to the scraping table where men with knives and scrapers grasp it. The carcass slides along the table, scarcely stopping until it lands at the end minus its hair. Hair and bristles fly in every direction.

"At the end of the table a stick of wood is inserted in the hind legs and the defunct porkers are hung on long poles for the man who takes out the 'innards.'"

The hog then was "spread out" to cool overnight.

"Except for the blood and the squeal," the writer noted, "no part of the hog is wasted." After cleaning, the bristles were dispatched to manufacture brushes. The head and the vital organs were used to fabricate lard and brown soap.

The Brazil Iron Works commenced construction on six acres June 1, 1867, and went "into full blast," amid considerable suspense, near midnight on Friday, Dec. 6.

A Terre Haute Express writer described the awaited event in colorful terms: "A bustling and excited crowd gathered around the base of the huge cupola furnace, the huge monster filled with molten mass The furnace looming up in its gigantic proportions was wreathed with coronets of blue flame from every joint and rivet.

"Now the hot blast blows and makes the monster tremble while the escaping gas, bursting the bounds which would confine it, takes fire from exposure to the air and leaps and flashes with its tongues of flame around the furnace.

"The flame has caught the timber that supports the roof of the cast house; the firemen seize the hose and mount ladders. While the excited crowd sways to and fro, the ladder falls and two men are injured. With another rush and steady stream from the hose, the fire is extinguished but soon blazes with renewed fury.

"Two men mount the roof of the cast house, climb the sides of the furnace and battle with the fire and the frost. At three o'clock in the morning, an underground explosion lifts a group standing near the boilers off their feet."

All day Saturday and Sunday the furnace "seethed and cavorted." Finally, the crowd fell back as a "molten mass of white iron slowly pours from the hearth of the furnace.

"Down the trough in increasing volume comes the solid column of fiery iron through the 'sows,' into the 'pigs' that lie in their beds.

"The people shout with exultant joy! There is the treasure they have been watching for! Ah! Shout and shout, for you have that which will make Indiana rich! At least ten tons of pig iron are upon the floor of the cast house."

By 1869, Clay County boasted four additional blast furnaces and each furnace company owned its own collieries, mining block coal.

Mike McCormick is the Vigo County Historian. His column appears each Sunday.