Georgia Iron Works, 620-640 12th Street, Augusta Canal, Augusta

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Alan J. Steiner, August It is understood that access to this material rests on the condition that should any of it be used in any form or by any means, the author of such material and the Historic American Engineering Record of the Heritage m Conservation and Recreation Service at all times be given proper credit. Georgia Iron Works HAER GA-7 (Page 2)

Georgia Iron Works

Executives at Georgia Iron Works in Grovetown, Georgia, still tell stories of the old days when few of the production workers at the com- pany's Augusta plant could read and write. Workers in the machine shop memorized the instructions for their jobs, or scribbled them on the wall in personal codes. One day the owner of the Iron Works decided to spruce up the interior of his buildings. The machine shop crew arrived at work, and discovered that their instructions lay beneath a fresh coat "of paint. The machine shop immediately shut down its operations.

[1] The empiricism, "family secrets, foremen's fancies, handicraft...[and] just plain mumbo-jumbo," and the traditional modes of metal-casting and machining at Georgia Iron Works, were to linger for many years before the company introduced more scientific methods. [2]

Early Business History

The Georgia Iron Works actually began'its operations as the Warwick Machine Co,, a jobbing foundry and machine shop in Augusta, Georgia. The company, incorporated on March 4, had a capital stock of [3] Two of the leading incorporators of the foundry were Thomas F. Warwick and Henry C. Perkins. Warwick, for whom the company was named, became manager of the works. Perkins, who also owned the Perkins Co., a local lumber company, became President of the Warwick Machine Co. [4] The original buildings of the company were on or near the site of the Perkins Company's mill #2. [5] 'The company soon employed about forty workmen and set about the business of building Georgia Iron Works HAER GA-7 (Page 3) mill machinery and engines.

[6] In May the company changed its name to Georgia Iron Works, and during that year J. A. Hauser replaced Warwick as manager, [7] Hauser had some fourteen years' experience in "some of the largest saw- mill machinery houses in the country." [8] The new manager's background and Perkins' involvement with the lumber industry helped set the direc- tion of the company. Georgia Iron Works specialized in "High Grade Heavy Saw Mill Machinery." [9] According to one source, the company was manufacturing equipment that Georgia sawmill owners once had to obtain from suppliers in the North and Northwest.

The machinery, built specifically for cypress and yellow pine mills, included "Fractional Head Blocks, Saw Dust Conveyors, Slab Conveyors, Log Haul Ups..., Edgers, Trimmers, Arbors, Jump Saws...and everything else for the com- plete equipment of mills." ORIGINAL SITES AND STRUCTURES The original site of the Georgia Iron Works included 500 feet of frontage on Eleventh Street in Augusta. The company erected three buildings. The main structure was a wooden two-story machine shop with a low-pitched metal roof, measuring 125 feet x 60 feet. A monitor run- ning the length of the building improved the lighting and ventilation of the middle of the machine shop. The company's foundry building was 60 feet x 80 feet.

A third structure, 35 feet x 75 feet, contained the boiler house, the erecting shop, and the blacksmith's shop. The company was situated along the Augusta Canal, but was between two branches of the second level and thus had no drop and no water power Georgia Iron Works HAER GA-7 (Page 4) availahle. The original Georgia Iron Works used steam power. Around Georgia Iron Works moved into new buildings on Twelfth Street between the second and third levels of the Augusta Canal. The company built on land previously occupied by Sterling Cotton Mills and Georgia Paint Works, two companies which existed briefly during the 18 and By nothing remained of either company except portions of their water power systems.

Georgia Iron Works widened the old tailrace of Sterling Cotton Mills and installed a verti- cal turbine in a brick wheelhouse topped by a wooden tower. The vertical shaft of the turbine extended into the tower, where it drove a pulley. The pulley turned a 1,080-foot-long manila rope, which tra- velled above the yard of the works, entered the second story of the machine shop building, and turned a second pulley, which dropped the power down to the shop's shafting. The process of iron manufacturing began in a foundry approximately 130 feet long. The molders and their helpers shovelled sand into mold boxes set in wood patterns and hand- or air-rammed the molds. In the foundry's core room, core makers formed the inner dimensions for the molds.

The foundry workers baked the cores and sand molds in an oven within the building to harden them. The molders melted the raw iron and core in two round brick cupolas. The molten iron went down to tapholes whose spouts entered the molding shop. The workers than caught the metal in buckets held on a circular crane. The hand-operated crane (see photos 4 and 5) covered a radius of 25 feet. The width of the molding shop was 50 feet, so a molder, with help, could move the hot bucket to his mold Georgia Iron Works HAER GA-7 (Page 5) # and pour in the iron. After the molds had cooled, the molders "knocked the floors out" and removed the castings. The workers then placed the casts on a wagon in later years, on a Ford truck for transportation across the canal to the company's machine shop.

In the machine shop, workers finished the castings. A tumbler room next to the wheelhouse and tower contained a round "rumbling mill," run by air power. The workers put castings in the rumbling mill, which tumbled the castings and cleaned and shined them in the process, The finished casts then were shipped or stored in the company warehouse. Georgia Iron Works never used steam engines to power its rope drive. The company built a boiler and engine house which apparently contained a small dynamo to run the company's electric lights. While its original buildings on Eleventh Street had a steam heating system, the new Georgia Iron Works were heated with stoves. Prior to the installation of an electric motor, the company may have used steam power to run the blower for the cupola.

The buildings at the Georgia Iron Works were utilitarian brick shells. At its south end, the foundry building had two high open arches, which housed the tall cupolas. These openings facilitated the delivery of materials for cupola charging, left space for runways to the high cupola doors, and permitted the cooling of an extremely hot area. The machine shop, the company's largest building, included a wing for a blacksmith's shop. A monitor atop the building permitted better natural lighting for the work area. Between and the company Georgia Iron Works HAER GA-7 (Page 6) erected another plain brick building, which, contained a general ware- house, the pattern shop, and the pattern warehouse. BUSINESS

History to

During the early part of the century, the management of Georgia Iron Works searched for work in which its foundry could specialize. The company still manufactured a whole line of foundry products, including portable sawmills; cast iron fire hydrants; lamp- posts; ornamental cast iron; and municipal castings (manhole covers, storm sewer covers and frames, and pipe fittings for water lines). By Georgia Iron Works had begun to produce mining machinery for Florida phosphate fields. Refined phosphate was used in the pro- duction of fertilizers. The first step in the process of phosphate mining and refining involved the. removal of blanket-like ore deposits from the earth.

Mining companies dug down to the deposits and, in a process called hydraulic mining, aimed high-pressure streams of water at the phosphate ore and washed the pebble-like deposits into a pit. The owners of Georgia Iron Works found the specialized work that they desired in the production of hydraulic nozzles for phosphate ore- washing. When America entered the First World War, the power shortages, pro- duction controls, and transportation crisis did not prevent the Florida phosphate mines from obtaining ore-washing equipment made in Georgia. The problem for mining companies lay in the acquisition of equipment to transfer and process the phosphate.

After the ore was washed into a pit, the companies pumped the phosphate-sand-water mixture, called Georgia Iron Works HAER GA-7 (Page 7) slurry, though pipelines to refining plants. At the end of the pipe- line, the slurry entered a five foot diameter steel drum with rotating screens that initiated the separation of phosphate from the slurry. Small pumps transmitted the phosphate mixture around the plant for fur- ther refining. The procurement of pumps and replacement parts, which were manufactured primarily by the Morris Machine Works of New York, provided the most critical problem for the mines. Georgia Iron Works responded to this problem by undertaking, at first, the manufacture of pump parts, and then the production of pumps.

Eventually the company made equipment for every part of phosphate mining, transferal, and processing system. The foundry produced the hydraulic nozzles, the slurry pumps, the couplings that connected pumps and motors, the rotating screens and smaller pumps for refining plants, and assorted gearing mechanisms and gear boxes. Georgia Iron Works soon established a steady, profitable business and a good reputation with the Florida phosphate mines. Until the late J. A. Hauser, the original manager of the iron works, ran the operation. By Charles W. Beaufort, company superintendent for some 20 years, had replaced Hauser as vice-president of Georgia Iron Works. As Beaufort advanced, he carried along his son-in-law, George C. Harding, who moved up from clerk to secretary of the company.

When Beaufort died in the Harding became vice-president. Although the presidency of Georgia Iron Works remained in the Perkins family, Harding ran the company. It seems highly unlikely that any of the top management at Georgia Iron Works Georgia Iron Works HAER GA-7 (Page 8) during this period had any formal training in metallurgy. Eauser and Beaufort probably had learned all they knew by working their way up in various foundries. Whatever Harding knew about iron-making, he learned from Beaufort. Since the workers also did not understand the sci- entific basis for their work, the company operated largely on tradition and the folklore of the industry that passed from older to younger workers.

The management of Georgia Iron Works was fiscally conservative and failed to update the company's technology. Yet Georgia Iron Works continued to profit, its officers drew good salaries, and the com- pany piled up a backlog of orders. When Andrew Perkins, the company president, died around his estate sold his half of the company to George Floyd, who went into debt to make the acquisition. Floyd expected to pay off his debts by drawing a large salary as vice-president. Harding, who owned the other half of the company, had become president. The men could not agree on the matter, and Floyd had to sell his share of the company just to repay his loans. Harding was entering his sixties and was ready to sell his portion of the company and retire comfortably.

By early Georgia Iron Works was available for purchase. A number of Augustans were looking for just this type of investment, The Hagler brothers, Tom and Carroll, unsuccessfully had attempted to acquire controlling interest in the Georgia-Carolina Brick & Tile Co., once owned by their family. Virgil Hollingsworth, a. childhood friend of Tom Hagler's, had failed in an attempt to gain control of the Hollingsworth Candy Co. CPA George C. Baird, another friend of the Georgia Iron Works HAER GA-7 (Page 9) Haglers, had done the books for Georgia Iron Works and knew that the company had a backlog of orders. He also knew that the company had lost money only during the Depression, when the owners were drawing what he thought were excessive salaries.

Furthermore, Baird realized that Georgia Iron Works had operated under soon to be lifted wartime price controls which prvented the company from increasing prices while costs rose. Here, believed the accountant, was a potential gold mine. The four men joined forces, obtained a bank loan, and purchased Georgia Iron Works for MODERNIZATION The new owners found the company's operation unscientific and tech- nologically backward. The Haglers, Hollingsworth, and Baird had not acquired Georgia Iron Works in order to exploit the company or drive it into the ground. Each man wanted the opportunity to exercise what he felt was stifled leadership potential. Hollingsworth, Chairman of the Board, Tom Hagler, President, J. Carroll Hagler, Vice-President, and George C.

Baird, Secretary-Treasurer, decided to modernize the foundry. In the next few years, the company would invest in new technology. The first new piece of equipment to arrive at Georgia Iron Works was the motorized sandslinger. With the sandslinger, the molder and his helper no longer shovelled sand into molds and air-rammed them. Instead, the molder placed the sand and some water into a muller, which mixed the materials. The resulting mixture went into a hopper bucket, which the molder put on the sandslinger. The new machine travelled up and down Georgia Iron Works HAER GA-7 (Page 10) the foundry on a track, and molders could swing it to any mold. When operated, the aandslinger would fill the mold with, sand and ram it up.

The new technology eliminated the need for molders' helpers, whom the management then could place on other jobs. Clyde Blackston, a molder at Georgia Iron Works since estimated that the installation of the sandslinger doubled the production of molds. Alvin Postell, at the time the company's maintenance man, was responsible for several post-1947 improvements made in the loading of the cupolas. For years, the molders had pushed wheelbarrow loads of iron and coke up a 30-foot runway to the cupola door and then dumped in the coke and threw in the iron. Postell revised this system by instal- ling an electric hoist to raise the iron and coke to the cupola door. He later topped this improvement by putting in an automatic loader. The molder then loaded a bucket of iron or coke on the ground.

The new machine lifted the bucket to the cupola door and automatically dumped its contents into the cupola. These technological changes eased the back-breaking work of the molders and contributed to increases in pro- duction per man. Another step toward modernization was the elimination of water power. Prior to the owners of Georgia Iron Works had installed an electric motor to run the rope drive when the canal was John C. Hagler III, a son of Carroll Hagler, noticed that production seemed better when the company used the electric drive. The water wheel was designed to produce 75 horsepower. The young Hagler did some tests and found that only 47 hp was reaching the company's machinery.

The Georgia Iron Works HAER GA-7 (Page 11) management accepted his recommendation to abandon the water wheel and employ the electric motor at all times. The owners maintained the rope drive, powered by a 100 hp motor, until when they placed motors on the individual line shafts. The determination of the owners of Georgia Iron Works was clear in their attempts to produce harder metals. In one of the Haglers attempted to obtain an order for 35 pumps from American Cyanimid. The chemical company wanted the pumps to be made of a very hard metal, a nickel-chromium alloy. Although Georgia Iron Works had produced only grey iron and semi-steel, Hagler insisted that his company could make the metal and the pump. Coining the term on the spot, he promised American Cyanimid pumps made of gasite.

Georgia Iron Works got the order, but no one at the company knew how to produce the desired alloy. Finally, a nickel salesman came to the plant and told the owners about a nickel-chromium alloy. The salesman's advice enabled the company to produce the metal and fill the order for pumps. Aware of their company's backwardness, the owners attempted to update their operation by observing the techniques used by other foundries. The company sent John C. Hagler III on tours of various foundries. He visited one foundry in Birmingham, Alabama, which parti- cularly impressed him. The foundry used the patented Meehanite process, which called for strict controls in the manufacture of metals. These laboratory-type controls appealed to Ragler's academic background in chemistry.

He travelled to Chattanooga, Tennessee, and there visited another foundry using the Meehanite process. Again Hagler was impressed. Georgia Iron Works HAER GA-7 (Page 12) He returned Co Augusta and asked the Meehanite Metal Corp. to make Georgia Iron Works a licensee for the manufacture of metals under their patents. The Meehanite Co. initially rejected the company as too backward. In December after the owners had poured funds into modernization, the Meehanite Corp. granted them a license. The installation of Meehanite controls at Georgia Iron Works required a testing laboratory and trained chemists, metallurgists, and engineers.

Prior to the introduction of scientific methods in the foundry industry, the recipients of a finished product would describe the capabilities of the product to the iron works after it had operated in the field. Times had changed; the purchasers now insisted on speci- fying the exact standards for a piece of equipment before placing an order. Meehanite controls permitted Georgia Iron Works to produce cast iron of superb quality and to guarantee the physical and chemical properties of their metals. The owners soon found that the company could produce more high- quality metal than was needed for the pump business. Rather than waste its capacity, Georgia Iron Works began to sell jobbing castings that did not require machining.

The company put a salesman on jobbing castings, which became a larger and larger part of the foundry's business. The jobbing castings business differed from the pump business in that the customer, rather than Georgia Iron Works, designed the final product. The production of jobbing castings, while profitable, was not as steady as the production of pumps and replacement parts. The owners eventually moved their salesman back on to pumps. Soon the pump business increased Georgia Iron Works HAER GA-7 (Page 13) and the company could no longer afford to undertake small jobbings. By the owners were moving the company out of jobbing entirely. Modernization and new management at Georgia Iron Works had substan- tially increased production and profits.

By the early the com- pany required more space than was available at its 3-acre Augusta site. In Grovetown, Georgia, about 20 miles from Augusta, the owners found abundant, cheap real estate and lower taxes. From to Georgia Iron Works moved into new buildings on a 100-acre site in Grovetown. The company transferred some of its machinery and also purchased new equipment. Blanche Mills, an adjacent textile manufacturer, pur- chased the buildings as warehouses until when that company ceased operations. Since then the buildings have remained vacant, and the old wheelhouse and tower have burned down. The now silent and over- grown foundry presented an amazing contrast to the booming operation in Grovetown.

The new Georgia Iron Works carried out all the processed of pump manufacturing under one roof, except for pattern making. The company made additional technological changes. Workers melted the various metals in electric induction furnaces rather than cupolas, and molders filled their shells with "no-bake" sand, which hardened by itself. Alvin Postell, who had become vice-president in charge of manufacturing, had led the way in the company's development of a special sand reclamation system. The owners, still unafraid to spend money to improve the opera- tion, installed a computer system to aid in information storage and in the chemical and structural analysis of materials and products.

Georgia Iron Works HAER GA-7 (Page 14) Shiny new testing machinery and scientific controls, however, could not dispel this visitor's feeling that something totally immea- surable had affected the owners and a number of the employees at Georgia Iron Works. Once, said Alvin Postell, recalling the days prior to modernization and the company's real take-off, "we was po1 folks." Participation in the enactment of a rags-to-riches story had given many of the people connected with Georgia Iron Works the inspiration and unabashed confidence derived from being "bora again," technologically. Georgia Iron Works HAER GA-7 (Page 15) Footnotes 1. Unrecorded interview with. John C.

Hagler III, Jimmy Hewett, and Alvin Postell at Georgia Iron Works, Grovetown, Georgia, 3 August At the time of the interview, John C, Hagler III was Chair- man of the Board, Jimmy Hewett was a supervisor, and Alvin Postell was vice-president in charge of manufacturing. (Hereafter referred to as Unrecorded Interview,) 2. Bruce L. Simpson, History of the Metalcasting Industry (Chicago, p. 3. Charters Book I, pp. Minutes of the Superior Court of Richmond County, Municipal Building, Augusta, Georgia. 4. Augusta City Directory, Vol. X, p. Warwick, in was a mater mechanic for the Central Railroad. 5. Sanborn Fire Insurance Maps, Map Room, Sciences Library, Uni- versity of Georgia, Athens, Georgia. (Hereafter reffered to as Fire Ins.

Maps.) Augusta City Directory shows address as cor- ner of Eleventh and Fenwick. 6. Augusta Exchange Club, compiler, Industrial Advantages of Augusta, Georgia (Augusta, pp. (Hereafter referred to as Industrial.) 7. Charters Book I, pp. Minutes of the Superior Court of Richmond County, Municipal Building, Augusta, Georgia; Howard's Directory of Augusta Vol. I (Augusta, p. Warwick was listed as a machinist and plumber, p. The company's capital went up to Maloney Directory Co.'s Augusta p. 8. Industrial, p. 80. 9. Industrial, p. 79. 10. Industrial, p. 79. 11 industrial, PP- 12. Industrial, p. 79, 13. Industrial, p. 79. Photograph of machine shop building appears on p. 79. 14. Industrial, p. 79. Georgia Iron Works HAER GA-7 (Page 16) 15. Industrial, p. 79. 16. Fire Ins. Maps.

Augusta City Directories list the first Georgia Iron Works as at the corner of and Fenwick Street between D'Antignac and Fenwick between Talcot and Fenwick between Talcot and Calhoun These addresses all locate the original Georgia Iron Works in the vicinity of two branches of the second level of the Augusta Canal. For infor- mation on the canal, see HAER, Augusta Canal Project, Report #1. 17. Industrial, p. 79. Mentions use of electric lights and steam heat, but nothing about power. 18. Augusta City Directory Vol. XVI, (Atlanta, p. lists the address of Georgia Iron Works as Twelfth. 19. See Fire Ins. Maps, For information on Sterling Cotton Mills, see William Whatley, A_ History of the Textile Development of Augusta, Georgia (unpublished thesis, University of South Carolina, .

The Georgia Paint Company or Paint Works were manufacturers of mixed paints, Georgia Red and Georgia Golden Ochres. D. B. Plumb was president. Sholes1 Augusta City Directory (Augusta, p. 63, p. This listing was the only one the author could find for the paint company existing in the city directories. Prior to the buildings of these two plants, the land served as the site of a Confederate pistol factory. See Earl L. Bell, "Augusta-Made Con- federate Colts," Augusta Magazine (Fall pp. 20. See Fire Ins. Maps. 21. Fire Ins. Maps; recorded interview with Clyde Blackston and L. A. "Lonnie" Jones, at Georgia Iron Works, Grovetown, Georgia, August 17, Clyde Blackston worked at Georgia Iron Works as a molder since L. A.

Jones worked In the core room at Georgia Iron Works beginning in Neither Clyde nor Lonnie nor others inter- viewed knew the manufacturer of the turbine, which remains under- ground in its pit. (Hereafter referred to as Recorded Interview.) 22. Recorded_ Interview. Verified length in phone conversation, August 24, also that drive was rope, not cable. "I should know, I spliced it," said Alvin. Discussion with Alvin Postell, July 22, 19 77, at Georgia Iron Works. 23. Recorded Interview. Statistics were those given by Clyde Blackston, and the molder used the term "knocked the floors out." 24. Recorded Interview. 25. The other buildings at Georgia Iron Works included an office build- ing, a chipping shed, an oil room, and an area for iron storage.

In Georgia Iron Works HAER GA-7 (Page 17) Georgia Iron Works had no fire apparatus. By the com- pany had pails of water available and the boiler house had auto- matic sprinklers. See Fire Ins, Maps. 26. Fire Ins. Maps. 27. The foundry never was run directly by water power. At an unknown date, the company installed an air compresser which ran off an over- head shaft. The compressed air was used, to power a crane and air- ramming equipment in the foundry. Recorded Interview. 28. Recorded Interview. 29. Fire Ins. Maps. 30. Fire Ins. Maps. 31. Unrecorded Interview. Information from John C, Hagler III, who learned this from George C. Harding, ex-president, who stayed on for six months after the sale of the company in to help the Hadlers get going. 32. See R. L.

Polk & Co.'s Augusta Directory, (Augusta, Georgia), p. 33. Unrecorded Interview. Film "Performance the Augusta Iron Works Story," viewed 3 August at Georgia Iron Works. 34. All information from Unrecorded Interview. 35. All information from Unrecorded Interview. 36. Polk's Augusta City Directory, (Richmond, Virginia, p. No Hausers are listed in that year's directory. 37. Polk's Augusta City Directory, (Richmond, Virginia, p. An earlier directory lists Harding as a clerk at Georgia Iron Works. Harding was originally a New Yorker. In the Army during the First World War, Harding, as a lieutenant, was stationed at Camp Hancock in Georgia. After the War ended, he decided that he liked the Southern climate. He met and married Charles Beaufort's daughter Marie and worked at Georgia Iron Works.

Unreco rded Int erview, 38. Folk's Augusta City Directory, (Richmond, Virginia, p. Beaufort is not listed in the directory; I assume that he died. 39. Andrew C. Perkins had replaced Henry C. Perkins as president by Georgia Iron Works HAER GA-7 (Page 18) According Co Clyde Blackston, although. Perkins was president, Harding was "the wheel." 40. Unrecorded Interview. 41. Clyde Blackston noted that Harding "never spent too much money to improve the business." Recorded Interview. 42. Unrecorded Interview. 43. Unrecorded Interview. 44. PolkTs Augusta City Directory, (Richmond, Virginia, p. Floyd's background Is unknown to the author. 45. Unrecorded Int erview. 46. Unrecorded Interview. 47. Polk's Augusta City Directory, (Richmond, Virginia, p.

PolkVs Augusta City Directory, (Richmond, Virginia, p. 48. Unrecorded Interview. 49. Recorded Interview. 50. Recorded Interview. 51. Unrecorded Interview. 52. Hagler picked gasite as the. name for the promised metal to stand for Georgia (GA) and because "site" sounded hard. Unrecorded Interview. 53. Unrecorded Interview. 54. The Meehanite Metal Corporation was organized on 28 January as the Meehanite Brake Shoe Foundry. The company now is located in Chattanooga, Tennessee. Phone conversation with secretary, Meehanite Corp., 26 August 55. Unrecorded Interview. ,. 56. Recorded Interview. 57. Unrecorded Interview. 58. Unrecorded Interview. 59. Phone conversation with John C. Hagler III, 25 August Georgia Iron Works HAER GA-7 (Page 19) 60.

See HAER, Augusta.Canal Project, Report #9,.Globe Mill. 61. The turbine remains in the ground. 62. The author obtained this information from the company's film, "Performance the Georgia Iron Works Story" and a tour of the plant, 3 August 63. Discussion with Alvin Postell, 22 July at the Georgia Iron Works. Georgia Iron Works HAER GA-7 (Page 20) Bibliography Oral Interviews John C. Hagler III, Jimmy Hewett, and Alvin Postell at Georgia Iron Works, Grovetown, Georgia, 3 August Unrecorded. Mr. Hagler provided much of the information about the early history of the company and about the purchase and modernization of Georgia Iron Works. Clyde Blackston, molder, and L. A. "Lonnie" Jones, core maker, at Georgia Iron Works, Grovetown, Georgia, 17 August Recorded. Mr.

Blackston gave detailed information on the water power system at Georgia Iron Works and on the operation of the foundry and its modernization. Maps Sanborn Fire Insurance Maps, Map Room, Sciences Library, University of Georgia, Athens. Books Simpson, Bruce L. History of the Metalcasting Industry. Chicago, The final chapters cover metalcasting in the last three centuries and supplied some background for the study. Augusta Exchange Club, compiler. Industrial Advantages of Augusta, Georgia. Augus ta, 189 3. Provided information on the original Georgia Iron Works. Augusta City Directories. City Records Minutes of the Superior Court of Richmond County, Georgia. Contained incorporation approvals,.