Listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1988.
From the record
“George Cresswell Furnace, also known as the George Cresswell Furnace Stack, is a historic lead furnace located near Potosi, Washington County, Missouri. It was built about 1840, and is an open hearth furnace measuring about 100 feet square at its base and constructed of massive limestone blocks interlaced with mortar.”
Wikipedia article George Cresswell Furnace, CC BY-SA 4.0.
One of 5 National Register listings published here for Washington County · listed in 1988 · category: Structure.
National Register reference number.88000613- the number the National Park Service assigned this property when it was listed, and the key its nomination file is catalogued under at the National Archives.
Fires near this property
71 since 1992
Regional context, not property-specific
evidence. The
federal wildfire occurrence database
lists 71 fires within 5 miles of George Cresswell Furnace
between 1992 and 2018, burning about 829 acres in total. None started naturally. 6 were recorded as arson.
Distance is straight-line from the map coordinates, so a fire counted
here may appear on a neighbouring settlement's page as well.
Reported cause
Fires
Missing data/not specified/undetermined
36
Debris and open burning
25
Arson/incendiarism
6
Smoking
2
Misuse of fire by a minor
1
Recreation and ceremony
1
The most recent of
them, most recent first, with the day each was reported and the service
that recorded it.
Regional context, not property-specific
evidence. The federal mineral resources record lists
36 workings within 5 miles of George Cresswell Furnace: 32 past producers, 2 producers, 1 unknown, 1 prospect.
2 still produce. What was taken out: Lead, Barium-Barite, Lead, Zinc, Copper, Silver. Distance is straight-line from the
map coordinates, so a quarry counted here may appear on a neighbouring
settlement's page as well.
Regional context, not property-specific
evidence. The National Weather Service names
Potosi, the town this property stands in, in 78 storm reports between 1993 and 2025: 50 hail, 19 thunderstorm wind, 5 tornado, 2 flash flood.
The reports record 7 injuries. Each account below is quoted exactly as the forecast office
filed it, from the NOAA Storm Events Database, and each date
opens the federal record of that event.
The 1st in a series of 5 small tornadoes struck just northeast of Potosi along Highway 21. The Potosi Lumberyard was severely damaged. Seven people were injured with one kept overnight at a local hospital.
A small tornado initially touched down near the intersection of Highway P and State Road 8, damaging a door and windows of a large garage. The tornado then traveled across a city park damaging several trees, sections of a chain-linked fence, and several advertisement bill boards. Before lifting numerous trees were downed, several mobile homes were flipped, and minor roof damage was caused to a service station just east of the intersection of State Roads 8 and 21.
The tornado formed and caused damage on the west side of Potosi. Roof shingles were blown off several church buildings, trees were downed, and a mobile home used for storage was destroyed. The tornado moved east-southeast down High Street in Potosi causing roof damage to several businesses, downed trees, power lines and business signs. The tornado crossed Highway 21 and continued along Highway 8 causing tree damage in the Spring Town Road area. About a half mile east of the Potosi city limits the tornado destroyed a building at a saw mill along Highway 8. The tornado continued for about another half mile causing tree damage and then dissipated.
Up to three inches of rain fell in a short amount of time causing flash flooding in Potosi. Mine A Breton Creek overflowed its banks in town onto Jefferson Street. Several water rescues had to be made in this area.
Up to two inches of rain fell in a short amount of time causing flash flooding. Several roads were flooded including Highway E between Blackwell and Cadet.
Numerous trees, tree limbs and power lines were blown down. Several of the trees fell onto homes and businesses causing minor to moderate damage. Also, some roofs were partially blown off causing minor damage.
The second tornado struck 1 mile northeast of Potosi along State Route E. One mobile home and a storage building were damaged. Several trees were either snapped off at the trunk or uprooted.
No historic map-sheet match is published
for this property yet. That does not mean no map exists. This record needs
a coordinate-quality review before it can be joined to a sheet boundary.
Browse the county's mapped places while that work is
pending.
Listed places nearby
1 within 8 miles
Other National Register properties close
enough to walk or drive between, ordered by distance from this one. Both
positions come from the same geocoding pass that matched these properties
to their map sheets.
Listing record. National Park Service National Register of Historic Places, listed-properties dataset, current to 2026-05-22.
Map join. Address geocoded through the United States Census geocoder, then tested against the published boundary of every sheet in the USGS Historical Topographic Map Collection.
How this page is made. Listing fields come from federal records; map-sheet coverage is a labelled coordinate-to-boundary calculation, not a source-field claim.
Wildfire. Short, Karen C. 2022. Spatial wildfire occurrence data for the United States, 1992-2020 [FPA_FOD_20221014]. 6th Edition. Fort Collins, CO: Forest Service Research Data Archive. https://doi.org/10.2737/RDS-2013-0009.6 Collected with United States Government funding and usable without additional permissions or fees.
Mines and quarries. USGS Mineral Resources Data System (MRDS) https://mrdata.usgs.gov/mrds/ A work of the United States government, no copyright under 17 U.S.C. 105.
Storms. NOAA National Centers for Environmental Information, Storm Events Database https://www.ncei.noaa.gov/stormevents/ A work of the United States government, no copyright under 17 U.S.C. 105. Narratives are quoted verbatim from the National Weather Service report and are not edited or summarised.
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