Le puddleur

The “puddleur” (furnace worker) “loaded a load of cast iron weighing 225 kilos, which had to yield 195 kilos of iron... At arm's length! Using an iron poker, the puddler stirred, pierced, felt and “stirred” the molten iron inside the furnace. Finally, at the decisive moment, which he judged by his esteem, ... he extracted from the furnace a white tumor, with an unbearable glow, full of flaming pustules. Mesh headdresses on their faces, sheet-metal anemids on their shins, the master roll-formers stood opposite each other on either side of the rotating cages with fluted cylinders, ...and they passed, caught and re-passed in the flutes the bar that was turning from red to blue. Production was launched into the circuit of the annealing furnaces and the series of rolling mills ... where the unscrambler - a child - directed the jet of iron macaroni spurting out of the last cylinder in fiery volutes.”

Extracts from the memories of Robert Delavignette, Birama.