Joseph Reid Anderson Tredegar Iron Works CLASS OF 1824 A year after graduation, Anderson married Sally Archer, daughter of the post surgeon at Fort Monroe, Virginia. Seeking better prospects than army life promised, he resigned to work as a civil engineer with Virginia State Engineer Claude Crozet, onetime West Point professor of engineering (1817–1823). In 1841 Anderson joined the Tredegar Iron Company in Richmond, eventually becoming its owner. By 1860 the foundry was one of the nation’s largest, producing locomotives, boilers, cables, naval hardware, and cannon. When war came, it emerged as the industrial heart of the Confederacy. Using slave and free labor, Anderson supervised ordnance and munitions production through most of the war. When Richmond fell in 1865, the federal government confiscated the company, but Anderson regained control in 1867 and remained a prominent Virginia businessman. NEXT Wars of Expansion William Gibbs McNeill 1801–1853 Class of 1817 George Washington Whistler 1800–1849 Class of 1819 George Bomford 1782–1848 Class of 1805 Robert Parker Parrott 1804–1877 Class of 1824 Joseph Reid Anderson 1813–1892 Class of 1836
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