Nails and a barrel lid from James Wood & Company

Pittsburgh iron goods found an eager market across the nation. This barrel of nails was on its way to settlements in the Nebraska and Iowa territories when the steamboat carrying it, the Arabia, sank in the Missouri River near Kansas City, Mo., in 1856. The cargo was excavated in 1988. Built in the Monongahela River town of Brownsville and finished in Pittsburgh, the Arabia also symbolized the region’s industrial legacy.