Seyfert's Forge, Gibraltar

This large composition depicting a scene at Seyfert’s Forge located in the Gilbraltar Valley, Pennsylvania. In an 1868 feature for the Berks and Schuylkill Journal, Tom Zimmerman wrote, “While at his studio, we noticed on the easel another picture, larger than either of the two previously described…which is to represent landscape in the immediate vicinity of Gilbraltar in this county. It is to be painted for Henry A. Seyfert, Esq. and will be finished during the coming winter.” The forge was built beginning in the 1760s by Mark Bird, who also established the forges at Hopewell, along French Creek in Berks County.