 This was the first reverberatory furnace (in this case known as an 'air furnace') to be built for iron foundry purposes.This seems to have formed the basis for the Company for Making Iron with Pitcoal, though it may also have been intended to exploit a patent granted to Thomas Addison in 1692.The company ran its foundry for a few years, with Thomas Fox (the brother of Shadrach Fox of Coalbrookdale) as founder.