The building up of the Capital City after the Civil War coincided with the opening of the American West. The area's ample supply of lumber and the ease by which iron could be transported from the northern part of the state facilitated the manufacturing of plows and agricultural tools that were in great demand. E. Bement & Sons (founded 1869) would, by the 1880s, become one of the nation's leading suppliers of these tools and the city's largest manufacturing company.
