Anthracite iron were their principle businesses. The Franklin Institute, in 1830, offered a gold medal to the manufacturer of the greatest quantity of anthracite iron, and Nicholas Biddle and his associates offered a prize of $5,000 to the first individual to smelt a certain quantity of iron ore within a given time, using anthracite. The Lehigh Coal & Navigation, by then an industrial giant of the times, also offered free water power and discount rates on coal and shipping to encourage the development of the process. The first key breakthrough occurred in 1828-29, when Scotsman James Beaumont Neilson patented the hot blast
What Is a Nation? What Is a Nation? "What is a Nation?" ("Qu'est-ce qu'une nation?") is an 1882 lecture by French historian Ernest Renan (1823–1892), known for the statements that a nation is "a daily referendum", and that nations are based as much on what the people jointly forget, as what they remember. It is frequently quoted or anthologized in works of history or political science pertaining to nationalism and national identity. Renan wrote "What is a Nation" in order to symbolize the nationalism which was born in France as a result of the French Revolution of 1789. Renan begins his essay by noting