IRON CROWN OF LOMBARDY 



3062 



IRONWOOD 



recipient, this decoration reminds one of the 

 rarely-bestowed English decoration, the Vic- 

 toria Cross (which see). A noticeable fact dur- 

 ing the War of the Nations was the large num- 

 ber of German soldiers who received the Iron 

 Cross as compared with the small number of 

 British soldiers who received the Victoria 

 Cross. It was estimated that for each recipi- 

 ent of the Victoria Cross there were at least 

 three thousand recipients of the Iron Cross; 

 it was decreed by the German authorities that 

 no unusual act of bravery should be unre- 

 warded. 



IRON CROWN OF LOMBARDY. See sub- 

 head under CROWN. 



IRON MASK, THE MAN WITH THE, a mys- 

 terious French character confined in the Bas- 

 tille and other prisons during the reign of Louis 

 XIV, to whom he was believed to be related. 

 His face was always concealed by a mask of 

 black velvet, and his name was never men- 

 tioned, but he was buried under that of Mar- 

 chiel, in 1703. Many romantic stories were 

 circulated regarding him, but his identity was 

 never established; it is only known that his 

 speech was pleasing and his bearing that of a 

 gentleman. The whole matter constitutes one 

 of those historical mysteries which will never 

 be satisfactorily solved, but which will con- 

 tinue to fascinate and mystify the world. Alex- 

 andre Dumas' romance, The Man of the Iron 

 Mask, deals with the life of the unknown pris- 

 oner. 



IRON MOUNTAIN, a low peak of the Saint 

 Francois Mountains in Southeastern Missouri, 

 so called because of its great deposits of high- 

 grade magnetic iron ore. The hill also contains 

 porphyry, a hard, purplish stone which takes a 

 high polish and is used for decorative purposes. 

 The mountain rises 1,097 feet above sea level 

 and is about 300 feet higher than the sur- 

 rounding country. It is heavily wooded with 

 oak trees. 



IRON MOUNTAIN, MICH., the county seat 

 of Dickinson County, known chiefly through its 

 iron-mining interests. It is situated on the 

 Menominee River and on the southwestern 

 border of the Upper Peninsula. Escanaba is 

 sixty-two miles east, and Green Bay, Wis., is 

 100 miles south. Transportation is provided 

 by the Chicago & North Western, the Chicago, 

 Milwaukee & Saint Paul and the Wisconsin & 

 Michigan railways. The place was settled in 

 1879, and was incorporated as a city in 1891. 

 It owes its name to the mountains in the 

 locality, which contain immense deposits of 



iron ore. In 1910 the population was 9,216. 

 The area of the city is six and one-half square 

 miles. 



Aside from its extensive iron-mining indus- 

 try, Iron Mountain is the commercial center 

 for a farming district in Wisconsin and for a 

 large mining section in Michigan. The city 

 is located 1,160 feet above sea level, amid 

 beautiful mountain and river scenery. It has a 

 park of forty acres, a high school building, 

 erected in 1913 at a cost of $200,000, a Car- 

 negie Library, a business college and two hos- 

 pitals. J.M.G. 



IRONSIDES, OLD. See CONSTITUTION, THE. 



IRONTON, OHIO, the county seat of Law- 

 rence County, situated on the Ohio River near 

 its most southerly dip as the southern state 

 boundary, 134 miles east and south of Cin- 

 cinnati and 100 miles southeast of Columbus. 

 It is on the Cincinnati, Hamilton & Dayton, 

 the Chesapeake & Ohio and the Norfolk & 

 Western railroads. The Chesapeake & Ohio 

 Railway, on the Kentucky side of the river, 

 operates passenger and freight ferries to Iron- 

 ton. The population was 13,147 in 1910, and 

 13,949 in 1916, by Federal estimate. The area, 

 of the city is two and one-half square miles. 



Ironton contains a Federal building, a court- 

 house, Briggs Public Library, Memorial Hall, 

 Masonic Temple, Odd Fellows' Hall and a city 

 hospital. The city is surrounded by a section 

 rich in timber, iron ore, bituminous coal, and 

 fire and pottery clay, and has a thriving river 

 trade, especially in lumber. Important indus- 

 trial plants are manufactories of iron and iron 

 goods, cement, ' lumber, machinery, boilers, 

 stoves, furniture and fire brick. Ironton was 

 settled in 1832, and was incorporated in 1849. 



IRONWOOD, the popular name for horn- 

 beam, a large family of trees whose snowy- 

 white wood excels the best oak in durability. 

 Many species are found, in nearly all temper- 

 ate climes. In the Orient it is planted around 

 the Buddhist temples for its fragrant flowers, 

 while in America the smaller, wiry species, from i 

 twenty-five to forty feet high, with birch-like 

 foliage, grow in the shadows of the forests, 

 both north and south. The slender trunks are , 

 gnarled and swollen in ridges under the close ; 

 gray-blue bark. The flowers grow in catkins 

 much like the hop, hence the common name , 

 of hop-hornbeam, while the tiny, boat-like 

 seeds sail off on the wind to be distributed (see 

 CROSS-FERTILIZATION) . 



The flexible branches of the European horn- 

 beam, which in many respects is very similar 



