Interpretive Panel: Engineering Evolution

Wayside panel: Engineering Evolution

NPS

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Tactile Exhibit

Engineering Evolution. The crumbling concrete before you is all that remains of the magazine. It’s one of the few left of its kind from the Civil War. Inside the magazine’s storage rooms, barrels held 40-pound, or 18-kilogram, linen bags of black powder. Soldiers carefully carried pass boxes filled with bags to the Rodman Gun to ready its next shot.

“The magazines are perfectly dry, and no complaints were ever made of ammunition having been damaged, either by leakage or by imperfect ventilation.”
- Brevet Major General John G. Barnard, Engineer, US Army

Tactile caption (tactile not pictured)

The magazine is fragile. Help preserve the fort by not touching or climbing on it. Instead, feel the bumpy texture of this replica concrete. Soldiers mixed small stones and oyster shells to make the concrete locally.