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Potbelly stove at the Museum of Appalachia

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A potbelly stove is a cast-iron, coal-burning or wood-burning stove that is cylindrical with a bulge in the middle.^[1] The name is derived from the resemblance of the stove to a fat person's pot belly. Potbelly stoves were used to heat large rooms and were often found in train stations or one-room schoolhouses. The flat top of the stove allows for cooking food or heating water.

Potbelly stove in the South Street Seaport Museum, New York

Fanciful drawing by Marguerite Martyn in the St. Louis Post-Dispatch of October 21, 1906, of a country store, centered by a potbelly stove

^ Gove PB (editor in chief) (1981). Webster's Third New International Dictionary of the English Language Unabridged. Springfield, Massachusetts: Merriam-Webster Inc. 102a + 2,663 pp. ISBN 0-87779-201-1. ("potbelly", definition and illustration, p. 1775).