Conservation of Historic Stone Buildings and Monuments (1982) / Chapter Skim
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Geological Sources of Building Stone
Geological Sources of Building Stone
Pages 49-61
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From page 49... ...
In the United States, weathering-resistant, strong, and attractive building stones are abundant in all but one geological province: the Atlantic and Gulf Coastal Plain. Abundant stone is supplied by the other geological provinces, which are composed of crystalline rocks or older sediments.
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From page 50... ...
More advanced cultures quarried and used dimension stones to construct monuments and buildings, again with the thought of preserving what they thought most important in their heritage. In this century we have moved steadily from buildings constructed principally of dimension stone to those using materials that are easier and cheaper to handle, such as steel and concrete.
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From page 51... ...
The American Society for Testing and Materials (ASTM) has adopted standard definitions for the principal commercial dimension stones.
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From page 52... ...
Most limestones are formed of shells or reworked shell fragments, although many commercial limestones, including colitic and very fine-grained and compact varieties, are chemical precipitates. Sandstone ASTM defines sandstone as "a consolidated sand in which the grains are composed chiefly of quartz and feldspar, of fragmental texture, and with various interstitial cementing materials, including silica, iron oxides, calcite, or clay." Commercially used sandstone is a cIastic sediment consisting almost entirely of quartz grains, 1/16 to 2 mrn in diameter, with various types of cementing material.
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From page 53... ...
quartzite a metamorphosed sandstone consisting almost entirely of quartz and utilized locally, as the Sioux Falls quartzite of South Dakota and the Baraboo quartzite of Wisconsin; (b) greenstone~efined by ASTM as a metamorphic rock principally containing chlorite, epidote, or actinolite; (c)
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From page 54... ...
In recent years the total amount of dimension stone has been less than 0.5 percent of total stone produced and its value about 4 percent of the total. Despite this decline in relative production, the actual amount of dimension stone produced since 1973 has not varied greatly from 1.5 million tons.
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From page 55... ...
It is generally underlain by poorly consolidated sedimentary rocks of Cretaceous to Recent age that lie in nearly honzontal layers. Very little dimension stone has been produced because the rocks lack strength, although in Colonial times a coquina limestone that harfdened when exposed to the air was widely used in Flonda and other southeastern states.
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From page 56... ...
SOURCE: Laurence, 1973.8 Appalachian Crystalline Province The Appalachian Crystalline Province includes the Appalachian mountain belt, from the Blue Ridge and Piedmont in the south, northward to the Reading Prong and New Tersey-Hudson Highlands, the Adirondack Mountains, and New England. Included geographically within this province is the lithologically unrelated Triassic Basin Subprovince.
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From page 57... ...
Crystalline rocks are exposed in the cores of domal uplifts, as in the Black Hills of South Dakota and elsewhere. The eastern two-thirds of the province is underlain by Paleozoic sedimentary rocks that have produced more than 80 percent of the total domestic sandstone and limestone.
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From page 58... ...
Italy dominates the international trade in dimension stone; it is the leading importer of rough blocks and the leading exporter of finished stone. The principal export has been marble, especially from the Carrara district; but travertine from around Tivoli, serpentine, volcanic tuff, and limestone are also exported.
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From page 59... ...
Little blasting can be done in mining dimension stone, and quarrying must involve the use of diamond saws, wire saws, and drilling machines. Large circular saws~are used for final processing; some are 1Q it (3 m)
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From page 60... ...
Perhaps a data base can be built up of future sources, especially deposits that merit special legal protection so that they can be preserved until needed. So Tong as man believes in preserving his cultural heritage and transmitting his monuments to future generations, his primary concerns must remain the preservation, production, and protection of durable and attractive building stones.
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From page 61... ...
Geological Sources of Building Stone 4.
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