SOAPSTONE — BUSHNELL 481 



DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA 



In the Smithsonian Report for 1878 Professor Baird first described 

 the soapstone quarry at Chula, Amelia County, Va., and tlien 

 continued : 



Attention being drawn to these explorations wliile in progress by notices in 

 some of the Washington newspapers, Mr. Elmer R. Reynolds, of this city, brought 

 to notice some similar specimens of vessels which he had found within the 

 District, on Soapstone Run, a branch of Rock Creek. 



The quarry was located just north of the present Bureau of Stand- 

 ards, on the summits of two adjoining hills 100 yards or more apart 

 and separated by a small stream known as Soapstone Run. The hills 

 were partly removed in 1891, when Connecticut Avenue was extended 

 northward, and were more greatly reduced a few years ago when 

 Albemarle Street was graded from east to west across the avenue. 



The quarry was discovered by Reynolds during the summer of 

 1874.^° The surface was covered with brush, ferns, and fallen leaves, 

 with quantities of soapstone scattered about and "hundreds of frag- 

 ments cropped out through the leaves, nearly every one of which 

 showed well defined traces of having been worked " by the Indians. 



Reynolds worked on the south hill, and in 1890 Holmes did sim- 

 ilar work on the north hill, finding quantities of broken, unfinished 

 vessels, together with innumerable stone implements which had 

 been used in and about the quarry." 



In a later account of the quarry and of the material found. Holmes 

 referred to the method of making soapstone vessels and drew this 

 conclusion : ^^ 



So far as the evidence obtained on the site shows, work was confined 

 almost exclusively to procuring material for use in vessel making, but 

 apparently the pots were not often shaped or even partly shaped in place, 

 to be afterward detached by undercutting and wedging as observed in many 

 other places. It appears that as a rule the rough block was first obtained, 

 then trimmed down to the approximate size and form, and afterward hol- 

 lowed out ready for the finishing operations, which were in most cases con- 

 ducted elsewhere. There were naturally many failures from breaking, from 

 splitting along partially developed cleavage planes, and from imperfections 

 in texture ; and many hundreds of these failures yet remain on the site, 

 in the pits, in the heaps of debris, and scattered far down the slopes of 

 the hill and along the stream bed. 



Northward from the District of Columbia, soapstone is plentiful 

 in Maryland, and many quarries were opened by the Indians on 



*" Reynolds, Elmer R., Aboriginal soapstone quarries in the District of Columbia. 12th 

 Ann. Rep. Ptabody Mus. Arch, and Ethnol., vol. 11, No. 3, pp. 526-535, 1880. 



" Holmes, William H., Excavations in an ancient soapstone quarry in the District of 

 Columbia. Amor. Anthrop., vol. 3, pp. 321-330, October 1890. 



" Holmes, William H., Stone implements of the Potomac-Chesapeake Tidewater province. 

 15th Ann. Rep. Bur. Ethnol., pp. 13-152, 1897. 



