356 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. 



the quarrying country, for the better trucking of stone to the 

 docks at Wilbur. 



Some of the quarries have been veritable gold mines. One in 

 particular, known as the great Lawson Quarry, at West Hur- 

 ley, is said to have produced over four million dollars' worth of 

 flag and other classes of bluestone. This quarry was worked by 

 Lucius Lawson, now of Chattanooga, Tenn., for fully thirty years, 

 and in it nearly two thirds of a village of three hundred people 

 earned their living. The great quarry has now been abandoned, 

 as the top has got so heavy that it does not pay to remove it to 

 get at the good stone. In consequence of its abandonment, the 

 village of West Hurley has dwindled to less than one third its 

 former size, and is rapidly becoming a deserted village. Hun- 

 dreds of other quarries have been abandoned for similar reasons, 

 yet the whole bluestone district of Ulster County is thickly dotted 

 with new quarries, which are opened as soon as the old ones are 

 abandoned. 



In working the quarries there is a great difference in the 

 thickness of the slabs taken out. The formation exists in per- 

 pendicular blocks of different surface dimensions which are 

 formed of flat plates piled up like cardboard. The top of worth- 

 less stone and earth is first removed by blasting with powder, 

 after which wedges are driven in the natural seams which sepa- 

 rate the plates, lifting them up, after which they are hoisted out 

 with derricks. In working a block the slabs may run to several 

 thicknesses, varying from two to ten inches. The thin slabs are 

 then cut up into what is known as Corporation four and five foot 

 flag and smaller sizes, while the heavier blocks are preserved 

 intact for such huge platforms as we see reaching from building 

 to curb line on the sidewalks of New York. Many of the blocks 

 worked are so small in surface area that they are unfit for flagging, 

 and are consequently worked up in coping, pillar caps, window 

 and door sills and lintels, building and bridge stone for tram- 

 ways. Other blocks are found suitable for curb and gutter alone, 

 while some quarries furnish slabs so small and thin that they are 

 used only for floor tiling, or for the facing of brick walls. Again, 

 some of the slabs, or more properly platforms, taken from the 

 quarries are from twenty to thirty feet square, ten inches thick, 

 and weigh over twenty tons. Owing to the difficulty in handling 

 and the danger of breakage during transportation, these platforms 

 are seldom taken to tide water, but are broken up at the quarries 

 into more convenient sizes for handling. Sometimes, however, 

 monoliths of tremendous size and weight have been transported 

 to the docks at Wilbur, the one shown in the illustration being 

 twenty by twenty-four feet in surface area, nine inches thick, 

 without a flaw, and weighing several hundredweight over twenty 



