86 Report on Building Stone of New York. 



feet. Then the sandstone and shale, in irregularly alternating strata, 

 are found quite to the bottom of the quarry. The heavier beds and 

 the best stone for building, are in the upper 30 feet. And the present 

 quarry operations are on a floor, which is only 40 feet or so below the 

 top. The strata appear to be nearly horizontal ; and range from 2 

 inches to 2 feet in thickness. The rock is conveniently divided by 

 two systems of vertical joints, which run north and south and east 

 and west. The stone is fine-grained and has a gray to greenish- gray 

 color. In working, deep holes are sunk, and by means of large 

 blasts great masses of stone are thrown down. They are broken into 

 convenient sizes for building. The stone is all sold in the rough, and 

 no cutting or dressing is done at the quarry. The larger part of the 

 product is used in Elmira for building and a small part for curbing. 

 The stone averages about a dollar a perch in the city. The plant in- 

 cludes one derrick, a steam-drill, boiler-house and shop, and the teams 

 and wagons for the carting of the stone into the city. A large force 

 of men is employed, quarrying in the warm season and stripping in 

 the winter. The quarry is only a mile from the D. L. & W. and 

 the N. Y. L. E. & W. R. R. depots ; and is about 150 feet (at 

 top) above the valley. 



North of Simon's quarry, and in the same range, three quarries 

 have been opened in the steep hillside, at elevations of 250 to 300 

 feet above the city. That of John McGreevy has a working face 180 

 feet long, a breadth of 75 feet and a height of about 40 feet, at the 

 back. There are shales and sandstone here also, and rather more of 

 the former. In the next opening, 50 feet beyond, the working 

 face is 450 feet by 60 feet in height. The vertical section includes 

 earth from 5 to 8 feet thick ; shale and a little sandstone intermixed, 

 5 to 8 feet ; then, shales with beds of sandstone from an inch to a foot 

 thick, for 50 feet. About 75 per cent of the mass is shale ; and hence 

 waste. About 100 yards to the north there is a third opening, which 

 has a length of 600 feet and a height of 60 feet. Here also the pro- 

 portion of shale is large. The beds in these quarries are horizontal. 

 Joints divide the rock vertically and make the work of quarrying 

 easy. And much of the stone has the natural joint faces ; and they 

 are usually of a dirty -yellow to brownish shades of color. The stone 

 is fine-grained and hard, but not very durable. 



These three quarries are not much worked. The amount of waste 

 offsets the advantages of natural drainage and the convenient loca- 

 tions for waste dumps and the nearness to city and railway. 



