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NEW YORK STATE MUSEUM 



The principal difficulty in the production of the stone for the 

 market has been to secure an even quality, as the serpentine has a 

 tendency to gather in bunches and stringers which look like the 

 knots in granites. 



Some of the larger occurrences of the serpentinous marble are in 

 the vicinity of Port Henry, Essex county. 



The J. E. Reed quarry is 6 miles due west of Port Henry, in the 

 town of Moriah, near the precipitous hill known as Broughton ledge. 

 The beds are exposed for a vertical distance of 25 feet and in blocks 

 up to 5 feet thick. They show a rather uniform mixture of car- 

 bonates and serpentines, with here and there a band of pure serpen- 

 tine from a few inches to several feet long. The bands are bent and 



Fig. 18 Serpentinous marble, Reed quarry, Port Henry. Enlarged 10 times 



twisted in a most complex way. A small fault cuts through the 

 exposure and on the north side of it the stone is more broken. The 

 limestone outcrops 200 feet east of the quarry site and also on the 

 property of S. A. Foote, one-half of a mile farther east. The 

 quarry was last worked about twenty years ago. The product was 

 used for monuments, several of which are to be seen in the Port 

 Henry cemetery, and to some extent for coping and lintels. When 

 exposed long to the weather the serpentine particles are brought in 

 relief through the more rapid solution of the carbonates. The stone 

 is better adapted for interior decoration than outside work. 



