Mance: Quarry Industry of Southern Indiana 169 



The average of 8 analyses of specimens from 8 of the leading quarries or 

 Bedford stone showed the following percentage composition: Calcium 

 carbonate, 97.62; magnesium carbonate, .61; iron oxide and alumina, .36; 

 insoluble residue, .91. These analyses show the fitness of the Bedford Oolitic 

 stone for making a very pure quicklime; and the practical burning of the 

 lime at Salem, Bedford, and other points proves that fitness. For some 

 reason, however, the lime industry in the Oolitic stone district is not as 

 flourishing as it should be. Abandoned kilns are found in a number of 

 localities in the area, notably in Monroe county, near the old University 

 building at Bloomington, and at Ellettsville; in Lawrence county, 2 south- 

 east of Bedford, and 3 south of the same place along the Monon railway, 

 and in Owen county at Romona. 



Professor T. C. Hopkins in his report on the Oolitic stone 

 industry, in the twenty-first Annual Report of the Indiana 

 Department of Geology and Natural Resources (p. 337). says: 



To see the great quantity of waste rock on the dump piles about the 

 quarries one wonders why more of it is not burnt into lime, and no satisfac- 

 tion could be obtained to that query when put to the quarrymen. One 

 said it did not make good lime. Another that the lime was too hot, and 

 some had not thought of it, did not know that it had ever been tried or would 

 make lime at all. 



One needs only to look at the average analysis quoted above to 

 see that it would make a rich, fat lime, as remarked earlier in 

 this paper. Quoting from the same source (p. 337) : 



The reason that more of it has not been burnt may be due to a number 

 of causes [as follows]: 1. Freight rates, the cost of bringing in the coal and 

 shipping the lime. 2. A prejudice in the local markets against rich lime. 

 3. Want of a large market, as they are situated in the midst of the Missis- 

 sippi Valley, with large deposits of limestones on all sides. 4. The lack of 

 some enterprising person to push the business into prominence, as all the 

 stone dealers are interested in the sale of building stone and not lime. 



Considering the force of these reasons for the lack of develop- 

 ment of the industry in this district, at the time of writing the 

 present report, it will be seen that not all of them are now effec- 

 tive. In the first place, more railroads have penetrated the stone 

 belt and are competing for the business. This has had a tendency 

 to lower freight rates. The quarry operators and the railroad 

 managers have come to realize that their interests are mutual, 

 and so are better acquainted with conditions and will cooperate 

 to make rates that will allow the industry to develop. In the 

 second place, the development of the process of hydrating lime 

 at the manufacturing plants has done away with the objections 

 to hot limes by making them easy and safe to handle. With 



