On a hot July day in 2008, Bob Denesha headed into the overgrowth covering a large portion of a 42-acre piece of property in Westerly, R.I. Denesha knew there were abandoned quarries in the area left from Westerly's heyday in the granite industry, and he was setting out to find them.
It didn't take long tramping through the brush, cutting vines, and stepping over stones, before he came to an old roadway. Encouraged, he followed the roadway farther until he came upon a site that took his breath away. Thousands of tons of the once famous Westerly pink granite lay strewn on the ground, harvested from the nearby quarry years before and now abandoned.
"There were just piles and piles of it," Denesha said. "The overburden from the quarry. Back then they only wanted monument size blocks, but their trash is our treasure."
The property is owned by United Builders Supply Co., where Denesha has worked in the masonry division for 20 years. He knew architects and builders would love to be able to work with authentic Westerly pink and blue granite in restoration and new projects. So United Builders took this treasure and has made it available in full bed and thin veneer squares and rectangles and a few other options.
Westerly granite can be found in monuments, buildings, walls, and other projects all over New England. That's because in the mid-1800s and early 1900s, Westerly was one of the monument capitals of the world and its granite was some of the most expensive and sought-after in the industry.
The history of Westerly granite begins in 1845, with a discovery not unlike Bob Denesha's in 2008. Stone mason Orlando Smith stumbled across a small outcropping of granite on Westerly's Rhode's Hill, land that had once been the prosperous farm of Joshua Babcock, Westerly's first physician and first postmaster. Recognizing the value of the granite, Smith quickly purchased the farm and began a granite quarrying operation.
"It really is a Jed Clampett kind of story," Denesha said, "him tripping over the granite, then going on to become such a huge success."
Within twenty years of the discovery, more quarries had opened on "Quarry Hill" and other areas of Westerly and surrounding towns. The treasure they were bringing out of these quarries was the exceptional Westerly granite, known for its blue, pink (buff), or red tint, very fine grain, and immense strength - qualities that made it ideal for carving.
"This is the finest granite in the world - like 220 sandpaper," Denesha said. "You can carve it down to the tiniest detail, like leaves or fingernails or pages of paper. It's also one of the hardest in the world. You'll see monuments carved a hundred years ago that look like they were done last week - no weathering, no staining." Continued on page 2 Below: The Babcock-Smith House as it appeared circa 1860. It was the home of Orlando Smith, who discovered the outcropping of granite. Fine grain, uniform color, great strength and easy workability made this stone famous throughout the country.
Below: The Babcock-Smith House as it appeared circa 1860. It was the home of Orlando Smith, who discovered the outcropping of granite. Fine grain, uniform color, great strength and easy workability made this stone famous throughout the country
Left: 2nd Ohio Infantry monument at Chickamauga National Military Park, Fort Oglethorpe, GA. The acorn appears on Ohio memorials in the park. Acorn is polished red Westerly granite, the cap of the acorn is rockface. The acorn sits on two bases of blue Westerly granite. It was produced by the Smith Granite Company of Westerly, RI in 1894 for the princely sum of $1,500.
In this early period, quarrying was primitive work. This description comes from "The Strength of the Stone" a publication of the Westerly Public Library Granite Project:
"Quarrymen used simple shovels, picks, crow bars, and small hand-drills. Derricks, lifting devices, were shear poles - two large poles joined at the top to form an 'A' shape and guyed to stand vertical. From the apex of the shear pole a block and tackle were fastened to lift granite from the quarry or to turn the granite in preparation for finishing to specifications."
Workers also used black powder, a slow-burning explosive, to blast fractures in the block in a controlled manner, and oxen pulled the stone on carts. And the stones were huge. In 1932 a stone weighing almost 60 tons was pulled from deep within one of the quarries and transported to the railway station by a hundred oxen.
In "The Story of Westerly Granite," Stephen W. Macomber wrote in 1955, "Back in that bygone era, it was not unusual to see from four to five hundred or more stone workers hurrying down from Quarry Hill after their day's work was done."
Because the granite was such high-quality carving stone, the majority of the quarried stone was used for monuments and statues, resulting in the migration to Westerly of a highly skilled group of tradespeople. Designers, sculptors, models, engineers, draftsmen, blacksmiths, carpenters, and stone-setters, along with their shops and sheds, made Westerly a busy place.
Above: One of three statues on the Sanders monument in Calvary Cemetery, Evanston, Illinois. It was ordered from Smith Granite Company in September 1893 to be made from blue Westerly granite, for $8,113. Although over 100 years old, the granite carving remains crisp and illustrates the pinnacle of the carver's art in Westerly. Blue Westerly granite is still used to indicate the upper end range of hardness in granites.
Workers came from Ireland, Scotland, Finland, Poland, Italy, and other countries in Europe, leaving a legacy of ethnic diversity that can still be found in Westerly today.
The timing was right for the monument business, since the end of the Civil War in 1865 brought with it a desire for numerous monuments and commemorative statues. Most of the statues at Gettysburg battlefield were carved from Westerly granite, as are many of the statues in New York's Central Park, monuments at the battlefields of Chickamauga and Chattanooga, and the statue of George Washington in Allegheny City, Pennsylvania. Many buildings in New England and the East Coast were also built using Westerly granite, including the Travelers Tower in Hartford, Connecticut, the American Tract Society Building in New York City, and Sayles Hall at Brown University.
This was the golden age of monument creation, which included several phases. Sculpted figures started with a model: local women posing as angels and men as soldiers. Artists would sculpt the figures in soft clay, which was then transferred into a plaster cast. Once the plaster cast was created, the stone carver went to work, cutting a granite replica of the same size. This was the era of well known Westerly artists Robert D. Barr and Edward Pausch, and stone carvers Angelo Zerbarini, Antonio Pinardi, and Joseph Bedford, to name just a few.
Examples of these monuments can still be found in many cemeteries in Westerly and throughout the Northeast. Despite the fact that many of these sculptures are unsigned, the work shows an exquisite attention to detail.
"The detail is incredible," said Denesha. "The Richardson Stone of a mother and child in River Bend Cemetery is so life-like, down to the eyelashes and fingernails."
Denesha also told a story about the creation of the George Washington equestrian statue in Pennsylvania. The 17-foot-high monument of the president on horseback was cut from a 42- ton block taken from the Smith Quarry and assembled in three pieces. The sculpture was designed by artist Edward Pausch and carved by brothers Angelo and Columbus Zerbarini. Denesha said there's a story that exemplifies these carvers‚' attention to detail. Supposedly when the sculpture was picked up, one of the Zerbarini brothers said, "If you give me another week, I will make the spurs actually spin for you."
For very exclusive monuments, the artists would break the clay and plaster models so that no other carving could be created from it. But for many, the model was used more than once - customers could pick from a variety of examples. "Just like ordering out of the Sears catalog," Denesha said.
As the years went on, tools improved and the granite industry evolved, bringing in more advanced machinery, steel tools, saws, and eventually sandblasting equipment. Meanwhile, the desire for hand-carved war memorials declined, and the Depression took its toll on the granite industry. By 1945, the Smith Company's quarries had been sold, and the business that so influenced the area of Westerly is now all but nonexistent. Today Westerly is known more as a tourist town for those wishing to visit its seven miles of beaches than the granite Mecca it once was.
"Granite built Westerly. In 1900, 70% of the people here had something to do with the granite industry," Denesha said. "We're so proud of the granite and the history. It's a shame so many people aren't aware of it."
But several historical organizations are trying to raise awareness of the area's rich history. The Babcock-Smith House Museum, located in the house first owned by Joshua Babcock then Orlando Smith, is a repository of artifacts, papers, and photographs from the period. Visitors to the museum can also find maps to the many places in the area where they can see examples of Westerly granite craftsmanship.
United Builders Supply Company is also hoping the new availability of Westerly blue and Westerly pink as a veneer product will renew interest in this historic area and in the granite for which it was once known throughout the world. For more information on Westerly Granite veneer products please contact Mr. Bob Denesha, Vice President and Masonry Manager of United Builders Supply Co., Inc. Call 401-596-2831 x3324 or email bdenesha@unitedbuilderssupply.com
The Slippery Rock Gazette would like to thank Linda Chaffee, Archivist of the Babcock- Smith House Museum, for providing the historical photos for this article, and their on-going efforts to preserve the history of this unique community and American stone product.
")
