Barre's amazing obelisks, and how they were built
Toolbox
By PAUL WOOD - Published: July 13, 2009
This is the latest in a monthly column on central Vermont's granite industry by the Vermont Granite Museum.
Many obelisks were quarried and finished in Barre. Most of Barre's major quarries, at one time or another, provided granite for obelisks including E.L. Smith, Wells-Lamson, Wetmore & Morse, C.E. Tayntor & Co., Marr & Gordon, and Boutwell, Milne & Varnum. A notable Barre-manufactured obelisk was the Rockefeller Monument with a total height of 65-feet 10-inches which is located at the Lakeview Cemetery in Cleveland OH. It was quarried at Wetmore & Morse and finished at C.H. More & Co. in 1898. The Ernst Monument had the largest first base (14-feet 4-inches square by 1-foot 5-inches high) shipped from Barre by rail up to that time. It was shipped upright in a well car with much of the stone projecting down into a well cut into the middle of the car. There was a clearance of only 9 inches plus the height of the rails between the bottom of the stone and the cross-ties.
The Joseph Smith Monument, erected at Sharon in 1905 and commemorating the 100th anniversary of the Mormon prophet's birth, is probably the best documented of all Barre-manufactured obelisks. With a shaft height of 37-1/2 feet, the monument was reputed to be, at the time of its erection, the world's tallest polished obelisk. The shaft was cut from a 4-foot by 4-foot by 46-foot block quarried at the Marr & Gordon Quarry and finished at the Barclay Brothers shed in Barre.
The 12-foot by 12-foot first base of the Smith obelisk was carried flat on a railroad flatcar so it could be unloaded without a crane. Since this was three feet wider than the Central Vermont Railway normally allowed, a special permit was required and Mr. Keefe, chief roadmaster, accompanied the stone on its trip. A heavy wagon, built by a Mr. Howland and owned by Jones Brothers of Barre, was used to haul the granite from the railhead to the erection site – a distance of almost six miles and a rise in elevation of 800 feet. A block & tackle had to be used since even a 22-horse team was not able to pull the wagon with a 30-ton load up even a slight slope.
A number of obelisks were listed in the Souvenir of the Exhibit of Barre Granite at the 1893 World's Columbian Exposition in Chicago and there are a number of Barre manufactured obelisks in Elmwood Cemetery including the Donald Smith obelisk. The original customer for the obelisk discovered a defect near the apex and refused to accept the obelisk. Being a good thrifty Scotsman, Smith (the manufacturer) rather than discarding the obelisk, adopted it for his own monument! In any case, after the obelisk was erected the defect was so high off the ground that it was virtually invisible.
There were many challenges in manufacturing large obelisks. First a large enough block of granite without defects had to be found in the quarry for the obelisk shaft. A 5-1/2-foot by 5-1/2-foot by 55-foot long block appropriate for the shaft of the Rockefeller Monument described above would weigh about 137 tons – far beyond the capacity of the typical quarry derrick. To handle this tremendous weight, a temporary timber ramp like an inclined railroad trestle was built from the quarry rim down to the quarry floor and the obelisk shaft was pulled up the ramp by block & tackle. Once at the finishing shed, the shaft was too large to be sawed in a gang saw so the rough sides had to be tapered and hammered flat by hand and by pneumatic surfacing machine.
In addition to the need to ship large first bases in well cars, the length and weight of many obelisks exceeded the limits of the standard flatcar and had to be shipped on two heavy-duty cars. Once off the rails, the obelisk had to be transported over roads and bridges. The use of sledges on rollers, heavy-duty wagons with 20-inch wide wheels, block & tackle, and temporary buttressing of bridges was often required. Erection at the chosen site required a special guyed heavy timber framework, non-damaging clamped-on collars to secure blocks & tackles to the shaft, and one or more geared hoists.
Barre's granite companies made glorifying claims for the size of shafts quarried and finished by them. A photographer was often called in to record the shaft's removal from the quarry or its transport on heavy wagon or railroad flat cars. This provided an opportunity for the workers, managers and owners to pose proudly with the shaft. The shipping crate for the finished obelisk was usually painted to indicate the size of the shaft and to advertise the quarry and finishing shed. Often exaggerated claims of the tallest or the heaviest were made as form of advertising – announcing a firm's supposed ability to quarry and manufacture whatever the customer might desire no matter how large.
The golden age of the American obelisk was ca. 1880s to the 1920s with many commemorating war dead and others memorializing politicians, explorers or wealthy businessmen. Travelers to Egypt and Europe were impressed with the obelisk and some returned home to America with the idea of its use for memorialization of themselves and their families. With a simple geometric elegance and slender but solid strength, the obelisk is likely to continue to be a favored monumental form for centuries to come.
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