The art of turning granite
Grearson & Lane Co., Part I
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In this photo, Maurice (Felix) Goulette works on a turned piece for Grearson & Lane, a Barre company renowned for producing turned and columnar granite work. Submitted Photo |
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By PAUL WOOD - Published: January 4, 2010
This is the first of two parts on the art of granite turning in Barre, provided by the Vermont Granite Musuem.
James Grearson, captain of the merchant ship Water Lily, died at sea during a storm off Portland, Maine. His wife Mary moved from St. George, New Brunswick, Canada to Barre after her husband's death. Frederick, the oldest son, was employed as a mill and quarry engineer and in the early 1890s entered the employ of I.W. Bates & Co. of East Barre. Soon he established himself as a skillful workman - especially in turned granite work. In 1897, Frederick and a younger brother James Jr. established Grearson Brothers, leasing the works of I.W. Bates & Co for two years. Grearson Brothers typically employed one gang of men and specialized in columnar and spherical work.
Their facilities proving inadequate, Grearson Brothers purchased a waterpower privilege in East Barre from W.C. Nye where they erected a plant with a new column-cutting lathe with all the latest improvements which enabled them to turn round work from five inches to nearly five feet in diameter and twenty-two feet long. While their main reliance would be on water power, pending the building of a dam they put in a steam engine. A side track connected the shed to the Barre and Chelsea main line. The Grearson's advertised that they would promptly fill all orders for flower vases, columns, urns, spheres and round monuments of all sizes and designs. In 1906, Willis A. Lane was admitted to the company and its name changed to Grearson & Lane Co. (G&L).
Frederick was the mechanical man - designing and building machinery and finding ways of doing things. James Jr. was more involved with sales and accounting. Willis Lane was born in Barre and established a stone polishing business on Granite St. in 1885 which continued until 1893 when he established a column turning business, "Granite City Column Cutting Works." Later, he opened a machine shop for general repairing and manufacturing where he designed and manufactured the Granite City Polishing Machine and the Light Polishing Machine as well as a sharpening machine for lathe cutting discs.
In 1908, G&L built a new 60-foot by 194-foot plant in Burnham Meadow in Barre. The shed had a two-story central aisle - tall enough for the traverse of an overhead traveling crane - and two one-story side aisles. The shed was wood-frame constructed with clapboard siding and tarpaper roof. A two-story freestanding office building was connected to the shed's northeast corner. The Sanguinetti Brothers shed (which became Comolli & Co.) was just to the north and the Willis A. Lane sheds were to the east.
By 1913, G&L employed 25 men and the plant included five 221/2-foot long, 8-foot diameter cutting lathes and five finishing (steeling and polishing) lathes - all run by a 60 horsepower electric motor. Vases and urns were the largest part of G&L's business. Columns, balusters, posts, spheres, monument rolls, quarter round markers, and landscape products such as sundials, birdbaths, flagpole bases and fountains were less common. Some examples of G&L's work can be seen in Hope Cemetery: the Davis soccer ball, the Gable colonnade monument, and the Gentile monument with a pair of urns and in Elmwood Cemetery, the Grearson monument consisting exclusively of turned work.
G&L's sales were primarily to Barre manufacturers and the turned work was included as part of larger projects such as mausoleums and large monuments. There were very few bulk orders. Mostly it was a single piece or a pair. Rarely an order might be for four or six columns. A couple of cutting lathes would be in more or less constant use. There were always some finishing lathes in operation. In the early days, there were more employees and probably most of the lathes were in operation. Shipping was done locally by truck. Jones Brothers turned paper rolls and chocolate rolls but ordered turned monumental work from G&L. The 1927 Barre and Montpelier Directory lists Fred A. Grearson, President; Willis A. Lane, Vice President; James W. Grearson, Treasurer; and Lucy E. Dix, Bookkeeper.
The 1940 Barre and Montpelier Directory lists Fred A. Grearson, President; James W. Grearson, Treasurer; Lucy E. Dix, Bookkeeper; James E. Grearson Jr., Employee; and Lloyd Grearson, Employee. Frederick died in 1941. Lloyd was working in a machine shop and when his father, James Jr., asked him to come and help out at G&L he moved to Barre and initially operated a finishing lathe. Lloyd's brother James III was already working at G&L. Lloyd worked some out in the plant but mostly worked in the office - quoting prices and dealing with customers. James III was the mechanic in the plant - getting things done and also operating a finishing lathe. The 1957 Barre and Montpelier Directory lists Lloyd S. Grearson, President; James W. Grearson, Treasurer and Clerk of Corporation; and Lucy E. Dix, Bookkeeper. Lucy Dix, the long-time bookkeeper, never married and devoted her life to her bookkeeping job at G&L. The company used to pay its employees in cash and Miss. Dix would figure the exact number of pennies, nickels, dimes, quarters, dollar bills, and five dollar bills needed and would request these at the bank!
Both Lloyd and James III retired in 1984 and Lloyd's sons Norman and John took over the business. John became president and Norman vice president until G&L closed in 1995. Norman had started at G&L at age 14 repairing the tarpaper roof and sweeping out the office floor. He started full-time after graduating from high school in 1962 and ran a wire saw to dimension the stone for the lathes. When he returned after four years in the Navy, he was taught how to operate the lathes and other equipment by his cousin Maurice (Felix) Goulette (1917 - 2006). Norman believes Goulette was the best lathe operator in Barre. "He did everything perfectly. He was both a craftsman and an artisan." John also started at G&L part-time at age 14 and after graduation from University of Vermont, he worked full-time at G&L - some out in the plant but mostly in the office.
In 1930, G&L like many other Barre granite manufacturers was under financial stress and was acquired by Rock of Ages (ROA). The sale probably involved no transfer of money since it is likely that ROA was looking to ensure the continued operation of a local facility for the manufacture of its turned work and it simply provided working capital when needed. ROA had always been G&L's largest customer. G&L retained its name, management and workforce and apparently operated with considerable autonomy from ROA. In the 1930s G&L specialized in plain and fluted columns and spheres. Circa the late 1940s, ownership was passed back to the Grearson's - again likely with no money changing hands. In 1995, Hillside Stone Products of Barre bought the diamond lathe, business name, and customer base. All of the rest of the old G&L machines were scrapped except for a finishing lathe and disc sharpening machine currently on display at the Vermont Granite Museum. The real estate was purchased by Capital Candy Co. in the late 1990s and the shed was torn down.
Part II of this article will describe the processes and machinery for turning granite at Grearson & Lane.
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