Limestone Country

Limestone Country

*This article first appeared in Volume 6, Issue 1 of “The Crossing’s News” - the predecessor of the Friends of Schoharie Crossing Newsletter

   Driving around the central Mohawk Valley, you can’t help but notice all the stone buildings. Houses, stores, churches... so many built from limestone blocks. Look more carefully and you will notice old bridges, canal locks, and railroad abutments made from the same stone. Why the abundance?

   The central “limestone zone” includes all of Montgomery County, roughly Amsterdam to Little Falls. Most of the limestone in this region was laid down about 450 million years ago during the Ordovician Age, when almost all of North America was covered by a shallow sea. The remains of prehistoric invertebrates sank to the bottom and turned into calcium carbonate, or limestone. The latest continental collision formed the Adirondack Mountains and a series of fault lines running northeast and southwest. These fault lines exposed subterranean layers of older stone.

   Throughout Montgomery County there are remnants of the 19th Century quarries including one owned by the Wemple Family along Queen Anne Road in Fort Hunter. Limestone is relatively easy to quarry because stresses in movements of the earths crust cause vertical joints to cross through the planes to create natural breaking lines. Limestone can then be cut into blocks and used as building material.

   At Schoharie Crossing you can see the crudeness of the cutting techniques at the East Guard Lock, whose limestone blocks were once (allegedly) a part of Queen Anne’s Chapel, which was built to accompany Fort Hunter. Looking at the locks at Schoharie Crossing from the enlargement phase of the Erie Canal (Yankee Hill and Empire Lock), you can see how the cutting technology [and “dressing” of the stone had] advanced by the 19th century. By 1840 steam engines were used to cute the limestone with wire. The result is clean cut blocks of equal dimensions.

   

 
   **This was inspired by an article, “Mohawk Valley Stone” which appeared in the Spring 2003 issue of Mohawk Valley Heritage magazine. Some edits were made to the original article.**