Quarries in the U.S.
Quarries in the United States, former and current, include:
Arizona Cochise Marble Company,
Bowie, Arizona, on-site quarrying, blocks, aggregates, calcium carbonate 99.5%, established 1908 in the Chiricahua Mountains; colors: white, grey, black, blue
Arkansas •
Lake Catherine Quarry, Malvern, Arkansas, NRHP-listed •
Ozark Southern Stone quarry, Elk Ranch,
Arkansas, rich in
dolomite limestone. Opened in 1883 as Eureka Stone Co.
California • Chile Bar Slate company quarry, off of highway CA193 next to the American River near
Placerville, California • Limestone quarry near
Auburn, California of the Mountain Quarries Company of San Francisco, a subsidiary of
Pacific Portland Cement Company, near confluence of the North Fork and the Middle Fork of the
American River. Served by
Mountain Quarries Bridge (1912), NRHP-listed. •
Stringfellow Acid Pits a former rock quarry in
Jurupa Valley in
Riverside County, California, which became a
toxic waste dump and later a
Superfund site. Deemed one of the most polluted sites in California in 1980s, and associated with mismanagement and scandal in the U.S.
Environmental Protection Agency. •
California Granite Company, Rocklin, California, NRHP-listed
granite quarry with historic structures. •
Permanente Quarry, in
Santa Clara County, California, a
limestone and
aggregate quarry and cement plant •
Griffith Quarry, Penryn, California, NRHP-listed •
North Chuckwalla Mountain Quarry District, near Desert Center, California, NRHP-listed. An address-restricted
archeological site in
Riverside County, California Colorado •
Aberdeen Quarry, an abandoned granite quarry in
Gunnison County, Colorado. Its granite was used in construction of the
Colorado State Capitol •
Marble, Colorado, only site of
Yule Marble quarrying, in the West
Elk Mountains. 99.5% pure
calcite, discovered in 1873, source of marble for the
Tomb of the Unknowns and for the exterior of the
Lincoln Memorial Connecticut •
Norcross Brothers Granite Quarry, Branford, Connecticut, NRHP-listed •
Portland Brownstone Quarries, Portland, Connecticut, NRHP-listed, source of much of the
brownstone used in New York City, Boston, Philadelphia •
Luman Andrews House, Southington, Connecticut, NRHP-listed. Identified in 1825 to be a site of blue limestone, suitable for making Portland cement, which previously had to be imported from England •
New England Cement Company Kiln and Quarry, Woodbridge, Connecticut, NRHP-listed
Florida •
Cemex Miami SCL Aggregates Quarry, Miami, Florida, source of
limestone •
Spanish Coquina Quarries, St. Augustine Beach, Florida, NRHP-listed, source of
coquina Georgia •
Burns Quarry, near Carrollton, Georgia, NRHP-listed. Address-restricted archeological site,
NRHP-listed in Carroll County •
Stone Mountain, Georgia, site of granite quarrying from the 1830s. Its granite was used in the locks of the
Panama Canal and in steps to the
U.S. Capitol building. The mountain is known for its Confederate memorial carving started by
Gutzon Borglum and for association with the
Ku Klux Klan revival in 1916.
Hawaii •
Mauna Kea Adz Quarry, Hilo, Hawaii, NRHP-listed
Idaho •
Harvey Mountain Quarry, Bonners Ferry, Idaho, NRHP-listed
Illinois •
Thornton Quarry, just south of Chicago, Illinois. One of the largest
aggregate quarries in the world, long, 0.5 miles wide, and up to 450 feet deep, site of a
Silurian reef. Quarried since 1836. The quarry also acts as an emergency flood control reservoir as part of
Chicago Deep Tunnel project.
Indiana •
Marengo warehouse, in
Marengo, Indiana, formerly a limestone quarry, now one of the largest subterranean storage facilities in the nation, with nearly space. It began as an open pit quarry in 1886 due in part to its proximity to a railroad. Underground
room and pillar mining began in 1936. Leased storage began in 1986. Used by the
U.S. Department of Defense for storage of 10,000,000
MRE meals, by
Bridgestone for storage of 400,000 tires, and by Controlled Pharming Ventures for growing tomatoes and corn. Indiana is the Limestone Capital of the world. Many quarries are located in southern Indiana, including The Empire Quarry, which supplied stone for The Empire State Building. Oolitic Indiana is home to Indiana Limestone Corporation, the longest operating stone quarry in the United States.
Iowa •
State Quarry, Iowa Men's Reformatory, Anamosa, Iowa, NRHP-listed, includes a quarry • T.J. Gipple's stone quarry, near NRHP-listed
Gipple's Quarry Bridge (1893), Columbus Junction, Iowa •
Old State Quarry, North Liberty, Iowa, NRHP-listed •
Quarry, Iowa, site of limestone quarrying in
Marshall County, Iowa. Town was laid out by Le Grand Quarry Company in 1868. Nearby
Quarry Bridge, in Marshalltown, Iowa, is NRHP-listed. •
Stone City, Iowa, site of
Anamosa Limestone quarrying
Kansas •
Quarry Creek Archeological Site, Leavenworth, Kansas, NRHP-listed, a large archeological site of the prehistoric
Kansas City Hopewell culture •
Dennis Quarry, near Onaga, Kansas, NRHP-listed. Address-restricted; a prehistoric
lithic quarry (PDF)
Kentucky •
Mega Cavern, a cavern in
Louisville, Kentucky created by
limestone quarrying over 42 years during the middle of the 20th century. Deemed the largest building in the state, it has and is now used for tourism including zip lines, for storage and other business.
Maine •
Willard Brook Quarry, in
Piscataquis County, Maine, near Chisuncook, Maine, NRHP-listed • Franklin, Maine, granite quarries, in one of which the NRHP-listed
Robertson Quarry Galamander, a customized wagon for stone, was found.
Maryland •
Beaver Dam, Maryland, a now "flooded marble quarry in Cockeysville, Maryland, that has been used as a swimming location since the 1930s. Source of
dolomitic marble known specifically as
Cockeysville Marble for the
Washington Monument in Washington, D.C. and many other purposes in the eastern U.S. •
Greenspring Quarry, now a lake, Pikesville, Maryland •
Heath Farm Jasper Quarry Archeological Site, Elkton, Maryland, NRHP-listed •
Iron Hill Cut Jasper Quarry Archeological Site, Elkton, Maryland, NRHP-listed •
Magothy Quartzite Quarry Archeological Site, Pasadena, Maryland, NRHP-listed,
Quartzite and sandstone quarries of the
Woodland period •
Seneca Quarry, Seneca, Maryland, NRHP-listed, source of
Seneca red sandstone used in two Potomac River canals: the Potowmack Canal (opened in 1802, and officially known as the Great Falls Skirting Canal) on the Virginia side of Great Falls; and the C&O Canal. •
Broad Creek Soapstone Quarries, Whiteford, Maryland, NRHP-listed, active from 1700 to 1000 B.C
Massachusetts • Fall River quarrying,
Fall River, Massachusetts, source of granite for many of 39 textile mill complexes and other local buildings, both before and after 1843 fire. •
Massachusetts Hornfels-Braintree Slate Quarry, Milton and Quincy, Massachusetts, NRHP-listed, archaeological site used from 7,000 B.P. until the early 17th century as a source of
slate and
hornfels used for chipped and ground tools. •
W.N. Flynt Granite Co., in
Monson, Massachusetts, a granite quarry that opened in 1809 and operated until 1935. By 1888, the company employed over 200 workers, and produced about 30,000 tons of granite per year. •
Quincy Quarries Reservation, in
Quincy, Massachusetts, producer of granite from 1826 to 1963, including for the
Bunker Hill Monument. Site of the
Granite Railway, often credited as the first commercial railroad in the United States •
Fletcher Granite Company, operated a
granite quarry that opened in 1881 in Westford, Massachusetts, and in 2009 it owned a quarry in Milford, New Hampshire.
Michigan •
Green Quarry Site, Mears, Michigan, NRHP-listed, "the only known source of Lambrix
chert" •
Pewangoing Quarry, Norwood Township, Michigan, NRHP-listed, site of tool-making from Early
Archaic period through
Late Woodland period • Calcite Limestone Quarry,
Rogers City, Michigan, the largest limestone quarry in the world, now owned by
Carmeuse and operated as
Carmeuse Calcite Operations. Limestone was first mined here in 1912 and continues through the present.
Minnesota •
Clark and McCormack Quarry and House, Rockville, Minnesota, NRHP-listed. Established in 1907, was the source of Rockville Pink granite. •
Grand Meadow Quarry Archeological District, Grand Meadow, Minnesota, NRHP-listed. Site of pre-historic
chert mining. •
Jasper Stone Company and Quarry, Jasper, Minnesota, NRHP-listed. Quarry established c. 1890, an early regional source of
Sioux Quartzite for construction, and since World War I a leading international producer of
silicon dioxide for industrial
abrasives. •
Louis Hultgren House and Sand Pit, Kerrick, Minnesota, NRHP-listed. A
molding sand quarry. •
Pipestone National Monument, in southwestern Minnesota, near
Pipestone, Minnesota, site of quarrying for
catlinite, also known as "pipestone", used by Plains Indians to make ceremonial pipes •
Kettle River Sandstone Company Quarry, Sandstone, Minnesota, NRHP-listed •
Coldspring (company), founded originally as Rockville Granite Company to exploit granite from
Rockville, Minnesota, moved in 1920, to the town of
Cold Spring, Minnesota and becoming the Cold Spring Granite Company. The company became the largest quarrier in the country by 1930. It now has quarries and works in Minnesota, New York, South Dakota, Texas, California and Canada.
Missouri •
Crescent Quarry Archeological Site, Crescent, Missouri, NRHP-listed •
Beaumont-Tyson Quarry District, St. Louis and Times Beach, Missouri, NRHP-listed, archeological sites
Montana •
California Creek Quarry, Anaconda, Montana, NRHP-listed •
West Quincy Granite Quarry, Square Butte, Montana, NRHP-listed
Nebraska •
Nehawka Flint Quarries, Nehawka, Nebraska, NRHP-listed
New Jersey •
M.C. Mulligan & Sons Quarry, Clinton, New Jersey, NRHP-listed, complex of three
limestone quarries •
Houdaille Quarry, a quarry of
basalt in the
Watchung Mountains, in
Union County, New Jersey. It began as the Commonwealth Quarry in early 1900s.
New York •
Dutchess Quarry Cave Site, Goshen, NY, NRHP-listed, "in the Town of Goshen in Orange County, New York. It is midway between the village of Goshen and Florida, at the junction of
NY 17A and Quarry Road (Orange County Route 68), built into the side of a 580-foot (177 m) hill known as Mount Lookout. In the 1960s, archaeologists digging at the site found caves with artifacts left by hunter-gatherers 12,000 years ago, during the last Ice Age. A Paleo-Indian fluted point, a very rare stone tool, was among them.[1] At the time of its discovery it was the oldest such site east of the Mississippi.[2] The site has been at the center of a battle between local archaeologists and the Pleasant Valley-based
Dutchess Quarry and Supply Company, which actively produces
dolomite gravel on the site." •
Tuckahoe, New York, in
Westchester County, first site of large-scale quarrying of
Tuckahoe marble, also known as Inwood and Westchester marble, found in southern New York state and western Connecticut as part of the
Inwood Formation •
Walcott–Rust quarry, in
Herkimer County near
Russia, New York, a fossil quarry whose fossils supported the first definitive description of
trilobites' soft appendages.
North Carolina •
Mount Airy, North Carolina, known as "The Granite City", and site of NRHP-listed
North Carolina Granite Corporation Quarry Complex, "the world's largest open faced granite quarry". It has been quarried since 1743 by the
North Carolina Granite Corporation and predecessors. •
Barron County Pipestone Quarry, near Doyle, Wisconsin or Rice Lake, Wisconsin, NRHP-listed. "Several tribes have used rock from the quarry to create ceremonial pipes. Historically, various tribes would travel long distances to acquire the special red-colored stone found in the quarry.[2] A widespread legend among the tribes is that the stone gets its color from the flesh and blood of their ancestors." •
Bass Island Brownstone Company Quarry, in Lake Superior, near La Pointe, WI, NRHP-listed. Source of
brownstone for buildings in Chicago, IL and Milwaukee, WI •
Walczak-Wontor Quarry Pit Workshop, near Cataract, Wisconsin, NRHP-listed. Address-restricted archeological site. •
Krukowski Quarry, a
sandstone quarry near
Mosinee, Wisconsin. It yields late
Cambrian period fossils, in the course of quarrying rock slabs for countertops and other purposes. •
Quasius Quarry, in
Rhine, Wisconsin near the
Sheboygan River, NRHP-listed. A
limestone quarry and
lime kilns for producing
quicklime, built in 1911 and abandoned in the 1920s.
American Samoa •
Lau'agae Ridge Quarry, Tula, AS, NRHP-listed, "a prehistoric stone quarry on the eastern side of the island of
Tutuila in the United States territory of American Samoa" •
Tataga-Matau Fortified Quarry Complex (AS-34-10), near the village of
Leone on
Tutuila in
American Samoa, NRHP-listed, "a complex consisting of a series of basalt quarries and structures that archaeologists have interpreted as having a military defensive purpose. The site has been known since at least 1927, and was first formally surveyed in the 1960s. Features of the site include extraction pits, from which basalt was quarried for the manufacture of stone tools and weapons, as well as domestic features such as grinding stones. Archaeologists in 1985 noted that some of the sites features were, including trenches and terracing, were made in areas that were unsuitable for the production of stone tools, and closely resemble known military defensive structures in other areas of the Samoan islands.
Marianas •
Rota Latte Stone Quarry, MP, NRHP-listed, also known as the As Nieves quarry, located near the
Chamorro village of
Sinapalo on the island of
Rota in the
Marianas Islands. The prehistoric megaliths found there are believed to have been used as foundation pillars for houses." Is this same or different than the source of stone pillars for
House of Taga on
Tinian island? ==See also==