1. From the Travels of Peter Kalm as quoted in Edwin J. Hipkiss, Eighteenth-Century American Arts: The M. and M. Karolik Collection (Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1941), p. 96.
2. Unpublished manuscript, “Ores, Minerals and Geology of Montgomery County,” Montgomery County Historical Society (hereafter cited, MCHS), Norristown, Pennsylvania, p. 25.
3. Curt Chinnici interview with Earle Spamer, Geologist and Archivist for the Academy of Natural Sciences, Philadelphia, Pa., August 30, 2001. For a detailed analysis of Pennsylvania limestone, see Jocelyn Kimmel, “Characterization and Consolidation of Pennsylvania Blue Marble with a Case Study of the Second Bank of the United States, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania” (master’s thesis, University of Pennsylvania, 1996).
4. The quote is taken from a lecture given by Professor Henry Carvill Lewis (1853–1888) at the Franklin Institute and published as The Surface Geology of Philadelphia and Vicinity (Philadelphia, c. 1881). The lecture was “Read before the Mineralogical and Geological Section of the Academy of Natural Sciences of Philadelphia, November 25th, 1878.”
5. According to John Oldmixon’s British Empire in America (1708), the first North American limestone was quarried at Letitia Penn’s manor, Mount Joy. This quarry was probably in the vicinity of Port Kennedy. William J. Buck, History of Montgomery County Within the Schuylkill Valley (Norristown, Pa.: E. L. Acker, 1859), p. 37: “The census of 1840 shows the lime then manufactured in Montgomery County at about one third of that produced in the entire country.” For more on the lime burning industry, see Heinz J. Heinemann, The Lime Industry at Hope Lodge (Fort Washington, Pa.: privately printed, 1990).
6. Gerhard Troost, Geological Survey of the Environs of Philadelphia Performed by the Order of the Philadelphia Society for Promoting Agriculture (Philadelphia: H. S. Tanner, 1826), pp. 9, 10.
7. Ibid.
8. Sean Patrick Adams, Partners in Geology, Brothers in Frustration: The Antebellum Geological Surveys of Virginia and Pennsylvania (Baltimore, Md.: Genealogical Publishing Co., 1998). This book describes in depth the political and scientific worlds that coexisted when the Rogers brothers were working as state geologists during the mid-nineteenth century. Henry Darwin Rogers, Geological Survey of Pennsylvania (Philadelphia: J. B. Lippincott, 1858), p. 215.
9. Charles E. Hall, Catalog of Specimens, Second Geological Survey of Pennsylvania (Harrisburg, Pa.: Board of Commissioners for the Second Geological Survey, 1883), pp. 135, 139.
10. Several other tombstones and altar tombs in the churchyard are made of highly figured limestone, and their colors are typically dark gray and bluish gray. Altar tombs, which were common in the eighteenth century, consist of a large inscribed slab raised on four piers of stone or brick. Occasionally the sides are enclosed, but those in this churchyard are open.
11. Edwin Troxell Fredley, Philadelphia and Its Manufactures (Philadelphia: E. Young, 1867), p. 362: “Less than twenty-five years ago, all Marble was sawed by the friction of a saw without teeth, aided by sharp sand, pushed backward and forward by manual force. Now, Marble is sawed, rubbed and polished by steam power; and a block of Italian Marble has been converted into four hundred superficial feet of slabs in twelve hours.”
12. The Marble Worker’s Manual, Designed for the Use of Marble Workers, Builders, and Owners of Houses, translated by M. L. Booth (Philadelphia: Henry Carey Barid, 1865). “Planishing [is]...the process of giving a smooth finish to metal surfaces by a rapid series of overlapping, light hammerlike blows, or by rolling in a planishing mill” (Academic Press Dictionary of Science and Technology, <www.harcourt.com/dictionary>).
13. Unpublished manuscript, “Pennsylvania Marble Quarries Chronology c. 1714–1997,” MCHS. Excerpts from this paper appeared in articles by Edward Hocker in the Norristown Times Herald in 1930.
14. In July 1730, Anthony Wilkinson charged Captain Bignell (or Bicknell) £4.4 for a six-foot lion figurehead for the ship Tryall. The vessel was jointly owned by Samuel Powel, Jr. and Clement Plumstead (Powel Family Business Papers, Joseph Downs Library, Winterthur Museum.) Philadelphia joiner John Head credited Wilkinson £1.11.16 for a “marvel harth” on March 8, 1734 (Jay Robert Stiefel, “Philadelphia Cabinetmaking and Commerce, 1718-1753: The Account Book of John Head, Joiner” [Philadelphia: American Philosophical Society, 2001]). On November 22, 1739, the Pennsylvania Gazette reported: “MASONRY in all its Branches, is performed by WILLIAM HOLLAND, Mason, lately from London, viz. Marble Chimney Pieces, Grave Stones, Mortars, Tables, Monuments and Steps, Pavements of all Kinds, Hearths, &c. to be had at his Shop in Water Street, next Door to Mr. Stephen Beezley’s, Philadelphia. N. B. The above mentioned W. Holland is now at New York, fixing some Works for a Gentleman of that City, wherefore this is to desire all Gentlemen and others, to apply to Mr. Anthony Wilkinson, Ship Carver in Philadelphia, until he return, which will be in 14 Days from the Date of this Paper (if God permit)” (as cited on <www.accessible.com>). Unless otherwise noted, all eighteenth- and early nineteenth-century newspaper advertisements cited in the footnotes are from this database. South Carolina Gazette, March 22, 1740, as cited in The Arts and Crafts in Philadelphia, Maryland, and South Carolina, 2 vols., compiled by Alfred Coxe Prime (1929; reprint, New York: Da Capo Press, 1969), 1:163. Pennsylvania Gazette, May 21, 1741, as cited in Prime, comp., Arts and Crafts, 1:163.
15. For more on this Philadelphia cabinet shop, see Luke Beckerdite, “An Identity Crisis: Philadelphia and Baltimore Furniture Styles of the Mid-Eighteenth Century,” in Shaping a National Culture: The Philadelphia Experience, 1750–1800, edited by Catherine E. Hutchins (Winterthur, Del.: Winterthur Museum, 1994), pp. 254–81, figs. 9–15, 22–30, 33, 37–39. Brian Wilkinson also advertised marble and stonecutting, although the date when he began this business is not known. In the December 19, 1774, Pennsylvania Gazette, Brian Wilkinson and Son oVered “chimney pieces of all kinds” and “Marble Stone cutting...in all its branches” (as cited in Prime, comp., Arts and Crafts, 1: 311).
16. For Irish influences on Virginia furniture, see Ronald L. Hurst and Jonathan Prown, Southern Furniture, 1680–1830: The Colonial Williamsburg Collection (New York: Harry N. Abrams, Inc. for the Colonial Williamsburg Foundation, 1997), pp. 305–8; and Ronald L. Hurst, “Irish Influences on Cabinetmaking in Virginia’s Rappahannock River Basin,” in American Furniture, edited by Luke Beckerdite (Hanover, N. H.: University Press of New England for the Chipstone Foundation, 1997), pp. 170–95.
17. William MacPherson Hornor, Jr., Blue Book: Philadelphia Furniture (Philadelphia: privately printed, 1935), p. 61. Pennsylvania Gazette, January 4, 1739. On May 18, 1738, the Pennsylvania Gazette reported: “This is to Certify that Mr. Joseph Claypoole, Joyner, has left oV his Trade; and has given his Stock and Implements...to his son [Josiah]...who has Removed...to the Joyners-Arms in Second-Street...where all Persons may be supplied with all Sorts of...Desks,...Chests of Drawers,...Dining Tables, Chamber Tables,... Tea Tables and Sideboards; he having the largest and oldest Stock of Timber in the Province, some of which have been in Piles near 25 years,...and a fine Sortment of the newest fashioned Brass Work Furniture, lately imported from London (as cited in Prime, comp., Arts and Crafts, 1:162, 163).
18. An early sideboard table formerly in the collection of Mrs. Lamont du Pont Copeland and another example with a history of descent in the Waln and Ryerss families (see Hornor, Blue Book, pl. 131) have cyma-shaped rails (the shaped sections are attached to flat inner rails). The latter table also has an applied skirt with relief carving.
19. The end rails of this table are similar to those on a high chest signed by Henry CliVton and Thomas Carteret and dated 1753 (Colonial Williamsburg Foundation). Furniture historian Alan Miller was the first scholar to suggest that this table was a product of their shop.
20. The Marble Worker’s Manual, pp. 52–54.
21. As cited in Hornor, Blue Book, p. 146.
22. For more on Nicholas Bernard and Martin Jugiez, see Luke Beckerdite, “Philadelphia Carving Shops, Part II: Bernard and Jugiez,” Antiques 128, no. 3 (September 1985): 498–513.
23. Pennsylvania Gazette, July 16, 1752 (Peters); Pennsylvania Gazette, May 15, 1755 (Stanaland); Pennsylvania Packett, December 19, 1774 (Brian Wilkinson and Son) (from Prime, comp., Arts and Crafts, 1:311); Pennsylvania Gazette, May 10, 1780 (Chambers); Pennsylvania Gazette, April 6, 1785 (Stiles); Porcupine’s Gazette, August 22, 1798 (Payne). David and William Chambers provided stone work for the Philadelphia townhouse renovated by John Cadwalader and his wife Elizabeth (Lloyd):

Receipt for stone work for John Cadwalader, 1770, Cadwalader Collection, series 2 box 2, ch-cl, Winterthur Museum Library, Joseph Downs Manuscript Collection. William Payne reported that he was a marble mason from London and the “ORIGINAL INVENTOR and PATENTEE of the much improved SOAP-STONE STOVES.” He informed “his Friends and the Public, that they may be supplied with the above stoves, either plain or embellished with American or Italian Marble. Those stoves can be adapted to any size chimney, or attached to the most elegant chimney-pieces without interfering with the design, and are allowed to be an ornament to the handsomest drawing room....Likewise on hand, for sale, several new and secondhand American and Italian marble chimney-pieces ornamented and plain—Where also may be had, monuments, head and foot-stones, press...stones for printers, &c.” (Porcupine’s Gazette, August 22, 1798).
24. The information on James Traquair is derived from an article on him in the September 26, 1798, issue of Porcupine’s Gazette, as cited in “Pennsylvania Marble Quarries Chronology” and excerpts from that chronology published by Edward Hocker in the Norristown Times Herald (Edward Hocker, Collection of Norristown Times Herald Articles [MCHS, 1947], pp. 4, 5).
25. Ibid.
26. John Cole apparently took over the day-to-day management of Wilkinson’s stone cutting business following the latter’s death in 1765. In the April 4, 1765, issue of the Pennsylvania Gazette, Cole advertised “the marble cutting Business...in all its several Branches, at the Shop late occupied by Mr. ANTHONY WILKINSON, deceased; where all Persons that please to favour me with their Custom, may depend on having their Orders obeyed, with care and Dispatch.” Peter Fritz acquired quarries formerly owned by Wilkinson before 1832. For more on Fritz and his business, see Edwin T. Freedley, Philadelphia and Its Manufacturers (Philadelphia: Edward Young, 1859), pp. 360–66.
27. Freedley, Philadelphia and Its Manufactures, pp. 360–66: “The Fritz Quarry, recently purchased by the Pennsylvania Land and Marble Company, is an old quarry, and has produced a very fine white and blue variegated marble, known as the ‘Pennsylvania Clouded,’ formerly much used for mantels and chimney-pieces in old Pennsylvania houses of the better kind.” The Charter and By-Laws of the Pennsylvania Land and Marble Company (1854) reported:

As quoted in Freedley, Philadelphia and Its Manufactures, p. 362. An original copy of this document is in the Historical Society of Pennsylvania. The white marble was wrought from the Hitner quarries of Marble Hall near Barren Hill, and the less expensive black and blue marble was from the Lentz Quarry. Rogers, Geological Survey of Pennsylvania, p. 21.
28. William J. Buck, History of Montgomery County Within the Schuylkill Valley (Norristown, Pa.: E. L. Acker, 1859), pp. 63, 64.
29. See “Pennsylvania Marble Quarries Chronology,” p. 8. Thomas U. Walter, “Girard College Contracts and Diary, 1833–1836,” unpublished manuscript, Philadelphia Athenaeum, series 3.
30. “Pennsylvania Marble Quarries Chronology,” p. 8.
31. Samuel Sloan, Sloan’s Architectural Review and Builder’s Journal, July–December 1868 (Philadelphia: Claxton, Remsen & HaVelfinger, 1868–1870).
32. Foust and Weaver Account Book 1854–1861, account book n, 339, Historical Society of Pennsylvania.
33. See Freedley, Philadelphia and Its Manufactures, pp. 363, 364.