This is Throwback Thursday #41. In these, we look back into the past at ESCONI specifically and Earth Science in general. If you have any contributions, (science, pictures, stories, etc ...), please sent them to [email protected]. Thanks!
-----------------------------------------------------
Today, we will revisit Flashback Friday #40. It was posted originally as a Lemont Quarry trip in 1952. But, after some digging, it seems to be a field trip to the Western Quarries Co in Lemont, IL on November 19th, 1950. Here is the announcement in the November issue of the newsletter.
FIELD TRIP TO LEMONT QUARRY - SUNDAY, NOV. 19 OBJECT: TRILOBITES
To reach quarry, follow Main Street from Downers Grove, south to Lemont, cross railroad tracks and turn left 4/10 mile to Shell gas station, then cross tracks on left and turn right. following rim of lake and continue 1-1/2 miles over winding rough road to Western Quarries Co. shack. Foot path leads to old quarry which is reached by wood stairs. Trilobites are found by prying up slabs of dolomite rock from floor of quarry. Tools recommended: small crowbar, hammer, chisel, and safety goggles. Meet at the quarry at 9:30 AM.
There is the field trip report in the December 1950 issue. It sounds like they has a good day.
TRILOBITES OR BUST
That could very well have been the nae of our last field trip of the season because trilobites was the one and only thing we went after Sunday, November 19th. to the Naval Quarry near Lemont. About twenty turned out and did we find trilobites! One member gave away several to less fortunate members and still carried home 18. And everybody had lots of fun. Harry Nelson of Riverdale and Steve Norvell of Western Springs had maybe the most fun of all working as a team on the basis of one for you and one for me. They really turned up a lot of the little beasties. These trilobites were of the Calymene niagarensis (Silurian) type ather than the Bumastus trentonensis (Ordovician) type found in Thorton Quarry on the Sept. 24th trip. Many specimens had excellent detail.
As usual, we had some visitors, and mighty glad we were to welcome them. They included Mr. and Mrs. Pierce of Geneva and a lad named Lage from Downers Grove who walked off with the prize of the day, a curled-up trilobite.
Not sure where Western Quarries Co. was located in Lemont, but there were a few Western Stone Co quarries in Lemont. The company was in business from the mid 1800's until it was dissolved in 1925. There's a bunch of good historical information on this page. There doesn't seem to be many clues to find the exact locality they visited. It sounds like it was an abandoned quarry in 1950.
The Keepataw site was part of the vast holdings of the Western Stone Company, “the largest company of its kind in America,” according to Unrivaled Chicago: Containing an Historical Narrative of the Great City's Development and Descriptions of Points of Interest, published in 1896.
The quarrying of limestone throughout the Des Plaines River Valley dates to the 1830s and 1840s when excavation of the I&M Canal between Chicago and LaSalle-Peru revealed extensive outcroppings of dolomite limestone. The formation of this valuable stone is described in the online publication, Architectural Resources in the Lemont Historic District. “Four hundred million years ago, Illinois was submerged under a Silurian sea where the shells of microscopic plants and animals accumulated and eventually formed strata of rock. In the Des Plaines River Valley, expanses of smooth-textured rock of the Sugar Run Dolomite lay just beneath shallow topsoil. Dolomite is a calcium-magnesium carbonate rock with properties very similar to limestone. Generally harder and finer grained than ordinary limestone, its suitability for building was recognized, and it began to be quarried in the 1830s. The excavation required for the building of the I&M Canal, which opened in 1848, uncovered additional stone beds. Local contractors were awakened to the potential richness of high-quality stone that could be so easily removed. Buff white when freshly quarried, dolomite can be polished to a smooth finish and was marketed as ‘Athens Marble’ and ‘Joliet Marble.’”
The popularity of dolomite as a building material grew during the 1850s as the I&M Canal and expansion of railroads facilitated transportation of the stone. “ … Joliet and Lemont, and to a lesser extent, Lockport, (became) prime suppliers of limestone to Chicago,” notes a report titled Historic Documentation Record, Western Stone Company prepared by the Illinois State Toll Highway Authority and written by Karen Poulson. “As local historian Fayette B. Shaw has written, ‘by the beginning of … 1856, there were 8 quarries being worked in and around Joliet, the smallest of which employed 5 men, the largest 48.’”
...
Meanwhile, in 1905, Madden was elected to the U.S. Congress. Madden devoted more and more time to Washington, and by the time of his formal retirement from Western Stone in 1915, the end of the company was near. The Keepataw site, along with other properties, was sold off in 1918, and in its annual report of 1920, the company stated, according to Poulson, that it “had not actively engaged in operation of its plants for some time.” A Superior court decree formally dissolved the company on February 16, 1925. Throughout the years that followed, the property passed through a number of owners, including Vulcan Materials Company, which reportedly sought to resurrect quarrying operations in the 1960s and 1970s.
Remnants of another sort were discovered during an archeological survey by the Will County Historical Society in 1972. Called the Bluff Site because of its proximity to Bluff Road, this area once contained housing for Western Stone Company employees. Building foundations and artifacts from the period – doll parts, clay marbles, fancy glass, tableware and serving dishes – indicate that these were family dwellings comprising a “job town” from the period 1890-1910.
According to the Historical Society report, these houses were of Swedish construction and were one and one-half story frame structures with a tar paper roof. “The ground floor was a combination living room and kitchen without a partition, and the second, or half-story, was a sleeping loft. The structure would have peaked out at 15 feet in height.”
Here are the photos from the original post.
Calymene niagarensis (Silurian)
Bill Allaway, first president of ESCONI, is wearing the fedora and Helen is seated next to him.
