A Cornerstone of Freedom

Image: © M J Richardson Taken: 7 Sep 2007

An intriguing feature in a flower bed on the Embankment at Bedford. Bedford, Indiana, is the headquarters of Indiana Limestone, great quarriers of Bedford limestone for the whole of the USA. The company is still extant, but its website records its foundation in 1926, which does not sit well with this stone, presented in 1948, recording the centenary of its foundation - perhaps an earlier incarnation. Update June 2012 - a brochure obtained during a recent visit to Bedford, Indiana, says that commercial quarrying in the area began in the 1820s; demand for stone increased in the 1870s to replace wooden structures in Boston and Chicago destroyed by fire, and the number of quarries doubled between 1889 and 1895; limestone cladding of early skyscrapers kept the industry going, but post WWII architectural styles reduced the demand for limestone and many quarries did not reopen after the war. The use of stone has become fashionable again and many modern buildings in Indiana and further afield are being clad in the fine grey oolitic limestone from the area.

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