Rutland, The Vermont Marble Museum, July 29

Vermont is known for it's marble quarries and the little village of Proctor houses one the largest, if not the largest marble exhibits in the US.  The village of Proctor is just a few miles from Rutland where we were boon dock camping so off we went to see the displays of marble.  The museum was excellent and they were having a special with roll back prices to 1978 so the admission was $1.00.  Wow!

The entrance to the museum:

This is an example of antique Verdi marble.  This chunk weights over 18,500 pounds.

There is a small sculpture garden near the entrance.

Danby Marble is one of the whitest marbles and is excavated in Vermont.

I didn't realize there were so many different colors of marble.  I always thought all marble was white or close to white.  Below are examples of white marble and black marble originating in Vermont.

The museum features the Hall of Presidents.  There is a sculpture of each president with a description of his birthplace and who the first lady was for that particular president. Did you know some First Ladies were not wives but nieces or daughters even though they were married?

This is a close up of one of the sculptures.  Since I am originally from California, its only fitting that I took a picture of Nixon. There were none from Nevada.

The Tomb of the Unknown Soldier was also made out of Vermont Marble. A huge block of white marble was cut from the quarry.

These are just some of the products that are made from marble which includes calcium and sodium bicarbonate. In addition it is used in paint and dry wall mud.  The Vermont Marble Company which was a family owned company  was bought out by OMYA.

These samples of marble looked like art work to me.

Alan Dwight has been the resident sculpture for 30 years.  His studio is full of sculptures and he was more than happy to talk about how he develops a sculpture from a piece of marble.

This piece reminded me of a piece of cut wood.

This sculpture was brought to the marble factory many years ago and was left for repair but never reclaimed.  It reminds me of a large Hummel.

There are examples of marble and granite everywhere in Rutland and the surrounding villages, even the curbs are made out of granite.  Churches and schools are made out of blocks of marble and granite and even some bridges.  Now that I have learned a little about the material I will be on the look out as we travel through Vermont.