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Thread: Chapel Hill N.C. ?

  1. #11
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    https://randolphhistory.wordpress.co...tstone-quarry/

    Found this is anyone lives near there.

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    Steve56 (10-27-2016)

  3. #12
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    Quote Originally Posted by rideon66 View Post
    https://randolphhistory.wordpress.co...tstone-quarry/

    Found this is anyone lives near there.
    It's quite a drive for me, being in Knoxville, but I'd like to try it sometime. As soon as the leaves fall (soon) but before it gets winter would be a good time to go.

    Cheers, Steve

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    It would be cool only I think it would probably be a wild goose chase. So it turns out Roy went to school there and I am sure being who he was and going there had a friend who got him a better idea of where to look. Plus it is not what it was back then so I would think either it is gone and developed or the clues like the old road are gone. I looked long and hard online and came up with nothing but his article and stuff related to it or other quarries. Based on him having a hard time finding it with all the info he had. I don't think I would have much luck. He had an old map with the quarry listed on it with a road near by. I don't think that road is there anymore. So with this article being as old as it is and no one else ever finding it since then and writing about it, I would guess the chances are slim of actually locating and being able to access it.

    Plus it sounds like an oil stone. I don't like using oil stones much. I also don't have a way of grinding it down which would take a lot of work.

  5. #14
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    I was wrong. I did find this. Which is in this. http://tradingpath.org/pickard.pdf

    On a spring day in April of 2006, I was stan
    ding in my driveway when an SUV with
    UNC decals rolled up. Two students got out,
    indicating that they were looking for the
    McCauley whetstone quarry. It
    seems that one of their fathers is a collector of antique
    tools and had a copy of a 1983 article in
    Mother Earth News
    which described an amazing
    whetstone quarry outside of Chapel Hill. They had a fragment of the 1891 Tate map of
    Orange County which indicated that the qua
    rry was nearby, most likely on the hillside
    above Dairyland Road near my private road.
    I sent the students on to my best guess at
    the location. I knew nothing about a quarry
    but eventually found the article which
    contained the reproduction of the map, and disc
    overed that it was an excerpt from a book
    written by Roy Underhill. He is the famous
    craftsman with red suspenders who shows
    weekly on PBS as the host of the “The Woodw
    right’s Shop.” Roy spoke of a “tattered
    map” on the wall of his shop, his attempt to
    find locals who might know of it, and his
    locating a report published in the
    American Journal of Science
    for 1828. That report on
    the geology of North Carolina by a UNC profe
    ssor spoke of this quarry as “the most
    valuable bed that I have met with,” and pr
    ovided specific landmarks. Roy eventually
    found the quarry, and wrote that it produced
    “as good a stone as I had ever used” for
    sharpening and honing
    tools and blades.
    10
    I contacted Tom Magnuson who became interest
    ed, and with his cartographic skills,
    pinpointed the probable location of the quarry
    on a topographic map. He and I stumbled
    around on the overgrown ridges, ev
    entually finding the greasy
    blue stone likely to be
    excellent for honing, as well as a worked “co
    re” or arrowhead, and
    probable deposits of
    rhyolite. The latter is a
    stone favored by Native American
    s for points and tools. Tom
    noted the coincidence of rhyol
    ite in the near vicinity (one-half mile) of the Lower
    Trading Path (on my property), a pattern wh
    ich has been noted elsewhere and suggests
    the historic presence of Native Americans.
    Matthew McCauley, presumably associated
    with the quarry, was one of the very early
    settlers in the ar
    ea (1750s), became a
    prominent citizen, and was an officer in the
    local militia during the Revolutionary War.
    He “established a large holding on Morgan’s Cr
    eek, where he had a mill and a blacksmith
    shop” (
    Orange County—1752-1952
    by Lefler and Wager). One suspects that
    McCauley’s mill was actually considerably further downstream on the creek.
    In 2001, Bill Burlingame placed a cons
    ervation easement with Triangle Land
    Conservancy on these 26 acres. The easement
    protects the property in perpetuity from
    subdivision and development and ensures that
    most of the acreage will remain “forever
    wild.” Over the past few years a number of
    properties in the Pickard’s Mountain Natural
    Heritage Site have been protected with c
    onservation easements. The mountain is now
    essentially ringed with protected properti
    es—although there are se
    veral critical pieces
    which are not yet conserved. The current c
    onservators include Tim Toben (Pickard’s
    Mountain itself), Bob and Chris Nutter of Ma
    ple View Farm (extensive adjacent forests
    and Morgan Creek), Everett and Lewis Cheek
    (a lengthy portion of Morgan Creek), Bill
    Burlingame (Morgan Creek), Nicholo and Caro
    lyn Sartor (property
    adjoining Pickard’s
    Mountain), and Dr. Charles Ke
    ith (an arboretum and the southern approaches to
    Pickard’s Mountain). It was to accompa
    ny the documentation of my conservation
    easement that this brief and incomplete history was originally drafted.

    Oh and here is the map. https://www.loc.gov/resource/g3903o.la000590/
    Last edited by rideon66; 10-27-2016 at 01:36 PM.

  6. #15
    Senior Member Steve56's Avatar
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    Has anyone tried Google Earth? Maybe we can see it before we go?

    Cheers, Steve

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    Ok so it still makes no sense. Pickard's mountain is on the wrong side of hillsborough road in the new map campared to the old map and the rivers are off too. This is not a simple compare maps type of thing.

  8. #17
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    My giess would be the road has been rerouted? They do that onece in a while.

    Cheers, Steve

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    I thought that too, but Morgans creek is also on the wrong side of it vs the old map.

    Quote Originally Posted by Steve56 View Post
    My giess would be the road has been rerouted? They do that onece in a while.

    Cheers, Steve

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    Ok So I think I located the property, but it is still some 26 acres and up a private road on private property. If this is correct. Looks like even the newer article is off on road names and such. I guess things keep changing. It puts me on the correct side of the creek though.

  11. #20
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    I was also concerned that the site was not accessible/on private property. And if you did visit the site, there's no guarantee you could find a good stone without some additional research and testing.

    Other than a local curiosity, it would probably be better to visit the Ouachita Mountains in Arkansas. I think those deposits are much larger and likely more accessible. I've thought about that too just for hoots.

    Cheers, Steve

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