American Naturals?

I know this may be a rather naive question but I'm wondering if there are American natural stones that may be right under our eyes but ignored by the honing community. One of my other past hobbies was flintknapping and I've seen a lot of different native stones that are both extremely fine texured and hard. Of course there are the Arkansas stones (novaculite) but there are also many many other native cherts that just beg to be tried as hones. I'm thinking of stones like Indiana hornstone, Burlington chert, Texas chert, Flint-Ridge chert, etc. These range from fine texured to very fine to almost glass-like. Has anyone tried or heard about results from using these? I'm no geologist so I may be barking up the wrong tree entirely.
Edit:
(I just realized I posted this in the wrong place. Would a mod please move it to Hones? Thanks.)

Where could a person resource these stones IOT try them for honing?

:thinking::hmmm: I live about 15 minutes away from Flint Ridge state park here in Ohio. May have to go for a hike this weekend and keep an eye out.

Many of these stones can be purchased from flintknapping suppliers. Google will show plenty. When using this stuff for flintknapping it seems expensive but if it was suitable for hones it would be really cheap compared to just about any other hone material. If it worked, and that's the really big "if."

The way I see it, there is no "if". There are undoubtedly lots of different stones that would work. Abrasives are not at all rare. The only question is, are they homogenous enough to safely abrade the very thin steel of a razor blade?

You have to keep in mind, the currently known abrasive stones got that way due to historical reasons, not necessarily geological ones. The Japanese hones, for example, were discovered because there used to be a TON of wars here, and they went through a lot of bladed weapons that needed to be very sharp, as well as the very strong cultural dependence on good carpentry (almost all buildings were wooden) which depends on sharp tools.

Europe has a similar history, the use of Coticules apparently goes back to Roman times.

That kind of history just wasn't as strong in North America, so people didn't look so hard...but it's a big continent, with a lot of geological diversity. Surely something somewhere would work.

I'm a knapper too. fort Payne would undoubtedly be a goo hone.

I am not a knapper, but I am a arrow head hunter, and have a very nice collection, which means I speak rock... :)
I live in Northern Oklahoma and we have a popular chert called "Kay County Chert" I have thousands of pieces of it in my flower bed (yeah I pick up the flakes) some of them are a bit larger. I don't think they would work well as I would compare them to my transulcent and surgical black hones or even Washita hones, which I have tried on my razors, yeah I guess over time they would work ok, but very very VERY slow.
Cherts by nature are very hard which would be the reason our native american history use them as tools. not to sharpen tools. (yeah I know we can talk about native amercians using them to sharpen other tools as well, but that is different)

We do have sandstone/slate in the US. I think that type of material would be better than a chert/flint type.

I have some nice big slabs of Kentucky Hornstone and some smaller slabs of a quartz material (the name eludes me just now) that feel as if they would be high grit to my fingers. I might try them out, especially if I can source a rock saw to saw out some hones from the round slabs.

As a quick test, I marked the edge of a new knife with a sharpie and tried 3 different natural cherts. All 3 removed the ink very quickly. these stones feel just as fine as my chinese 12K and my Naniwa 12K to my fingers. I plan to try them on my razors as they need touch up in the future. As mentioned earlier in this thread, these stones would be as cheap as the chinese 12K and seem to be likely polishers to my way of thinking.

I have always wondered about Oregon...THe terrain is the same a Japan...Gotta wonder if the stone has some simularities also....You know that whole continent breaking apart thing...

I'm very interested in exploring this question. I need to get together with someone who has a rock saw to cut these slabs into useable hones. the hornstone and quartz will undoubtedly work as fine finishers, and the fort payne will be useful as a coarser hone, probably in the 1000 grit range. flint Ridge is very glass like, but might be a finisher, I don't know. Obsidian is glass, so it would not be useful... too bad, as I have several hone like slabs already cut and chamfered! the hornstone is very interesting, though, and I'm convinced it would be very useful as a finishing hone. I would be willing to send a piece of hornstone to one of the honemeisters to evaluate; some of the other materials also, just to get an expert opinion.

One native stone that is mentioned in some past threads but hasn't been talked about since really is the Hindostan hone. I think it was also called an Indiana orange stone. I found one at an antique store, but I don't have enough experience to say much about it. I've PM'ed someone , and posted a question to thread, but as of yet, no luck. Hopefully, eventually somebody will let me know their opinion of it. I did have one person say to lap it and it was good to go. Feels like glass to the touch, and took 4 hours to lap. I'll use it til someone with some experience tells me otherwise. A finishing stone isn't in the budget.

If you think about all the different types of stone we have in this country, it is like thinking of life on other planets.... some of them HAVE TO be good hones, and some have to be good finishers. It is just a matter of trying them out and identifying them.

I have a "Deer Lick Oil Stone" made from "Washita Grit" from somewhere in the USA. I can't read much of the rest of the label except for "made from only the finest...." Even though it's labeled as an oil stone, I cleaned it up and gave it a whirl as a water stone and got an absolutely incredible edge, when the stone was used as a finisher. Better than my PHIG, which I thought gave a super smooth edge before trying this one. Bought it off ebay for about 15 bucks.

I've found some harder slate that I've tried out. Came in around 4-6K, but once and a while it would turn up an inclusion...so I filed it to the circular file. I'm sure that there is SOMEWHERE here in the States that a finisher can be turned up.

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Originally Posted by shooter74743

I've found some harder slate that I've tried out. Came in around 4-6K, but once and a while it would turn up an inclusion...so I filed it to the circular file. I'm sure that there is SOMEWHERE here in the States that a finisher can be turned up.

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Correct me if I am wrong but i thunk I read that the best finishers come from volcanic ash that settled and slowly got hot with pressure over time. Instead of things like chert which have high heat and kind of half melt the stone.

So I guess we need to think about what geological area the good stuff comes from and see if the U.S. has similar.


Are there any experts out there? I only have an associates degree in WIKI :)

Here some info i found on the net any ideas??
This guide to the locations of potential whetstone sources is adapted from a list published in the Annual Report of the Geological Survey of Arkansas for 1890, volume 3, Whetstones and Novaculites of Arkansas, by L.S. Griswold. I have not attempted to correct any of the misspellings of the locations given here for fear of. doing more harm than good. Your state geology department should have more detailed records for your own area. Good hunting!

Alabama. Sandstone is quarried near Eldridge, in Walker County.

Arkansas. "A quarry of this mineral [novaculite], three miles above the Hot Springs of Washitaw, has often been noticed by travelers for its extent and excellency of its quality" (Henry R. Schoolcraft, 1819). Lower Silurian novaculite is found in the following counties: Garland, Hot Spring, Howard, Montgommy, Pike, Polk, Pulaski', and Saline.

Dakota. Sandstone is found near Buffalo Gap in Custer County and schist near Tigerville in Pennington County.

Georgia. There is novaculite in Lincoln County on a low hill two miles from the Lincolnton courthouse, projecting nearly vertically from the ground over an area of four or five acres. It is strawcolored to greenish white. It is also found near Graves Mountain. A nother whetstone grit is found in McDuffie, Heard, Troup, Oglethorpe, and Meriweather counties.

Indiana. Hindostan quarries were opened about 1840. Two stones are quarried, one a shoemaker's sandstone and the other a very finegrained, compact sandstone, used chiefly for whetstones by carpenters, mechanics, and others. These are found in Orange County, French Licks 9, and Orangeville 2.

Maine. Novaculite is found in abundance near the forks of the Kennebec, eighty or ninety miles from Hallowell Silurian novaculite is found near Phillips and Temple in Franklin County. There is Huronian serpentine novaculite on Little Deer Island and Western Island in Hancock County. Sandstone may be found at Nutter's Head in Washington County and Cambrian novaculite at York in York County.

Maryland Cambrian novaculite is found on the Patuxent River, near the road to Washington, Anne Arundle or Prince George counties.

Massachusetts. The vicinity of Boston furnishes compact feldspar analogous to the Turkey stone. This lower Silurian novaculite slate of Middlesex County is found near Cambridge, Charlestown, Concord, and Malden. In Bellingham, 22,800 mica schist whetstones were manufactured in 1838. In Essex County, Silurian novaculite is found near Nahant. Lower Silurian mica schist was worked commercially prior to 1841 at Enfield, Norwich, and Cummington in Hampshire County. Other novaculite slates are found in Norfolk County at Dedham, Milton, and Quincy and in Suffolk County at Brighton, Brookline, and Dorchester.

Michigan. Huronian novaculite slate is found at Carp River and Teal Lake in Ontonagon County and at L'Anse in Baraga County. Sandstone is found in many places in Huron County.

Mississippi. There is good sandstone on Big Bear Creek in Tishamingo County.

Missouri. Sandstone is found in many places in Randolph and Barton counties, at Pierce City in Lawrence County, and at O'Bannon's quarry in Madison County.

New Hampshire. A fine-grained stone from Lisbon in Grafton County was known as the "chocolate." Those from Orford came from the shore of Indian Pond and were sold under the "Indian Pond" brand name. Other Grafton County stones are found at Littleton, Haverill, and Piermont. A Silurian novaculite is found at Tamworth in Carroll County,

New York. There is Silurian and Cambrian novaculite slate in Columbia County at Clermont, Germantown, Greenport, Livingstone, Rogers Island, Stockport, and Stuyvesant. There is sandstone at Labrador Lake in Cortland County and Beaver Kill River and Monticello in Delaware County. Silurian whetslates are found in Rensselaer County.

North Carolina. The stones from McPherson's quarry in Chatham County, five miles west of Woodin's ferry on the Haw River, have a finer and softer grit than McCauley's. They are bluish and yellowish white. On the Salisbury Road in Randolph County, near Deep River, is a bed of a similar kind, highly valued by the inhabitants. Other fine stones are found at Barbee's mill, two miles south of Chapel Hill, on the Flat River in the eastern part of Person County to the narrows of the Neuse, and near Wadesboro in Anson County.

Ohio. Sandstones are found at Berea in Cuyahoga County, Amherst in Lorain County, Hocking River in Hocking County, Manchester in Summit County, and Farmington and Mesopotamia in Trumbull County.

Pennsylvania. Lower Silurian sandstone is found in Berks County at Oley. Cambrian micaceous sandstone is in Delaware County at Avondale, Darby Creek, Marple, Township 2, Springfield, and east of Swarthmore. Cambrian mica schist is in Chester County at Hayes's quarry on the Newlin Township line and in the m iddle of th e co u n ty.

Rhode Island. The Geology of Rhode Island in 1840 reported production in Smithfield of six to eight thousand dozens of whetstones. Mica schist is found one-half mile northeast of Woonsocket village, extending a mile southwest.

South Carolina. Huronian novaculite is found in Abbeville a nd Edgefield counties and on Turkey Creek in Chester County.

Tennessee. There is sandstone near Knoxville and on the French Broad River a mile above Dandridge in Jefferson County.

Vermont. There are oilstone quarries on an island in Lake Memphremagog. The island is about seven miles west of Stanstead Village. One quarry is now entirely under water and the other partly so. These were large quarries with stones of good repute. There is Cambrian novaculite slate at Thetford in Orange County and at Guilford and Marlborough in Windham County. Huronian mica schist is in Windsor County at Ludlow, Plymouth, and Stock-bridge. Cambrian mica schist is found in Newport, Trasb u, and Brownington. There is Huronian talcose schist at Northfield in Washington County and mica schist at Berkshire and Fairfield in Franklin County