GLENMONT’S STONE QUARRIES

April 4, 2008

Glenmont is a peaceful community surrounded by seven hills. Over the years these hills have been very important for Glenmont’s economic growth in that some of the hill slopes and ridge tops were covered with large blocks of sandstone that did not require much stripping. Sandstone of all sizes, therefore, could quite easily be quarried out. Thus began the quarrying operations in the town of Glenmont.

The first stone quarry of Glenmont was owned and operated by the Purdy Brothers. This original quarry was located on top of a hill on the south side of S.R. 520 a short distance east of the Glenmont community. A two-track slanted trolley was built as a bridge across the road with a steam engine cable system to lower large stone slabs to the south side of S.R. 520 where they were cut and hewn into finished products. The first items produced by the Purdy Brothers were grind stones and large mill stones. After a time sandstone blocks used for buildings and bridge culverts were quarried. As early as 1857, stone taken from the Purdy Brothers Stone Quarry was used to construct Glenmont’s St. Peter and Paul’s Catholic Church.

In 1917 Robert Blum, a stone cutter from Amherst, came into the area searching for a particular stone for residence construction. He found what he wanted in the quarry at Glenmont and went back to Amherst and made arrangements to buy the quarry from the Purdy Brothers. Blum named his new company The Briar Hill Stone Company; a name suggested by a sales agent after tramping through the briars on a hill nearby the quarry. Robert Blum’s son, Harold, came to manage the business in 1920; Harold’s brothers Elmer and Chester joined him in 1923. Since stone cutting was a highly skilled work and no local people were prepared to do this, stonecutters from Amherst were brought into Glenmont for this job. These workers hand finished and dressed the sandstone with a hammer-like tool. Business was flourishing for Briar Hill during the 1920s and 30s, which helped the area get through our country’s Great Depression. After a while when the stone work business got slow, Briar Hill also made metal furnaces for Bryant Heater of Cleveland and then got a contract from the government to make military tank parts. By the 1950s Briar Hill was working quarries not only in Holmes County, but also in Coshocton and Knox counties. The various quarries now provided decorative sandstone in a dozen or so different colors as well as the sturdy, gray construction sandstone.

Eventually the stone quarries were sold again. In 1986 the Briar Hill Stone Company was purchased by another company that nearly bankrupted the whole quarrying operation. Currently the Scioto Stone Company owns this stone firm in Glenmont and the quarrying activity is back in business again. It is of considerable historical significance, however, that the Glenmont stone quarries have been in continuous operation, under various owners, since the mid 1800s.

Early Purdy Brothers Stone Quarry   Purdy Brothers Stone Quarry   Briar Hill Quarried Stone	Purdy Brothers Stone Quarry   Briar Hill Quarried Stone   Shipping Briar Hill Quarried Stone

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