nothin New Haven Independent | Quarry Finds Its “Gruve”

Quarry Finds Its Gruve”

Sally E. Bahner Photo

Steeped in history, the Stony Creek Quarry is experiencing a renaissance, an artistic renaissance.

While it is still a working quarry, with 50 of its 400 acres owned by the town of Branford and leased to Douglas Anderson since 2006, it has also been a venue for the arts since 1995.

Sally E. Bahner Photo

On the first day of fall, the quarry was the setting for Izzy Gruve, the frog mascot for the group. The concert was led by composer and pianist Istvan B’Racz and company, whose percussive dialogues and spoken words echoed off its granite walls.

The afternoon included guided tours of the quarry and a history of the quarry presented by First Selectman Anthony Unk” DaRos, who described himself as a fourth generation quarryman, working in the rigging process; the riggers work with the derricks in lifting the granite out of the quarry pit.

It was all part of the kick-off for a greater effort, The Quarry 2013 project, described as a quarry spectacle of light and sound” and produced by Projects for a New Millennium (Projects 2K) under the direction of Joy Wulke. That project is expected to take place a year from now; fundraising efforts are in progress. Wulke said its name will reflect the Terra theme of her previous events.

Wulke has been the creative director behind many other Stony Creek- and Branford-based projects that combine art, music, science and the environment. The high granite walls of the quarry act as an amphitheater; it’s a setting for spectacular light and sound effects.

Wulke is an award-winning sculptor, whose multimedia work combines art and architecture. Her projects have been commissioned throughout the country.

Sally E. Bahner Photo

Referring to the Sept. 22 event, Wulke said, I think the musicians made it happen … they were collaborating with the stone.”

She added that the music was heard differently within the quarry; it provided different relationships with the stone and people were moving about to hear it from various locations. About 65 people were scattered within the quarry, some along the quarry floor, others on the ledges and upper rim.

It was like playing in Camp Quarry!” she said.

Wulke said the original inspiration for these events came through collaboration with a laser artist in New York City. He wanted to do a laser chronometer (a time piece) of the North Star and she wanted to do a sundial. From there, it’s evolved to more than a dozen events locally, 10 in Branford alone.

Sally E. Bahner Photo

B’Racz, Wulke’s longtime collaborator, described the performance as a mish-mash, semi-improvised.” Izzy’s presence is in the barely distinguishable frog sounds that were recorded and incorporated from the Continuum production.

Tom Burnett performs keyboard and vocals; he read his poetry at the event. He and his brother Jamie, who does lighting, are longtime members of the ensemble. Joining them were percussionists Thomas Kozumplik and Lorne Watson. 

Now on this September day the granite walls acted as a resonance chamber for the performers. A percussionist was stationed on a ledge at each end of the quarry pit; chimes were played in the middle on the quarry floor. They spoke” back and forth, simply, and the sound reverberated throughout the quarry-scape. Percussionists stationed at the top of the quarry joined in, along with a recorder and the words of Burnett, the poet musician.

Sally E. Bahner Photo

It all reached a crescendo, and then ended like it began with the simple exchange of the drums and the chimes. The acoustics were unique.


A SHORT QUARRY HISTORY

DaRos, in his introduction, said quarry work was the fabric of the community.” The quarry veins extended into Guilford, where a quarry was run by the Beattie family. Click here

for a presentation on the history of the quarry this spring.

He said the quarry was designated as Red Hill (the Stony Creek Red Granite Company) after the Civil War; the Klondike area was the first area developed. It was purchased by the Norcross Brothers in the late 1800s. He said that 400 men worked in the quarry at its peak. They lived in nearby boarding houses and hotels. DaRos said his mother cooked for the workers.

Eleven guide derricks were used in the process. At 135 feet tall, they were the tallest in the world at the time. It was like a like a spider web,” he said.

Quarry work was started and stopped because of too much pressure within the fissures of the stonework. In addition, a strike at the end of the 1930s stopped production. Workers wanted a 10-cent-per-hour increase and management refused to accommodate them. As a result, they walked out, leaving their tools and equipment behind.

When Sam Castellucci bought the quarry in the mid 1950s, the tools were found as they were left at the time of the strike.

Sally E. Bahner Photo

DaRos said few old men worked in the quarry since many developed consumption,” also silicosis or black lung disease.

In the 1970s and 80s, the quarry produced about six saw blocks, each weighing 20 to 24 tons, per week using steam-powered derricks. Today, it’s more of a crushing operation, said DaRos.

DaRos explained that on the Rockwell hardness scale, the granite is a seven (diamond is 10), and there are different kinds of granite within the quarry – the harder granite is in another area within the quarry.

Darrell Petit, a sculptor who works with natural stone and lives in Stony Creek, considers the quarry an essential part of his life and work. He is an expert in how stone is formed as well as in how to quarry stone and he delivered a talk about the stone as he led folks on a tour during the afternoon events. He is also the project manager for the Stony Creek Quarry Corporation. 

In this latest chapter in the life of the Stony Creek Quarry, Petit said in a subsequent interview that the quarry is involved in numerous Stony Creek Granite Block cut-to-size projects. They include the interior lobby of the East Campus Residence of Columbia University in New York City, the redesign of the Javits Federal Plaza project in lower Manhattan, The Battery Conservancy in lower Manhattan, the facade restoration of the Newark Museum and scores of others. 

Stony Creek granite is world renown. It is the granite on which the Statute of Liberty sits and its stone makes up the two towers of the Brooklyn Bridge. Petit said the legacy continues.

On this day the quarry provided a unique setting for musicians whose sounds echoed against its soaring walls. 

Among the Quarry Spectacles and Branford events:

• 1995: Visualization of Time, also at the Stony Creek Quarry, a laser light collaboration of 19 different participants
• 1996: Along Shore at Branford High School
• 1997: A Celebration of Branford Waters, a recognition and appreciation of the Sound and river waters and community with environmental groups, historians, musicians, astronomers and poets
• 1999 Terra Continuum at the Stony Creek Quarry, a light, theater and sound project with audience participation that told the story of human inquiry
• 2001: Terra Lumina at the Stony Creek Quarry, most likely the best-known event that has taken place there, featuring choreography, light and athleticism
• 2002: Terra Alchemica at the Stony Creek Quarry in which participants collected clues about the geological events that created the quarry, highlighted by site-specific sculptural installations
• 2005: Terra Mirabilia, If Rocks Could Dream at the Stony Creek Quarry, a 10th anniversary celebration of the Quarry Terra Series featuring laser, theatrical light, fire mist, dance, poetry and more
• 2009: Branford Luminata, on the Branford Town Green, which combined the town’s history and its relationship to industry and the natural resources of Connecticut
• 2010: Water Wonders also on the Branford Green

Click here for more information on Projects2K.

Marcia Chambers contributed reporting for this story.

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