antebellum stone work

Quoted text begins."...what tools would have been used and the process for incising
stone during the colonial and antebellum periods."
End of quote.

Rachel,
I am a sculptor who has worked in stone for about thirty years, and I am
also the curator of a collection of antique hand tools (approximately
8,000 tools) that is on display at a small museum affiliated with
Reinhardt College in North Georgia. Though the examples we have on
display
( http://www.dondougan.homestead.com/files/toolgal_a_.jpg
and
http://www.dondougan.homestead.com/tp.gif )
are factory-made tools from the late nineteenth century, I have
researched numerous other collections and can tell you that the tools
used for hand-carved lettering in stone are pretty much the same as they
were 300 years ago (or 1000 years ago for that matter -- the tools used
for carving stone in ancient times were virtually the same, except prior
to the introduction of iron chisels the carver would have used chisels
made of the hardest metal available: copper).

There would be minor variations in the tools used depending on the type
of stone being worked -- i.e., soft stones (slate and soft limestones or
sandstones) might be worked with mallet-headed chisels struck by wooden
mallets while for harder types of stone (marble or - more rarely-used in
that time period - granite) would be worked with steel chisels and iron
or steel hammers. Almost all the stone-carving tools prior to
mid-nineteenth century or so would have been hand-forged by a blacksmith,
though their general appearance would be very similar to the later
factory made varieties.

For images of tools and techniques there is a wealth of historical
research material either posted or linked to on the site of one of the
other list contributers, Peggy Perazzo:
http://www.cagenweb.com/quarries/

If I can answer your more specific questions I will be glad to reply to
you off-list.

Don Dougan
dondougan@--------
http://www.dondougan.homestead.com/indexdd.html