Tuckahoe marble

Federal Hall (1842) in Manhattan is constructed of Tuckahoe Marble.

Tuckahoe Marble is a high quality marble first discovered in 1822 in the town of Eastchester in Westchester County, New York. The marble is from the larger "Inwood Formation" or "deposit", which stretches in a northeasterly direction from mid-Manhattan through southern Westchester. The marble is characterized scientifically as a dolomitic marble and varies in color from a light gray to light green, to a bluish white or brilliant white. A distinctive characteristic is the medium-to-coarse size of the calcite and dolomite particles that primarily compose the stone, which often contains minor amounts of hematite and pyrite. Oxidation of these iron-bearing minerals causes certain varieties of Westchester marble to turn orange-brown when the stone is exposed to weather.

History

Tuckahoe Marble Quarries exhibit

The vast majority of the early residential and commercial buildings in New York were constructed with wood while government and institutional buildings and mansions of the wealthy were often built of brick or stone. Locally quarried Manhattan schist and sandstone from the lower Hudson Valley were typically used before marble became more popular. By the late 18th century, marble was being produced by a number of quarries in northern Manhattan and along the Hudson River in Westchester. The most well-known quarry that supplied stone from the deposit was located in the area now known as Tuckahoe. This "Tuckahoe marble" was nearly pure white in color and considered by many to be of the highest grade.

White Tuckahoe marble supplied the early United States with a building material suitable for the neoclassic architecture popular in America's early public buildings. Tuckahoe Marble was the single most important white marble deposit in the country until the latter part of the 1800's when the extensive, high quality marble deposits of southwestern Vermont became more available after the rise of the railroad. Quarrying of Tuckahoe Marble ceased in 1930.

Buildings and structures

Tuckahoe marble was used to construct the burial vaults at the New York Marble Cemetery (1830) and the New York City Marble Cemetery (1831), both repositories of influential and prominent early citizens. The list of local buildings constructed of Tuckahoe marble is long and includes:

• Colonnade Row/LaGrange Terrace (1832), NYC
• Marble Schoolhouse (1835), Eastchester, New York
• Federal Hall Manhattan, 1842
• A.T. Stewart Company Store (also known as the Sun Building; the "Marble Palace") Manhattan, (1845-46)
• General Post Office (now the Hotel Monaco) Washington, DC (1842)
• Brooklyn Borough Hall, (1849)
• Tweed Courthouse Manhattan, (1861-72)
• Washington Square Arch Manhattan, (1891)
• St. Patrick's Cathedral Manhattan, (1858-78)
• Grace Episcopal Church New York, (1846)
• Marble Collegiate Church Manhattan
• Union Baptist Church New Rochelle, (1904)
• Immaculate Conception Catholic Church Eastchester, (1911).

NB: An asterix (*) denotes "Tuckahoe marble" specifically.

See also

• Torres, Louis (1976), Tuckahoe Marble: The Rise and Fall of an Industry in Eastchester, New York, 1822-1930; Harrison, N.Y., Harbor Hill Books.
• Urquhart, Gordon Ross (1986), The Architectural History of the Westchester Marble Industry; Unpublished Master's Thesis, School of Architecture, Columbia University.
• Ware, Robert Lamb (2001), A Comparison of Fresh and Weathered Marble from the Tweed Courthouse: A Thesis in Historic Preservation Presented to the Faculties of the University of Pennsylvania in Partial Fulfillment of the Requirement for the Degree of Master of Science; University of Pennsylvania.

See also

• List of types of marble