Bass Island Brownstone Company Quarry
a.k.a. Basswood Island Quarry
N of La Pointe on Basswood Island, La Pointe, WIThe opening of the Basswood Island Quarry in 1868 signaled the beginning of the brownstone industry in northern Wisconsin. Though active quarrying lasted little more than thirty years, Lake Superior brownstone achieved, in that short time, a lasting reputation as a strong and particularly attractive building material.
After many months of prospecting, Almson Sweet and his exploration party chose a site at the southeastern tip of Basswood Island to commence quarrying activities. The Bass Island Brownstone Company was established to quarry and market the stones. Docks and buildings were built and machinery was brought to the island. A census in 1870 showed nineteen people, mostly of Irish descent, employed at the quarry. The stone was "cut by channelers, in two directions, and then wedged off along the bedding plane to the desired thickness." These cuts were usually eight to ten feet deep. Channeling was preferred to blasting, as the stone often broke and shattered during the latter process. The Basswood Island Quarry did not have facilities for sawing.
Proposed for use in the Milwaukee County Courthouse, the stone of the Basswood quarry was subjected to extensive testing to determine its structural capability. The results were favorable, and the first stones produced by the quarry were used in the construction of that imposing Renaissance Revival building (now demolished). Other buildings known to have been built of Basswood Island brownstone include the old Chicago Tribune Building, the Forest Home Cemetery Chapel in Milwaukee, designed by Ferry and Clas, and St. Paul's Episcopal Church, also in Milwaukee, a National Register property.
The growing popularity of the steel frame building and consequent use of lighter materials, coupled with the economic recession of 1893, halted the operation of the Basswood Island Quarry. Other quarries in the area continued to supply brownstone for buildings throughout the mid-west until the market disappeared in the early twentieth century.
Listed in National Register of Historic Places in 1978.
The National Register of Historic Places is the official list of the Nation’s historic places worthy of preservation. Authorized by the National Historic Preservation Act of 1966, the National Park Service’s National Register of Historic Places is part of a national program to coordinate and support public and private efforts to identify, evaluate, and protect America’s historic and archeological resources.