The Fulton County news. [volume] (McConnellsburg, Pa.) 1899-current, 1900-12-06
QUEER USES FOR CANNON BALLS.
Condemned ms War Weapons, But Ali
Right in Stone Ouarries.

Right In stone Quarries.
Cannon balls for blastlngr'
This sign hung in conspicuous
place before the door of n store I'm
Atlantic avenue led a reporter inside
and started bit of questioning upon
the subject, says the Boston Globe.
The proprietor said: Last fall when
the United States Government sold
all of the old cannon balls and solid
shot which for so many years were
piled In pyramids along the main
street of the navy yard at Charlestown
we purchased lot of them with little
thought of converting them into any
thing besides pig iron. But a few
weeks after we had stored them here
overheard a quarry owner complain.
ing Of the slowness and uncertainty
of the old system of steel wedglng used
in getting out huge blocks of granite.
and after bit of thought suggested
the use Of cannon balls in the place of
the steel wedges. We sent about TWEEN.
ty of various sizes and weights out
to his quarry, and after the first trial
he hurried team In here with q note
that read:
Tried the cannon balls; they are
1t. Send fifty more; have thrown the
steel wedges away
"The experience of this man led us
to send the cannon balls and solid shot
to other quarry operators, and within
the last month the orders have been
coming in so thlckly we can scarcely
fill them from the stock on hand.
"The method used In getting out
great cubes or monoliths from the
granite and marble quarries has been
to drive steel wedges along the line of
the lower portion of the split made
by blast until the great chunk of
stone topples over on its face.
at required a deal of time and
number of men with big iron sledges
and steel wedges to separate these
cubes from the quarry wall from
which they had been started by the
blast
'The method now pursued with the
cannon balls Is to start the block of
stone away by slight blast, and then
between the quarry face and the block
several of the smaller solid shot, usual
ly the four-inch Sort are dropped down
into the aperture. Two men with
crowbars give the block little shake,
and the instant the block moves in
the slightest manner forward, the shot
takes up their purchase ON the space
made, when the large cannon balls
some measuring fourteen or fifteen
inches and weighing 200 or 800 pounds
are dropped into the top of the gap
Now the slightest outward jar by lev.
ers on the big stone sends these heavy
cannon balls dropping downward of
their own weight, until, with an easy
forward movement, the cube goes over
on its face.
"These shot do away with any drlv.
ing; of necessity their great weight In
proportion to their size forces them
downward, and their form prevents
any chance of backward setting of the
block.
"These cannon balls are also used
as rollers, as they take up and go over
the inequalities of the quarry surface
and can be rolled in any direction
without resetting, thus doing away
with the old style wooden rollers.
"They are also used to smother
heavy clearing-out blasts. Heavy rope
mats are thrown over the surface
where the blast has been set and these
cannon balls are thrown on the mats"