page_title: Tennessee marble
section_title: History
hierarchical_section_title: Tennessee marble / History
caption_attribution_description: English: Train carrying blocks of Tennessee marble quarried at the John M. Ross Marble Quarry (now known as Mead's Quarry) in Knox County, Tennessee, United States
context_page_description: Tennessee marble is a type of crystalline limestone found only in East Tennessee, in the southeastern United States. Long esteemed by architects and builders for its pinkish-gray color and the ease with which it is polished, this stone has been used in the construction of numerous notable buildings and monuments throughout the United States and Canada, including the National Gallery of Art and the National Air and Space Museum in Washington, D.C., the Minnesota State Capitol, as well as parts of the United States Capitol in Washington, Grand Central Terminal in New York, and Union Station in Toronto. Tennessee marble achieved such popularity in the late-19th century that Knoxville, the stone's primary finishing and distribution center, became known as "The Marble City."
  While Tennessee marble is not true marble, its crystalline nature lends it a strong resemblance to marble, especially when polished. The stone occurs in belts of Ordovician-period rocks known as the Holston Formation, and is quarried primarily in Knox, Blount, Loudon, Union, and Hawkins counties.
context_section_description: As early as the late 18th century, Tennessee marble was being harvested for construction purposes, most notably for the Ramsey House on the outskirts of Knoxville and the "Old Stone House" near modern Friendsville. Visitors to East Tennessee were reporting the existence of marble beds in the region as early as the 1810s, and state geologist Gerard Troost provided an extensive description of Tennessee marble deposits in an 1831 report to the Tennessee General Assembly.  The Rogersville Marble Company, founded in 1838, produced monuments and furniture from Tennessee marble extracted from a quarry in Hawkins County.  Marble Hall, a house built by the company's director, Orville Rice, contained numerous Tennessee marble interior elements, and acted as a showplace for the company.
  In 1850, Governor William Trousdale chose the Rogersville Marble Company's marble as the state's representative stone for the construction of the Washington Monument.  During this same period, marble from Hawkins County, either from Rice's quarry or a rival quarry south of Rogersville, was used in U.S. Capitol extension projects (William Dougherty, the construction superintendent for the Washington Monument, was instrumental in obtaining the marble).  Transporting the quarried blocks out of the region presented a major challenge for these early companies.  Mule teams, often led by local African American entrepreneurs, carried the blocks to the Holston River, where they were loaded onto flatboats and transported downstream.
  By the early 1850s, at least two marble quarries were in operation in Knox County, one of which supplied marble for parts of the Tennessee State Capitol. The arrival of railroads in the region, namely the predecessor lines of the East Tennessee, Virginia and Georgia Railway, provided a major boost for the industry, and helped Knox County overtake Hawkins as the region's primary quarrying and production center.  The industry was also aided by an infusion of northern capital in the years following the Civil War.
  In 1873, federal architect Alfred B. Mullett used Tennessee marble for Knoxville's Post Office and Customs House, sparking a nationwide curiosity in the stone. Mullett acquired the marble from a quarry at Forks-of-the-River, where the Holston and French Broad rivers join to form the Tennessee River east of Knoxville.  After the building's completion, businessman George Ross and several associates organized the Knoxville Marble Company to assume control of this quarry, and provided marble for the construction of the Mullett-designed Customs House in St. Louis during the mid-1870s.  Following Ross's death, his son, John M. Ross, became president of the company.
  By 1882, eleven Tennessee marble quarries were in operation in Knox County alone.  This number had doubled within a decade, as the rising popularity of Neoclassical architecture brought about a rapid increase in demand for marble. Knoxville, the industry's chief financial and production center, became known as "The Marble City" during this period and even included a marble mining derrick on the Knoxville flag. The community of Concord, located west of Knoxville, became a key marble transloading center, where blocks were transferred from boats to rail cars for transport out of the region.  By 1885, Concord was home to ten marble-related companies.
  Ross eventually sold the Forks-of-the-River quarry to the Baltimore-based W.H. Evans Company, which had opened a large marble finishing mill in Knoxville.  Ross then purchased a quarry in the Island Home area of South Knoxville.  In 1898, he sold this quarry (later known as the "Mead Quarry") to the Republic Marble Company, which had been operating quarries near Concord and Luttrell throughout the previous decade. Republic had been founded by Knoxville Iron Company executive William S. Mead (1833–1908), and at the time was managed by his son, Frank S. Mead (1864–1936). Though Republic purchased Ross's business interests and was subsequently known as "Ross-Republic," John M. Ross continued operating independently, opening a quar
caption: Marble blocks being loaded onto train cars at what is now Mead's Quarry in 1895
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