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Sandstone
Quarry is located
within the Scenic Loop Drive area about two miles from the BLM
Visitor Center.
This part of
Red Rock Canyon is the trailhead for the Calico Tanks and Turtlehead
Peak. It is very easy to get to as it is about 500 yards from the
parking lot.
It is an interesting place to visit because it was created at a time
when Las Vegas was first incorporated. The purpose of this place was to
quarry 10 ton blocks of sandstone. This was to become a building
material.
Unless they had in mind building pyramids, these huge blocks were to
have been further cut into smaller stone somewhere else.
The mine operated from
1905 to 1912 as the Excelsior Stone Quarry. The on-again, off-again
operation employed as many as 15 men at one time.
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The 10 ton blocks were cut so that they could be transported to Las Vegas using the 'Big Devil
Wagon'. This
frightful locomotive-like behemoth could haul 20 tons of cut stone on a single
trip. The odd looking contraption also burned about 400 gallons of crude oil per day.
Unfortunately for the Excelsior company, the mine had to be abandoned due
to the cost of using this machine. Probably also due to a lack of demand
for weak sandstone. |
Fortunately for posterity, it never occurred to the management at
Excelsior to cut the stones into finished product at the site, thus making
it possible to hual the stone using other, less expensive means.
The green line measures 36 inches. These blocks are very large and would
require at lot of labor manage.
It does not look as though too much material was removed from this quarry.
Today it is just an interesting and odd kind of place that deserves
mention. Had this quarry been successful, how much of Red Rock Canyon
would be left today?
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