A few more stoneyard scrapbook photos from the many we have received. Thanks to all for digging into the boxes on the top shelf to come up with these.
Lately we have had the good fortune to receive a multitude of photographs from the cutters and carvers. We also have had the pleasure of speaking with and exchanging emails with many of you. I will tell you that the majority of this has been due to the hand of Jose Tapia, and we thank him. While it will take us some time to organize and archive the abundance of material, we thought we should share a sampling of the snapshots in the Stoneyard Scrapbook II.
Thank you to Jose Tapia, Gabriele Hiltl-Cohen, Linda Peer, Eddie Pizarro, Timothy Smith, Amy Brier, and Angela Garcia (Angel Escobar’s daughter) for sending these photos for the Stoneyard Scrapbook II.
Before a stone gets to a banker mason, it gets to the machines. In the setting out shop the stone is added to the saw schedule based on the construction drawings. A job ticket is also prepared and sometimes a zinc template. Therefore saw schedules and job tickets were an integral part of the stone cutting process at the Cathedral.
The work on the tower was divided into 10 zones, A, B, C, D, E, F, G, H, I, J, K, and FP. Each zone had a North, South, East, and West elevation and stones were prefixed with the orientation and zone letter. The first stone listed above, NC 112, denotes a particular stone on the North elevation of C zone. It indicates it is a base stone with its overall dimensions. The zones were logical or manageable divisions. The “A” zone started at the cornice/roof level and ended at the top of the columns at the start of the gablets. The “B” zone comprised the gablets and terminated at the cornice where the “C” zone began comprising the sill/weathering courses and window elements.
Job tickets were created in the setting out shop at the same time as the templates and schedules. They were issued to the stone cutters and sometimes sawyers when they started on a stone. The ticket would usually have a sketch of the finished piece along with the overall dimensions. It also provided a record of who had worked the stone and when.
When we first visited the Poets’ Corner, we saw John Everett “Fud” Benson (left above) cutting the letters on the wall of the “corner”, in 1983-84. It is located in the Arts Bay of the nave. Since then we have heard from John Benson and also his son Nick. They identified the letter cutter on the right above, as Brooke Roberts. Brooke, who worked for the John Stevens Shop for 7-8 years and then went on his own, is now retired. Mr. Benson, retired also, said they spent about a month on the wall. He added that they cut the floor plaques for a year or so until the Cathedral found internal talent to do those plaques. He remembered Nick Fairplay. Simon Verity is also reported to have cut some of the floor plaques. We now return to the Poets’ Corner to learn more about who cuts the letters.
The letter cutting of the floor plaques became a permanent contribution about 20 years ago for Chris Pellittieri. Chris became an apprentice at the Cathedral about 30 years ago.
Chris attended the Cathedral school, so he knew the place and saw the early stoneyard operation. After college he chose to apply for an apprenticeship rather than continue in his degree field of mathematics. He also became an Artist-In-Residence of the Cathedral and works in New York as a professional stone carver and teacher.
Audre Geraldine Lorde was born on February 18, 1934, in New York City, and went on to become a leading African American poet and essayist who gave voice to issues of race, gender and sexuality. Lorde’s love of poetry started at a young age, and she began writing as a teenager. She attended Hunter College, working to support herself through school. After graduating in 1959, she went on to get a master’s degree in library science from Columbia University in 1961. She is the latest writer to be honored in the Poets’ Corner of the Cathedral, established during the time of Dean James Parks Morton.
