1. What color is the limestone? How does it feel?
2. Do you see any fossils in the foundation or on the walls?
3. Why do you think Indiana limestone was used for this building?
4. Look for the cornerstone carving. It's the date it was started in 1930. Do the carvings show any type of erosion?
5. Post a picture of yourself (face not required) or a personal item with the limestone.
History
McGuire and Shook designed a neo-Gothic facility. Gothic architecture became popular in the 12th century, first in France and then England and other European countries. This architecture is best associated with various European cathedrals and castles, many of which still stand. Limestone, like that used on the Rushville Public Library, was the most common building material for Gothic structures.
Representatives from the Bloomington Limestone Company showed samples to the library board, showcasing “split-faced” limestone, which was selected to adorn the building.
In August of 1930, builders laid the cornerstone and on January 16, 1931, the Bedford limestone (aka Indiana or Salem) library opened!
The Bedford limestone was brought via train from the source to a half block away from the library where it was unloaded. 2/3 of the library is Bedford limestone and the other 1/3 is just yellow brick. Many people think the yellow bricked part was built on later, but no, it was all built in 1930. So I'm guessing they ran out of money or resources to have it all in limestone.
Way earlier history!!
Fossils occur in blocks of the 330-million-year-old Salem Limestone, a rock unit that formed in a warm, tropical sea. At that time, most of the land mass now known as North America lay south of the equator. Shallow, clear water covered the area that stretches from present-day Nebraska to Pennsylvania. A myriad of organisms swam and crawled about this placid sea. When they died, their bodies settled to the sea floor, over time solidifying into a 90-foot-thick stone menagerie. This homogeneous matrix of corpses formed a rock that cuts cleanly and evenly in all directions.
Wave action from long-still tides shattered most of the shells, but many organisms persist and stand out. A unicellular animal known as a foraminifer, which lived in the ooze and muck of the sea floor, is common in this limestone but hard to see, even with magnification. Dotted throughout the walls, and easily discernible, are the poker-chip-shaped stems of crinoids, an extinct relative of starfish, and half-inch-long bryozoans, a sedentary animal that formed colonies of Lilliputian-scaled apartment complexes patterned like Rice Chex cereal. Many shell fragments come from pelecypods, the group that includes oysters, clams, and scallops. A rare find is a perfectly formed half-inch-long snail shell, which resembles a tiny swirled dunce cap.
Salem Limestone is one of the most commonly used building stones in the world. Over the past century, quarries in Indiana have sent this stone to the Metropolitan Museum of Art, Empire State Building, Grand Central Station, Dallas Museum of Fine Arts, San Francisco City Hall, and innumerable buildings in cities and towns from coast to coast.