Robert G Heft:
Born Saginaw, Michigan 1941.
Died December 12, 2009
Bob Heft was born in Saginaw, Michigan, but his parents separated when he was a year old, and he went to live with his grandparents in Lancaster, Ohio. He grew up there, and, years later, he pinpointed his love for the American flag to his years in the Boy Scouts.
During his junior year, Heft’s American history teacher, Stanley Pratt, gave the class an assignment to create a project that illustrated their interest in history. The 17-year-old Heft gravitated toward an idea involving the American flag. He knew Alaska, and soon afterward Hawaii, were likely to join the union, so he planned to design an American flag featuring 50 stars.
Heft graduated high school in 1960 and worked as a draftsman for an industrial company. He was there the day he received a phone call from President Dwight Eisenhower. Ike told him his design had been accepted to replace the 49-star flag that had briefly served as America’s official flag after Alaska’s but prior to Hawaii’s admittance to the union.
It’s estimated that more than 1,500 people offered designs featuring a 50-star flag and several produced the same star pattern that Heft had. Yet, he was given credit for the design, which became the nation’s official banner on July 4, 1960.
The Lesson:
Facing the Elements
In order to serve their primary purpose — that of commemorating the dead — gravestones must be able to remain in good condition for many years, generally without any maintenance. Because they are located outdoors and are thus subject to a wide range of environmental conditions, including the effects of wind, rain and snow, pollution, and the growth of lichens, moss, ivy and other plants on and around their surfaces, the choice of stone is important.
Sandstones, limestones, igneous and metamorphic rocks from all over the world are all commonly used for gravestones. Each has its advantages and disadvantages in terms of workability and durability.
Sandstone:
Sandstones exist in a variety of colours and textures. Although sandstones do not generally polish to a sheen, for gravestones they have the advantage that they can be cut to present a flat, muted surface that takes an inscription well.
The crystallization of salts absorbed into pore spaces can also cause surface blistering. These two factors may be the reason why the inscriptions in some—but not all—older gravestones made from sandstone are damaged, or flaked off altogether.
LimeStone:
Many types of limestone, including oolitic and various fossiliferous limestones such as Purbeck Marble (actually a limestone) and Carboniferous crinoidal limestones, and more recently, fossiliferous limestones from abroad, are used as gravestones.
Gravestones made from limestones can offer wonderful opportunities to view fossils, study sedimentary features such as bedding and bioturbation, and speculate about the palaeoecology of ancient marine environments. As gravestones, limestones are relatively easy to carve and shape, so these gravestones are often very decorative. However, as monuments they are particularly prone to surface loss through weathering, especially due to acid rain, which can lead to blurring of the inscriptions.
Marble:
Stone masons generally define marble as any limestone that can take a polish, marble is a metamorphic rock formed when the action and heat and pressure on limestone buried deep in the Earth's crust causes the limestone to recrystallize to form tightly interlocking grains. Marble became fashionable for use as gravestones in the nineteenth century and is still often used today.
The compact structure of marble means it can take a high polish and be carved into interesting shapes. But for geologists, marble gravestones are less interesting than gravestones made from limestones. Although weathering sometimes reveals areas where the original limestone was better cemented, the metamorphism tends to remove any traces of bedding features or fossils.
Granites and Gabbros:
Granites are defined as igneous rocks containing around 20 percent quartz and 65 percent feldspar along with smaller amounts of various dark-coloured minerals. Granite did not come into widespread use for gravestones until the second half of the nineteenth century when the technology for working granite was developed.
Granite became very popular for use as gravestones because of its decorative features and durability. Many different types are used, granite gravestones offer an opportunity to examine a wide range of interesting features including crystal structure and zoning in feldspars, flow structures and xenoliths.
Although gabbros are often referred to as 'black granites' in the trade, they are not true granites and differ from granite in many ways. Gabbros don't contain quartz; their main constituent is feldspar. Their dark colour is due to the high percentage of metal oxides and dark-coloured silicate minerals rich in iron and magnesium that they contain. Gabbros are found in many parts of the world. These are composed of very small crystals and the stone can be polished to produce a shiny black surface which can take very finely etched decoration.
Gneisses and migmatites:
Gneisses are banded, coarsely crystalline metamorphic rocks formed by high temperature and pressure deep in the Earth's crust. The banding, or foliation, is the result of a separation of dark-coloured minerals, such as biotite and hornblende, from lighter coloured minerals such as quartz and feldspar.
Migmatites are formed when gneisses subjected to extreme temperatures and pressures become fluid and the banding becomes disturbed by flow movements. These are preserved in the cooled and solidified rock as streaks, swirls and shear structures.
To Log This Cache:
1) What type of rock do you think this tombstone is made of? Why?
2) What do you think would be the worse choice of rock type to do for this gravestones? Why?
3) Post an pic of you with the cemetary in the background. If you do not want to be in the pic, take an original one.
Michigan Headstones