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Bluestone is the name given to several stones: (1) a feldspathic sandstone in the U.S., (2) a form of dolerite which appears blue when wet or freshly broken in Britain, and (3) a basalt or olivene basalt in Australia. Image File history File links This is a lossless scalable vector image. ... Image File history File links Question_book-3. ... This article is about the geological formation. ... It has been suggested that this article or section be merged with Diabase. ... For the cities, see Basalt, Colorado and Basalt, Idaho. ... Bluestone can refer to: Bluestone, a rock term Blue stone, a general mineral term Blue Stone, a nuclear weapon component Bluestone Television Category: ... It has been suggested that this article or section be merged with Diabase. ...

In the United Kingdom

British bluestone is a dolerite, and is currently used to make jewelry or knick-knacks.

Bluestone is an evenly-bedded product which tends to exhibit natural horizontal clefts allowing it to be removed in large flat sections suitable for flagstone, curbing, and the like. Where the clefts are less well defined, the stone is removed in blocks which are then taken to processors for cutting and refining.

The refining process for bluestone slabs is called spalling. This process incorporates water and heat to reveal the natural layers of the stone as it was deposited originally. The cutting orientation must be almost exactly along the horizontal layers. The cut slab surface is soaked with water and heated rapidly with a wide nozzle propane torch, breaking off chips of stone along their fault lines.

Stonehenge in 2005

The bluestones at Stonehenge were placed there during the third phase of construction at Stonehenge around 2600 BC. It is assumed that there were about 80 of them originally, but this has never been proven. The stones weigh about 4 tons each. They are believed to have been brought from the Preseli Hills, about 250 miles away in Wales, either through glaciation (erratic theory) or through humans organizing their transportation. If a glacier transported the stones, then it must have been the Irish Sea Glacier. Recently the archaeological find of the Boscombe Bowmen has been cited in support of the latter theory, but there is absolutely nothing, in the opinion of some geologists, to connect the finds with Wales in preference to any other European area of Palaeozoic rocks. Preseli Bluestone dolerite axe heads have been found around the Preseli Hills as well, indicating that there was a population who knew how to work with the stones (see N P Figgis Prehistoric Preseli). There is also a legend of Merlin having miraculously transported the stones himself. Image File history File linksMetadata Download high-resolution version (2560x1202, 1359 KB)[edit] Summary Stonehenge, September 2005 [edit] Licensing I, the creator of this work, hereby release it into the public domain. ... Image File history File linksMetadata Download high-resolution version (2560x1202, 1359 KB)[edit] Summary Stonehenge, September 2005 [edit] Licensing I, the creator of this work, hereby release it into the public domain. ... For other uses, see Stonehenge (disambiguation). ... (Redirected from 2600 BC) (27th century BC - 26th century BC - 25th century BC - other centuries) (4th millennium BC - 3rd millennium BC - 2nd millennium BC) Events 2900 - 2334 BC – Mesopotamian wars of the Early Dynastic period. ... Categories: Mountains and hills of south Wales | Pembrokeshire ... It is known that during the Ice Age, probably on more than one occasion, a huge glacier referred to as The Irish Sea Glacier flowed southwards from its source areas in Scotland and Northern Ireland and across the Isle of Man, Anglesey and Pembrokeshire. ... The Boscombe Bowmen is a name given by archaeologists to a group of early Bronze Age burials found at Boscombe Down near Stonehenge in Wiltshire in the United Kingdom. ... Merlin dictating his poems, as illustrated in a French book from the 13th century For other uses, see Merlin (disambiguation). ...

The term 'Preseli Bluestone' is quarryman's name for a whole variety of rock types and strictly is not a petrographic name. At Stonehenge, there are two types of dolerite - spotted and unspotted. The dolerite of the Preselis are plagioclase feldspar. There is no evidence in Pembrokeshire that spotted dolerite (or any dolerite, for that matter) was used preferentially either for the building of monuments or burial chambers (cromlechs), or for the manufacture of axes. The bluestones may not even have been used preferentially at Stonehenge, and around half of the original stones used in the "bluestone setting" were probably sarsen stones which were later used as lintels. This article does not cite any references or sources. ... Sarsen stones are sandstone blocks found on Salisbury Plain and elsewhere. ...

In the United States

American bluestone is a feldspathic sandstone, which is produced by about 150 mostly small quarries in adjacent areas of Pennsylvania and New York. The Pennsylvania Bluestone Association has 105 members, the vast majority of them quarriers. This article is about the geological formation. ... Pennsylvania Bluestone : Pennsylvania Bluestone is a layered sandstone found only in the Northeastern tier of PA. and the Southern tier of NY. Pa Bluestone has many uses from cut dimesional stone used in patios, walkways and stair treads to architectual stone used in building. ...

Bluestone from Pennsylvania and New York is commercially known as bluestone or Pennsylvania Bluestone. These are a group of sandstones defined as feldspathic greywacke. The sand-sized grains from which bluestone is constituted were deposited in the "Catskill Delta" during the Middle to Upper Devonian Period of the Paleozoic Era, approximately 370 to 345 million years ago. If the initial deposit was made under slow moving water the ripples of the water action on the sand or mud will be revealed. This deposition process may be seen today at any ocean beach in shallow water or in a stream bed where conditions allow it to be observed. The term "bluestone" is derived from a deep-blue-colored sandstone first found in Ulster County, New York. This article is about the U.S. State. ... This article is about the state. ... Feldspar is the name of an important group of rock-forming minerals which make up perhaps as much as 60% of the Earths crust. ... Greywacke (German grauwacke, signifying a grey, earthy rock) is a variety of sandstone generally characterized by its hardness, dark color, and poorly-sorted, angular grains of quartz, feldspar, and small rock fragments set in a compact, clay-fine matrix. ... The Devonian is a major division of the geologic timescale that extends from the end of the Silurian period (360 million years ago (mya)) to the beginning of the Mississippian subperiod of the Carboniferous (408. ... The Palaeozoic is a major division of the geologic timescale, one of four geologic eras. ... Ulster County is a county located in the state of New York, USA. It sits in the states beautiful Mid-Hudson Region of the Hudson Valley. ... This article is about the state. ...

The Catskill Delta was created from run off from the Acadian Mountains ("Ancestral Appalachians") which covered the area where New York City now exists. This Delta ran in a narrow band from southwest to northeast and today provides the base material for the high-quality bluestone which is quarried from the Catskill Mountains (and Northeast Pennsylvania). The Catskill Mountains (also known as simply the Catskills), a natural area in New York State northwest of New York City and southwest of Albany are a mature dissected plateau, an uplifted region that was subsequently eroded into sharp relief. ...

As the product became more popular as an architectural and building stone and demand grew, quarrying for it spread throughout south central New York and northeast Pennsylvania. It is a unique commodity of particular value to the economy of Susquehanna County, Pennsylvania. Susquehanna County is a county located in the state of Pennsylvania. ... This article is about the U.S. State. ...

This bluestone is made into products as follows: The bluestone is separated from the rock (quarry face) in the quarry by parallel cuts with saws with diamond-tipped blades into large rectangular blocks. Sometimes the stone is lightly blasted to encourage splitting along parallel planes of weakness, delineating the top and bottom of the block. The final products are often made in the quarry, but sometimes massive blocks are trucked to "saw shops" to be finished there, by sawing, by "snapping" or breaking the stone with a guillotine along a line of pressure points, or by splitting along planes of weakness. For other uses, see Quarry (disambiguation). ... This article is about the mineral. ...

The largest volume product is ordinary irregularly-edged flagstone, followed by ashlar. Flagstone belongs to a group of products that require no (or very little) sawing, such as rubble masonry and landscape stone. Two other product groups are classified as Architectural Stone, one group that requires some sawing or "snapping" such as paving stone, wall stone, ashlar, bridge stone, and curbing, and the other group that requires sawing on all surfaces, such as countertops, stair treads, lintels, thresholds, ashlar, sidewalks, and residential walls (veneer). The ashlar can be sawn on all six surfaces, or "snapped" on one or more surfaces with the remaining surfaces sawn. Flagstone is a type of flat stone, usually used for paving slabs, but also for making fences or roofing. ...

In Australia

Australian bluestone is a basalt or olivene basalt, and is quarried by one full-time producer and one part-time producer.

HM Prison Pentridge was one of the many buildings constructed of local bluestone in Melbourne in the 19th century

In Victoria, Australia, bluestone was one of the favoured building materials of the 1850s during the Victorian Gold Rush. Image File history File linksMetadata Download high-resolution version (1000x1217, 904 KB) File links The following pages on the English Wikipedia link to this file (pages on other projects are not listed): Coburg, Victoria HM Prison Pentridge User:Melburnian Australian non-residential architectural styles Metadata This file contains additional information... Image File history File linksMetadata Download high-resolution version (1000x1217, 904 KB) File links The following pages on the English Wikipedia link to this file (pages on other projects are not listed): Coburg, Victoria HM Prison Pentridge User:Melburnian Australian non-residential architectural styles Metadata This file contains additional information... Motto: Peace and Prosperity Other Australian states and territories Capital Melbourne Governor HE Mr John Landy Premier Steve Bracks (ALP) Area 237,629 km² (6th)  - Land 227,416 km²  - Water 10,213 km² (4. ... The Victorian gold rush was a period in the history of Victoria in Australia between approximately 1851 and the early 1860s. ...

In Melbourne it was extracted from a quarry in the Clifton Hill area and used extensively in the 19th century. Because the material was difficult to carve, it was predominantly used for warehouses and the foundations of public buildings. Significant bluestone buildings include the Melbourne Gaol, HM Prison Pentridge, St Patrick's Cathedral, Victoria Barracks, Melbourne Grammar School, Deaf Children Australia and Victorian College for the Deaf, Royal Victorian College for the Blind, the Goldsborough Mort warehouses (Bourke Street) and Timeball Tower. It was also used extensively for cobblestone roads, many which still exist in some of Melbourne's smaller lanes as well as walls, bridges, curbs and gutters in many of the inner suburbs. Some examples of structures that use the material include Princes Bridge and Federation Wharf and Hawthorn Bridge. Because of its distinctive qualities, post-modern Melbourne buildings have also made use of nostalgic bluestone, including the Southgate complex and promenade in Southbank, Victoria and apartments such as the Melburnian. This article is about the Australian city; the name may also refer to City of Melbourne or Melbourne city centre (also known as The CBD). ... Clifton Hill Shot Tower, Australia Clifton Hill is a suburb of Melbourne, Victoria, Australia. ... Alternative meaning: Nineteenth Century (periodical) (18th century — 19th century — 20th century — more centuries) As a means of recording the passage of time, the 19th century was that century which lasted from 1801-1900 in the sense of the Gregorian calendar. ... Ń== HEADKLINE text == Image:Old Melbourne Gaol. ... Main entrance HM Prison Pentridge was an Australian prison built in 1850 and located in Coburg, Victoria. ... St Patricks Cathedral, Melbourne Patricks Cathedral is the cathedral church of the Roman Catholic Archdiocese of Melbourne in Victoria, Australia, and seat of its archbishop, currently Denis J. Hart. ... Located on St Kilda Road in Melbourne, Australia, Victoria Barracks Melbourne is of architectural and historical significance as one of the most impressive 19th century government buildings in Victoria, Australia. ... Melbourne Grammar School, also known as MGS or Melbourne Boys, is an independent, day and boarding school predominantly for boys, located in Melbourne, Victoria, Australia, . Founded in 1858, the school is a member of the Associated Public Schools of Victoria. ... Deaf Children Australia is a charity that supports young deaf and hearing impaired people in Australia. ... The Victorian College for the Deaf (VCD), located on St. ... Bourke Street Mall The newly redeveloped Bourke Street Mall East Bourke Street Mall during redevelopment Bourke Street is a major street in the central business district(CBD) of Melbourne, Victoria, Australia. ... The Williamstown Lighthouse is situated at Gellibrand Point (38°35S 143°20E), in the Melbourne suburb of Williamstown. ... A list of lanes in Hoddle Grid. ... Princes Bridge The Princes Bridge is a historic bridge that crosses the Yarra River in Melbourne, Victoria, Australia. ... Hawthorn Bridge crosses the Yarra River five km east of Melbourne connecting Bridge Road and Burwood Road. ... Southbank is an inner city suburb of Melbourne, Australia in the state of Victoria. ...

It was also sourced in many other regions of the Victorian volcanic plains and used in towns and cities of central and western regions including Ballarat, Geelong, Port Fairy and Portland. Ballarat is a city in regional Victoria, Australia, approximately 120 kilometres north-west of Melbourne, with a population of 84,000 people. ... - - Nickname: City by the Bay Geography Area: 1,240 km² Coordinates: Time Zone UTC +10:00 Population (2003) 200,067 Among Australian cities: Density: persons/km² Political Mayor: Shane Dowling Governing body: City of Greater Geelong Geelong is a port city of 200,067 people (2003 census) located on Corio... Port Fairy is a town in Victoria, Australia. ... The city of Portland () is the oldest European settlement in what is now the state of Victoria, Australia. ...

References

External links

• Examination of the conflicting theories relating to the Stonehenge bluestones
• Enigma of the Stonehenge Bluestones and the Preseli Hills
• Wessex Archaeology's Bluestone information
• How American bluestone is quarried
• Pennsylvanian bluestone
• AGI Trade Solutions in naturalstone
• Article on Cultured Bluestone