Tuesday, April 15, 2014

What does it take to make a gravestone? More than you might think...

Trying to describe what my dad does for a living is quite the challenge. In fact, when I was little, I used to tellpeople that my dad worked for dead people. (Fortunately, my mom is a teacher, that's a lot easier to explain). 

For years, my sisters and I have been working for him. Usually we were doing data entry, secretarial tasks, or walking cemeteries looking for stones. Yes, walking cemeteries. We have a joke in our family that a vacation isn't complete until we visit the local cemetery. 

My dad owns a company called John H. McGee & Son where he designs and sells headstones. Basically, his job is to work with families who have lost loved ones to design a monument that will be placed at their grave. He has also done other projects like granite clocks, plaques, etc.

It's a very niche industry and pretty complicated to explain to an outsider. But it's ingrained in my family. My aunts and uncles tell stories about digging graves and mowing cemeteries when they were growing up.In fact while other kids were breaking arms on the playground, my Aunt Jo shattered the bones in her leg helping my dad set a stone and I broke my pinkie racing my sisters at Pine Hill Cemetery. My parents' and my grandparents' yards are scattered with old headstones. My grandpa owns a cemetery service company that does things like setting stones and digging graves. 

Last week, my dad took a local funeral director to Barre, Vermont to show him the process of making a monument. I was able to tag along. I had been there countless times before, but at 26 I can appreciate the process much more than a moody 13-year old.

Barre is a small quarry town that sits just south of the capital city of Montpelier. The granite quarries provide work for many of the locals. A company called Rock of Ages quarries the granite and distributes it to manufacturers in the Barre, Vermont area. Then retailers like my dad's will buy from the manufacturers. 

The granite quarries in Barre, Vermont are the best granite in the world. It is durable and will weather the elements for hundreds of years.

Blocks of granite are quarried from the top of the mountains surrounding Barre. 
When we visited, there was about 5 feet of frozen ice at the bottom of the quarry.

  The tall poles are called derricks. They act like cranes and carry large blocks of granite out of the hole.

The large blocks of granite are bought by the manufacturers, in this case, a company called Buttura & Gherardi.


The large blocks are sawed into slabs of granite.



The newly sawed granite slabs are stored in the saw plant waiting to be polished.
Once the monument arrives, companies like my grandpas', or even people like my dad, will set the monument in the cemetery. If a new inscription is needed in the future, sandblasters are able to do that in the cemetery without having to send it back up to Vermont. 

The entire process is fragile and intricate. There are around 50 skilled workers who work with the granite at Buttura & Gherardi. My dad and his employee, Matt, are able to design with Monu-Cad in house, which takes years of experience. On top of all of that, my dad is a salesman, which in this industry, can be a sensitive task, too.

So next time you see a cemetery, think of the amount of work that goes into the memorials that you see. Cemeteries shouldn't get such a bad, creepy, rap... they should be marveled at.

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