Contributed photoThis is an interesting image of the North River Steam Granite and Marble Works located on South River Street in Coxsackie circa 1890. With so much attention paid by genealogists and historians to cemeteries and graveyards it remains a source of no small mystery to me why we pay comparatively little attention to the 19th-century industry and artists responsible for the stones that fill our graveyards. For the past few years I’ve been taking note of the signatures which stonecutters added to their work, particularly on early and mid-19th century marble markers. Israel Baldwin of Catskill is just one of the artists whose work endures in cemeteries in the vicinity of Catskill. His transcribed account book of gravestone orders is a source available to researchers at the Vedder Research Library in Coxsackie. Of particular curiosity to me is another stonecutter who signed his work “Loomis” and was based in Kinderhook. Stones by his shop (or possibly by him personally) appear in graveyards in Coxsackie, Greenville, Durham and Cairo to name just a few — a surprising example of the distance stones would travel when families ordered works by accomplished and in-demand stone carvers. Little is available offhand to shed light on the longevity of the North River Steam Granite and Marble Works, though judging by the age of this photo answers would be forthcoming in an examination of newspapers and local directories. I have it on good authority that castoffs and fragments from this shop can still be found in considerable quantities at the lot this site occupied. Reach Jonathan Palmer at archivist gchistory.org.
Johnson Newspapers 7.1