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first order, where to dig clay, so...soil maps... Olga Vargas Soil Scientist at USDA-NRCS, who lives in the area, hooked me up. The client is particularly interested in telling the story of Uncle Sam and his life in Troy. This map focuses on the Sam Wilson home site and brickworks.
https://www.nrcs.usda.gov/wps/portal/nrcs/site/national/home/
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first order, where to dig clay, so...soil maps... Olga Vargas Soil Scientist at USDA-NRCS, who lives in the area, hooked me up.
https://www.nrcs.usda.gov/wps/portal/nrcs/site/national/home/
The purple shapes are Hudson soil series, which contains a high percentage of clay... this is what we are looking for. The top left tip of purple, and just below, is the Uncle Sam site where we'd like to dig. HuD and HuE. Cross referenced with information from our historian, Tom Carroll, "....they began making brick on the west side of Mount Ida, near the intersection of Sixth Avenue and Ferry Street."
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The City of Troy, Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute and CHA Engineering gave us survey info for the Uncle Sam site.
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An Index to the Geology of the Northern States, with transverse sections, extending from Susquehanna River to the Atlantic, crossing Catskill Mountains. To which is prefixed a geological grammar, 2d ed. 1820
By Amos Eaton, 1776-1842.
https://babel.hathitrust.org/cgi/pt?id=nyp.33433066368600&view=1up&seq=307&skin=2021
In Eaton's words, "The height of the mountains, &c. is greatly disproportioned to the real extent of the section."
Sam Wilson and his brother Ebenezer walked to Troy from NH in 1789, and established their brickworks in 1792. So they would not have had access to this information (first edition of this book was 1818). I'd love to know how they knew where to find clay.
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Amos Eaton (May 17, 1776 – May 10, 1842) was an American botanist, geologist, and educator who is considered the founder of the modern scientific prospectus in education, which was a radical departure from the American liberal arts tradition of classics, theology, lecture, and recitation.[2][3] Eaton co-founded the Rensselaer School in 1824 with Stephen van Rensselaer III "in the application of science to the common purposes of life".[3][4] His books in the eighteenth century were among the first published for which a systematic treatment of the United States was attempted, and in a language that all could read.[5] His teaching laboratory for botany in the 1820s was the first of its kind in the country.[6][7][8][9] Eaton's popular lectures and writings inspired numerous thinkers, in particular women, whom he encouraged to attend his public talks on experimental philosophy.[10] Emma Willard would found the Troy Female Seminary (Emma Willard School), and Mary Mason Lyon, the Mount Holyoke Female Seminary (Mount Holyoke College). Eaton held the rank of senior professor at Rensselaer until his death in 1842.[10][11] -Wikipedia
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“In February following [1789], the two brothers, Samuel and Ebenezer Willson, of Mason, New Hampshire, trudged across the hilly country to the little settlement. Samuel was then twenty-two years old and his brother twenty-seven. In the following summer they began making brick on the west side of Mount Ida, near the intersection of Sixth Avenue and Ferry Street. They made those with which the first brick building erected in the village was constructed,—the two-story dwelling, built in 1792, by James Spencer, on the northwest corner of Second and Albany streets. They also furnished the brick for the first courthouse and jail.”
—Arthur James Weise, M. A., Troy’s One Hundred Years, 1789-1889 (Troy, N.Y.: William H. Young, 1891), 31.
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An Index to the Geology of the Northern States, with transverse sections, extending from Susquehanna River to the Atlantic, crossing Catskill Mountains. To which is prefixed a geological grammar, 2d ed. 1820
By Amos Eaton, 1776-1842.
Note Eaton's words, "The height of the mountains, &c. is greatly disproportioned to the real extent of the section."
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This is my Photoshop version of Eaton's plate... highlighting #7, the Argillite layer in red. You can see how the Hudon River cuts through the strata revealing the clay, explaining the proliferation of brickworks along the River. This cross section seems pretty accurate to our experience in Troy. We dug on the right (East) side of the River, and Mount Ida rises to the East.
"Argillite ( /ˈɑːrdʒɪlaɪt/) is a fine-grained sedimentary rock composed predominantly of indurated clay particles." -Wikipedia
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detail, with my annotations...looking at Mount Ida, circled in foreground, where Sam Wilson's brickyard and house were, nearly 100 years prior. Arrows top center, this looks like clay excavation. It's on a canal to the Hudson River, which would have greatly facilitated transportation. Interesting to see current Google maps showing a baseball field on this site, reflecting alterations to the landscape shown here.
Troy, N.Y. 1881.
This reproduction bird's-eye view map of Troy, New York was published in 1881 by Beck & Pauli. Troy is county seat to Rensselaer County along the Hudson River.
https://www.worldmapsonline.com/historic-map-troy-ny-1881/
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While we were waiting to get permission to dig on the Uncle Sam historic site, soil scientist Steve Carlisle started looking for more easily accessible clay on the banks of the Hudson River. This location is at the north end of Troy, at Lock #1 on the Erie Canal.
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clay bank on River Road,
from Steve Carlisle, USDA-NRCS
5.14.21
Img 44: Clay exposure along River Rd., across from Lock No. 1, Champlain Canal, Lansingburgh, NY.
Steve Carlisle: "I just scraped a little away at the base of the clay scarp. Mapped Hudson. Varved clays (thinly bedded sediments representing low energy sediments from winter alternating with high energy sedimentation from spring, summer, fall). I am uncertain as to the meaning of the gray layer, but I suspect it might be a little tighter."
“As Tom Sanford [Rensselaer County Soil and Water Conservation District] indicated in our virtual meeting the clays are lacustrine deposits from Lake Albany. When high energy streams and meltwaters disgorged into the streams rapidly dissipating energy could no longer carry larger particles and they dropped out of suspension. Hence the gravel and sand deposits around Sand Lake, Averill Park and Wynantskill. Further out in Lake Albany where there was little energy to keep particles suspended the colloidal particles (clays) gradually wafted down to the lake bed. Surges in stream energy, summer versus winter, explain the layers or varves seen in the image where I scraped off some of the slough on the one photo. Lake Albany was dammed by the Harbor Hill Moraine which stretched from Staten Island to Brooklyn and Queens. When that moraine was breached Lake Albany drained, possibly in a cataclysmic fashion, and in its wake left the Hudson River and the narrows separating Staten Island from Queens.”
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7/14/21, Troy, NY: great day today digging clay on the Hudson with my soil science buddies Olga Vargas and Steve Carlisle…
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Steve Carlisle, showing the layered clay we found near Lock #1
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After the dig, I stopped by Broken Mold Studio to introduce myself to the owner, Bianca, and ask her if she wanted some of the clay... @brokenmoldtroy
https://thebrokenmoldstudio.com/
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test firing the little clay bowl from Lock #1
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oops! overfired at cone 5 (meant to stop at 04)... Hmmm... could this be Albany Slip? It's definitely NOT the brick clay!
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Troy + Albany stoneware collection at the NY State Museum in Albany... let's look at the Albany Slip interiors for comparison....looks amazingly similar to my overfired test!
"New York State was well-suited for stoneware production. The transportation network provided by its canals, rivers and turnpikes enabled New York State to become one of the leading producers of this ware. The white clay needed to produce stoneware was shipped from Bayonne, New Jersey area to potters located along canals and turnpikes. The finished products were then sent out to markets along this same transportation corridor.
Stoneware vessels were shaped by hand on the potter’s wheel or formed in a wooden mold. After the freshly shaped vessel had air-dried, and awl or pointed stick was often used to scratch a simple design into the surface. Freehand decoration was also applied with a cobalt blue paint (this color withstands the high temperature of the kiln.) Albany slip clay, a dark brown color, was used to coat the interior. The decorated pieces were then placed in a beehive-shaped kiln and fired at about 21,000 degrees Fahrenheit. When the heat was at its height, a bucket of coarse salt was thrown into the kiln. The salt vaporized, covering all exposed surfaces with a shiny and somewhat pitted or pebbled finish referred to as salt glaze."
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Ryan Rakhshan, on the material that we have named "Troy-Albany slip":
I dont think that troy slip is albany slip...
It's difficult to compare the analysis column since so much of the troy slip sample is LOI, but if you look at the (UM)Formula column on the albany slip image, and compare it to the umf for the troy slip, you'll see that they're very different.
That being said, I think that troy slip is better
Albany slip comes with a ton of silica and alumina, so the material just by itself is super high and to the right on stull.
Troy slip on the other hand has very low silica and alumina, allowing you to add in EPK and silica to explore wider ranges on stull and alter the material to your needs.
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me with Troy historian, Tom Carroll, at the Uncle Sam/ Sam Wilson house site... the brickyard was here, too. So we know there is brick clay somewhere.
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Finally got our permission to dig on the Uncle Sam site. USDA-NRCS Soil scientist Olga Vargas here, checking Soil Web for best spots to access the Hudson series. Cross referencing that with our RPI site survey.
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A little further up the hill into the woods, Olga found it...Uncle Sam brick clay! Here she's using a hand auger. We only had to dig down about 8 inches.
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RPI and CHA engineers here with soil scientist Olga Vargas, right. We found other soils (mapped Ur, which is Urban land) at this lower/ more accessible area, but not clay. They've been disturbed over the years and have fill on top of the originally deposited clay. We are planning a field trip + workshop to the Uncle Sam site in the spring or fall, when we can get a school group or two out here to dig and play with the clay.
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Souvenirs collected July 13, 2021 from the Sam Wilson home site, base of Mount Ida, Troy, NY.
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I read about clay dogs in the Hutton's book, The Great Hudson River Brick Industry...
I'm thinking that’s what this image of a broken Uncle Sam brick shows… Soil scientists or anyone have ideas on this?
"Clay dogs are naturally occurring clay formations that are sculpted by river currents from glacially deposited blue-gray clay and then dried by the sun. They exhibit tremendous variety in shape and size, with some being simple and others having highly complex forms. They only occur in a few places in the world. Until recently, Croton Point along the Hudson River produced them, but the clay slope that produced the dogs was subsequently demolished to extend a park lawn.[1] Clay dogs were described in detail in an article by L. P. Gratacap, Opinions on Clay Stones and Concretions.[2]"
https://en.everybodywiki.com/Clay_dog
"In the Connecticut River Valley, these concretions are often called "claystones" because the concretions are harder than the clay enclosing them. In local brickyards, they were called "clay-dogs" either because of their animal-like forms or the concretions were nuisances in molding bricks."
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Concretion
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Robilee McIntyre, Bianca, Charlie and I looking from the top of Mount Ida down to the city of Troy below.
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Between 1837 and 1890, there were several landslides of clay near the base of Mount Ida (undermining caused by digging brick clay? I couldn't really find anything that said this directly). You can still see evidence today in the form of a large bulge in the road along 4th Street, between Ferry and Ida.
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Troy, NY Landslide Buries Victims, Mar 1890
Submitted by Stu Beitler
New York | Landslides | 1890
BURIED IN A LANDSLIDE.
THREE PERSONS INSTANTLY KILLED BY THE CAVING EARTH. The New York Times New York 1890-03-16
Troy, N. Y., March 15. -- Two houses on the west side of Warren's Hill were buried under a landslide early this morning, and of the twenty-three persons asleep in them at the time three were killed and several injured.
more at
http://www.gendisasters.com/new-york/6330/troy-ny-landslide-buries-victims-mar-1890
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I asked Tom Carroll to share with me what he knew of brickmaking in Troy...
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Samuel and Ebenezer Wilson and Brickmaking in Troy
by P. Thomas Carroll
Senior Scholar and Treasurer
Hudson Mohawk Industrial Gateway
"Here you go. FYI, I originally prepared this for a VIP tour I provided many years ago for the fifth great granddaughter of Samuel Wilson. She and her husband live in Little Rock, Arkansas, and they'd never been to Troy before that visit."
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Samuel and Ebenezer Wilson and Brickmaking in Troy
by P. Thomas Carroll
Senior Scholar and Treasurer
Hudson Mohawk Industrial Gateway
"Here you go. FYI, I originally prepared this for a VIP tour I provided many years ago for the fifth great granddaughter of Samuel Wilson. She and her husband live in Little Rock, Arkansas, and they'd never been to Troy before that visit."
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Samuel and Ebenezer Wilson and Brickmaking in Troy
by P. Thomas Carroll
Senior Scholar and Treasurer
Hudson Mohawk Industrial Gateway
"Here you go. FYI, I originally prepared this for a VIP tour I provided many years ago for the fifth great granddaughter of Samuel Wilson. She and her husband live in Little Rock, Arkansas, and they'd never been to Troy before that visit."
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Samuel and Ebenezer Wilson and Brickmaking in Troy
by P. Thomas Carroll
Senior Scholar and Treasurer
Hudson Mohawk Industrial Gateway
"Here you go. FYI, I originally prepared this for a VIP tour I provided many years ago for the fifth great granddaughter of Samuel Wilson. She and her husband live in Little Rock, Arkansas, and they'd never been to Troy before that visit."
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Samuel and Ebenezer Wilson and Brickmaking in Troy
by P. Thomas Carroll
Senior Scholar and Treasurer
Hudson Mohawk Industrial Gateway
"Here you go. FYI, I originally prepared this for a VIP tour I provided many years ago for the fifth great granddaughter of Samuel Wilson. She and her husband live in Little Rock, Arkansas, and they'd never been to Troy before that visit."
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Samuel and Ebenezer Wilson and Brickmaking in Troy
by P. Thomas Carroll
Senior Scholar and Treasurer
Hudson Mohawk Industrial Gateway
"Here you go. FYI, I originally prepared this for a VIP tour I provided many years ago for the fifth great granddaughter of Samuel Wilson. She and her husband live in Little Rock, Arkansas, and they'd never been to Troy before that visit."
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Uncle Sam clay back at Red Dirt Studio in MD...
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Inside the Long-Lost Brickyards That Built N.Y.C.
By Devorah Lev-Tov, New York Times
May 21, 2021
https://www.nytimes.com/2021/05/21/nyregion/brickyards-nyc-hudson-valley.html?smid=url-share
Hudson Valley bricks are an “inescapable presence” in New York City, George V. Hutton, a retired architect, wrote in his book about the once-booming industry.
Mr. Hutton, despite his clear bias — he was from a prominent brickmaking family in Kingston, N.Y. — was not wrong.
It’s fairly safe to assume that any brick building constructed between 1800 and 1950 includes some form of sediment from the banks of the Hudson River. The Empire State Building, the Museum of Natural History, the arches of the Brooklyn Bridge, Delmonico’s and countless residential buildings — including the Parkchester development in the Bronx and Stuyvesant Town-Peter Cooper Village in Manhattan — were all built from Hudson Valley bricks.
During the industry’s turn-of-the-century heyday, there were more than 135 brickyards along the riverbanks mining seemingly endless deposits of clay. In Ulster County alone, 65 brickyards were once in operation. In 1904, 226,452,000 bricks came out of Ulster County, according to its archives office, and most of them were sent directly to New York City....
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The bottom piece uses clay we found at Lock #1, presented in a steel frame, using rammed earth techniques to create the layering. Thinking about how this clay was originally deposited in layers, from glacial deposition. The top image is actually gray concrete, a study from a previous commission, which is lending some ideas to how to present the finished Hartman commissioned work.
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This shows the raw Uncle Sam brick clay on the left, and the raw clay from Lock #1 on the right. Each is a 12" x 12" square, in a steel frame. I love this diptych and thought about a larger version of this for the Hartman commission, but we decided to focus on the Uncle Sam brick clay and bring in a mapping element.
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rammed earth technique... thinking about making a series of small works that use both clays in the Hudson soil profile, Uncle Sam and Lock #1.
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This study is an exploration of my original idea for the commissioned work... to use the brick clay from Uncle Sam's brickyard site, make a map of Troy, break it up and put it back into the dirt. I was thinking about how the Uncle Sam site looks now... with fragments of brick emerging from the ground.
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This study is an exploration of my original idea for the commissioned work... to use the brick clay from Uncle Sam's brickyard site, make a map of Troy, break it up and put it back into the dirt. I was thinking about how the Uncle Sam site looks now... with fragments of brick emerging from the ground.
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This brick fragment and shard of a cast iron pipe are from the Uncle Sam brickyard site. I like the idea of using the map as presentation for these historic fragments, giving them some context.
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This is the "clay dog" brick fragment...
I read about clay dogs in the Hutton's book, The Great Hudson River Brick Industry...
I'm thinking that’s what this image of a broken Uncle Sam brick shows… Soil scientists or anyone have ideas on this?
"Clay dogs are naturally occurring clay formations that are sculpted by river currents from glacially deposited blue-gray clay and then dried by the sun. They exhibit tremendous variety in shape and size, with some being simple and others having highly complex forms. They only occur in a few places in the world. Until recently, Croton Point along the Hudson River produced them, but the clay slope that produced the dogs was subsequently demolished to extend a park lawn.[1] Clay dogs were described in detail in an article by L. P. Gratacap, Opinions on Clay Stones and Concretions.[2]"
https://en.everybodywiki.com/Clay_dog
"In the Connecticut River Valley, these concretions are often called "claystones" because the concretions are harder than the clay enclosing them. In local brickyards, they were called "clay-dogs" either because of their animal-like forms or the concretions were nuisances in molding bricks."
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Concretion
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This is a big slab of Uncle Sam brick clay, paddled onto the floor of my studio. I transferred some of the map informatiotn from the paper to the clay using pouncing and blue chalk... but I was missing some information that I really wanted, so I also used a projector and traced more of the map imagery into the clay with a wooden tool.
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This homemade tool, hybrid pizza cutter and bike chain wheel, is one of my favorites... good for perforated map lines in clay or paper.
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now to let the clay dry and crack apart, before firing...
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Uncle Sam brick clay, fired to 04... a nice vibrant red-orange. Arranging the composition, thinking about how to present it as a finished product.
