Working for the Company

In some ways, the story of the Vermont Marble Company is a story of business; outlining the growth and consolidation of one of the world's largest companies at its time as a result of power and legal trends at the turn of the century. In some ways, it's a story of land use; one era in the grander narrative of Vermont's development that has left it a relatively rural state compared to other parts of New England.

Young marble worker in Rutland, VT

But above all else, the story of what became the largest marble producing company in the world and the backbone of the Rutland region is the story of the company's workers; people from a variety of backgrounds working a variety of jobs that not only responded to but influenced the historic events that illustrate the company's changes over time.

Marble workers with piece gang (1923)

Workers from Across the Globe

Many marble workers in the early years of the industry were Irish and Canadian; drawn to the region to work on the construction of the railroad in the 1850s. After a while, Swedish immigrants were sought after by the companies' executives as they were deemed reliable workers and employed at all levels of industry. The majority of Norwegians came to Vermont through Canada and sought jobs in granite and marble. The Finnish came to work on the railroads and were sought after for their experience working on the rails of northern Europe. As eastern Europeans fled Poland and Belarus under the shadow of Russia, they were put to works in the mills and shops of the marble industry. Austro-Hungarian and German workers found work in the quarries and shops. Northern Italians were sought after for their carving skills and southern Italians became the backbone of the railroad system.

"Employees of the Vermont Marble Company came from all over the world. Marble carvers came from Carrera, Italy, and quarry workers from Ireland. The largest influx of immigrant workers came through Ellis Island at the turn of the century. The immigrants from Poland, Sweden, Ireland, Italy and many east European countries lent their skills to making the products of the Vermont Marble Company world renowned. These immigrants settled in Proctor and the surrounding areas, making Rutland County rich in cultural diversity."

(Vermont Marble Museum)

Vermont Marble Co. workers (1890)

Workers at the building shed in Proctor (1915)

"Always finish your work so that you will not be ashamed to cut your name at the bottom; and don’t cut too much 'gingerbread-work' as we call it; it don’t pay, and it will be impossible to put on the finish you can on plain work.

The sure way to run the marble and granite business, and the only way to succeed, is to be prompt in paying your bills when due. Do not order a large stock unless you know you can pay for it.

Say nothing that will injure another’s reputation in order to carry a point or make a sale. Do not run down other’s work to build up your trade, or you will ruin yourself in the estimation of all thinking people.

Treat your hands as though they were human, and make an effort to pay them every Saturday night. Instruct them when you think you can learn them anything, and if hands will not take showing without being 'miffed,' then they are not worthy of being called marble or granite workers. Hire men who are steady and who will do your work and do it just as you want it done."

(Advice from The Marble and Granite Workers' Guide, 1900)

Red City

In the early 1850s, companies built numerous tenements to house their workers close to the quarries in what became known as the “Red City” because of the red paint used on all the buildings. By the 1880s, the Sheldons and Slason company alone owned 140 of these buildings.

Saint Bridget's Church

In the fall of 1854, Rev. Druon began services for the large number of Irish Catholics in West Rutland. By 1857, St. Bridget’s parish had 1,294 members. In June 1860, the congregation began construction of its new church. The project, completed in November 1861, was a major community effort; marble was donated by Sheldon and Slason and the work done by quarrymen in the evenings.

"Quarrying Marble"

Down deep in a pillared cavern,

Where lights but dimly glow.

Channeling machines are cutting

Marble, white as snow.

The rock drills sputter viciously

While driving steel through stone.

Like machine guns spraying bullets

Through human flesh and bone.

Booming blasts that reverberate

Add to the muffled din,

While hammers swung at a steady gate

Batter the wedges in.

Dusty men, who together sway

Upon a giant bar,

Free the block from it's glacial bed

Without a sound or jar.

Firmly snared by the derrick's rope,

The block floats through the air.

The workers gaze with reverant pride,

To see it swinging there.

Their skill and strength have broken free

From Mother Nature's womb,

This gleaming stone, ordained to be

The Unknown Solder's Tomb.

-Henry A. Collin, Poems from Proctor

Dangerous Work

In and around the quarries, work was risky as marble companies balanced the measures necessary to make a profit with risks they were willing to take on behalf of workers' safety. In 1905, Edwin B. Child writes an article entitled "The Marble Mountains" for Scribner's Magazine illustrating the thrill and danger, joy and drudgery in the lives of quarrymen.

Bleak illustrations from Child's article (1905)

Portion of New York Times article one of the worst quarry accidents in 1893 where four workers were killed and nine injured at Sheldon Quarry No. 3.

Rutland Daily Herald article from February 1886

Rutland Daily Herald article from November 1892

Quarrymen in passenger elevator

Old passenger elevator in West Rutland (2025)

Child Labor

With the industrialization of the late 19th and early 20th century, mills of many different industries hired young workers for a variety of tasks; especially those tasks demanding workers of smaller stature relating to machinery. Each decade following the 1870s, the percentage of children in the workforce increased until the 1920s with the rise of organizations opposed to child labor and the implementation of laws prohibiting child labor in the following years.

To learn more, see the history of child labor in the United States.

Above are young Vermont marble workers photographed by Lewis Wickes Hine in 1910 from the Library of Congress National Child Labor Committee collection.

Vermont Marble Workers' Strike of 1935-1936

Poster illustrating family evicted from Vermont Marble housing

From 1935 through 1936, Vermont Marble Co. workers went on strike over low wages; demanding a raise from 37.5 cents [$8.92 in 2025] to 50 cents [$11.73 in 2025] per hour. Violence erupted when workers learned that housing rents were reduced as a reward for those who stayed on the job. With this strike, marble workers attempted to unionize, and though the company’s reputation suffered when it issued stock dividends to investors during the strike, the workers still lost. The Vermont Marble Company did not ultimately unionize until 1945.

To learn more, see the Vermont Historical Society page on Creating An Image: Labor Unrest as well as the Rutland Historical Society Quarterly articles on the 1935-1936 strike or on the 1966 strike.

Strikers march to Center Rutland to plead with non-union workers

Billy Clubs from the 1935-36 Strike

This is one nightstick or "watchman's club" owned by Harry L. Hall; night watchman for the Vermont Marble Co. during the strike. Burned wood decorations depict scenes from the strike, including the “Battles of Barrett Hill & W.Rutland,” the dynamiting of trains and bridges, fights, and other events, as well as a list of names of the participants.

To see more items from the 1935-1936 marble strike and the Vermont Marble company as scanned by the Vermont State University Digital Archaeology Project, see "Vermont Marble Industry Artifacts".

Remembering Marble Workers Today

Engravings from marble workers in the West Rutland Coping Shop, now an open gallery space, from the early 1900s (2025)

"May the elemental spirit of these marble quarries always inspire both young and old alike to fashion its beauty" (2025)

Memorial to Vermont Marble Workers at Carving Studio and Sculpture Center (2025)

A Quarryman's Song

James Patrick Carney was born in Tipperary, Ireland in 1822. Carney came to Vermont in 1856 to work in the marble quarries of West Rutland and wrote the following ballad about his time as a quarryman. Carney continued to live in the marble belt of western Vermont until his death in 1907.

Below is a recording of the ballad made by Margaret MacArthur in 1985 for the Fast Folk Musical Magazine and featured in Smithsonian Folkways Recordings.

Come all you good people and attend for a while
To a story I will unfold
The truth I'll tell, you know full well
As I have plainly told
A dollar a day, it will be your pay
Go to work at the earliest dawn
It's a weary life to be pleasing a wife
And chipping the marble bawn
When I came to your state, 'twas very late
'Bout 9 in the afternoon
The night being dark and me being strange
I knew not where to roam
I boarded a train, to West Rutland I came
Where the steam mill is always sawing
The beautiful stone, the like never was known
They call it the marble bawn
The Irish boys that fear no noise
Will stand on the rocks so brave
The sound of the drill will be never still
But echoing always in your ears
They'll stand in line like the wild geese flying
And they'll never be scolding or jawing
They're the very best boys that ever wore frays
For chipping the marble bawn
Now when you're dead and in your grave
With a stone at your head and feet
Your parents will lament and be discontent
And bitterly mourn and weep
Will be your doom to lie 'neath in your tomb
With a cross so bravely drawn
Your name enrolled and prayers for your soul
Engraven on the marble bawn
My song I'll end, success to each friend
That ere left the shamrock shore
May you live in peace with the Yankee race
And by each other be dearly adored
We are free in the land of liberty
No tyranny for us will be drawn
We'll sit at ease and sing the praise
Of West Rutland marble bawn

References

“Our History.” n.d. Vermont Marble Museum. https://vermontmarblemuseum.org/history-of-vermont-marble/.

Miglorie, Catherine. Vermont’s Marble Industry. Arcadia Publishing, 2013.

Safety Rules for Workers. Proctor, VT: Vermont Marble Co., 1934. Proctoriana Collection. Vermont Historical Society Leahy Library, Barre, VT.

Skerrett, Robert G. “Vermont’s Varied Marbles: Origin of These Age-Old Deposits and the Splendid Industry that has Developed in Exploiting Them” in Compressed Air Magazine, v. 31, 1926, Proctoriana Collection. Vermont Historical Society Leahy Library, Barre, VT.

Vermont Marble Company - Its Past and Future. Proctor, VT: Vermont Marble Co., 1920. Proctoriana Collection. Vermont Historical Society Leahy Library, Barre, VT.

Vermont State University Digital Archaeology Project. 2025. “Vermont Marble Industry Artifacts.” Sketchfab. https://sketchfab.com/VTSU3D/collections/vermont-marble-industry-artifacts-f1144df3275a4c4195236836986c7471.

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