The stone arrives for the Charles City commission of "Girl Reading"

Vessels Trucking - that's Leon Vessels, owner over on the right watching- delivers the rock for the Charles City job.

The raw block is much larger than I need so sections need to be removed. First of all a large section needs to be
removed so that the locally available crane can remove it from the truck. Don drills holes and puts in feathers and wedges in order to spit off the section of stone.

The wedges are hammered in until the stone cracks.

The crane arrives and we remove the stone from the truck to steel wheeled cart next to the shop.

Using the model, it was determined which sections would need to be removed using the chain saw. If we didn't have the saw I would have taken the stone to a sawyer in Bedford Indiana to make the necessary cuts to this piece. Although I couldn't have had the first right angle cut made there, they would only be able to cut curners off.

Don takes the saw across the face of the block, cutting the maximum depth of 18"

Then he makes another cut from the top. There will be an area in the middle of the stone that is not cut, but wedges and a hammer will form a break across that section of stone.

Don hammers in the wedge

After the remaining stone has broken, Don can lever off the section of stone. Going...

Going..

gone.