One hundred years ago, Roald Amundsen and four men didn’t reach the South Pole. They came close. The spot where they left a tent with notes to Robert Scott and a letter for King Haakon VII of Norway was less than two miles from the pole but it is not clear if they actually crossed that mythic spot of 90 degrees South.

I am certainly no expert on this subject. My posting derives from an article written as part of the run up to the centenary of Amundsen and Scott’s great race: “The present location of the tent that Roald Amundsen left behind at the South Pole in December 1911,” by Olav Orheim. It was published in the Polar Record, Vol. 47, No. 242, 2011.

On December 14, 1911, Amundsen wrote in his journal, “So, we arrived, and were able to raise our flag at the geographical South Pole…Naturally we are not exactly at the point called 90°, but after all our excellent observations and dead reckonings we must be very close.” For the next three days, Amundsen and his men took regular readings to determine their location. They also skied methodically around the spot to ensure that someone crossed the mythic point of 90 degrees south. Amundsen’s journal for December 18 reads, “It is very difficult to arrive at a definitive result. But we can say with certainty that we are south of 89°59’.”

So where did they end up? Orheim refers to two previous calculations in his paper. Anton Alexander, an expert on maritime navigation for the Norwegian Hydrographic Service, published information in Amundsen’s account of his trek (1913). He wrote that on December 14, the five men were at 89°53’50’ S, 103°E, and on December 17, at the spot where they erected their tent, they had reached 89°58’30” S, 60° E. Maximum error was 3 kilometers. Orheim also referenced an article by Arthur R. Hinks in from The Geographical Journal, Vol. 103, No. 4, April 44, “The Observations of Amundsen and Scott and the South pole.” Hinks placed the tent slightly closer, at 89°58’45” S, 71°36’ E. Maximum error was .32 km.

Orheim’s goal was not to determine where Amundsen had been but where his tent now was. He based his analysis on GPS data, which shows that the glacier located under the Amundsen-South Pole Station is moving at a rate of 9.98 meters per year along the 40°46’56” west longitudinal meridian. This places the tent about 170 meters closer to the pole at 89°58’51” S, 46°14’ E.

He also looks at how snow has buried Amundsen’s tent. Based on two different averages, as well a compaction factor, he concludes that it now lies under 17 meters of accumulated snow and ice. He concludes that it will probably never be seen again.

I am not trying to cast aspersions on Amundsen and his men and his dogs. What they did was incredible and they may in fact have crossed over the pole at some point during their three day of skiing and observing. Mostly I wanted to try and find a way to mention Orheim’s work, which I think is pretty darned nifty.

 

Just came across a wonderful posting about building stone in Hamilton, Ontario, Canada. It is written by Gerard Middleton, a retired sedimentologist, who taught at McMaster University in Hamilton for 41 years. Since retiring he has devoted himself to the history of geology and in particular to knitting together the stories of stone in Hamilton. He got his start when approached by the people developing “Ruthven,” an old stone mansion on the banks of the Grand River, near Cayuga in southern Ontario. They wanted help identifying the source of the stone. This proved so interesting that he began to investigate all of the stone in buildings within a day’s drive from Hamilton.

Since then Gerard has given talks about his work and started to publish his findings. This includes cowriting a guidebook, Niagara Rocks, Building Stone, History and Wine, and helping Nina Perksins Chapple on her A Heritage in Stone: Buildings of the Niagara Peninsula, Fergus and Elora, Guelph, Region of Waterloo, Cambridge, Paris, Ancaster-Dundas-Flamborough, Hamilton and St. Mary’s. In all of his work, he does a fine job of describing the history and geology, making each accessible to non-specialists.

I look forward to more of Gerard’s splendid studies of building stone.

 

Stone or Rock? Is there a difference? Working on my new book has forced me to consider this question and its implications. Throughout the book, I use the terms interchangeably, based mostly on how they sound or how frequently I used one or the other.

When I did a bit of searching on the web, I found that some people thought that stone was more British; that rock could be hard and soft, whereas stone was always hard; that stones are smooth and rocks rough; and that stones are small and rocks are big. In his wonderful book, Stone by Stone, Robert Thorson writes “Rock is raw material in situ. Stone usually connotes either human handling or human use, although it can also be used to describe naturally produced fragments of rock larger than a cobble.”

Seeking a more erudite source, I turned to one of my favorite books, the Oxford English Dictionary (OED), to get the fine opinion of its worthy editors. The first definition for rock is “A large rugged mass of hard mineral material or stone.” Its first use comes from Old English, dated at 950-1100. The OED defines stone as “A piece of rock or hard mineral substance of a small or moderate size,” first used in 825. Now, I see the difference!

Curiously, the word stonerock, defined as “A pointed or projecting rock, a peak, a crag; a detached mass of rock, a boulder or large stone,” predates either of the singular words stone or rock. Stonerock, or stanrocces, as it was spelled, dates from the Early Old English, used from 600 to 950. I am not sure that this clarifies my quest but as is the norm for the OED, I got sucked into the many definitions and uses, which run to three pages for rock, including rock nosing, rockchuck, and rock-embosomed; and four and a half for stone, with such nifty combinations as stone harmonicon, stone-pock, and stone-toter.

Perhaps I could find a bit of clarity from on high. In the King James Bible, stone and rock seemed interchangeable, such as in Genesis 31:46, where we read of Jacob telling his brethren to “Gather stones; and they took stones, and made an heap.” (Now why they didn’t just say cairn here is beyond me!) But there are two situations where stone and rock cannot be substituted for one another. The first is the surprisingly common pastime (at least a dozen times) where somebody must “stone them/him/her with stones.” You can “stone them with rocks” but no matter how tin your ear is you cannot “rock them with rocks,” which allows for the introduction of this silly phrase: you can, at least since the 1960s, “rock them with The Stones.”

More common than death by stone is the affirmation of a Holy Being as the “rock of one’s salvation.” This sense highlights a central difference between the words. People often use rock to refer to something solid, large, grounded, substantial, something to base your faith upon, such as a mountain or palisade. No one would say the “stone of one’s salvation.” Stone, while connoting a hard mineral substance, favors smaller objects, such as something you can pick up in your hands, for example, the stones for the heap gathered by Jacob’s pals.

Seeking out an even higher authority I turned to Shakespeare. He also incorporated stone and rock into his writings, more than 115 times and 50 times, respectively (which includes the plural forms.) One of his most famous uses comes from As You Like It, in the banished Duke’s ode to a new forested life “And this our life exempt from public haunt/Finds tongues in trees, books in the running brooks,/Sermons in stones and good in every thing.” Clearly the Bard chose stone for the alliteration and sound, as he did in Titus Andronicus, where the title character states “A stone is soft as wax,—tribunes more hard than stones; A stone is silent, and offendeth not.” (One of my favorite poets, Robinson Jeffers, refers to the “insolent quietness of stone.”)

Shakespeare’s use of rock was often specific to the sea, as something to fear. “Rocks threaten us with wreck.” “And then there is the peril of waters, winds and rocks.” “Alas, the sea hath cast me on the rocks.” No one, especially one with Shakespeare’s gifts, would substitute stone in these situations. Again, his use of rock reflects the idea that rock refers to massive, immovable matter, though this idea does not limit rock to this definition.

I cannot end my consideration of these two terms without turning to one final source of inspiration, that of big time wrestling, or “rassling,” as one former National Park superintendent called it. I refer to the two icons of that theater, The Rock and Stone Cold Steve Austin. Surely these two men illustrate the differences between the two words.

Ultimately, I have concluded that there is some difference between the terms. I agree with Thorson that stone more often implies some sort of human use. Stone also does seem restricted to smaller material. But rock can also be used in these situations. In this sense all rocks are stones but not all stones are rocks. Clear as mud.

 

I am not normally known as a style guru but today I want to impart what I hear is the latest in the world of kitchen design. Apparently, granite countertops are on their way out. Where did I pick up this shocking tidbit? None other than the ever up-to-date Home section of yesterday’s New York Times. According to Evan Nussbaum of Stone Source “people have become a little sick of the traditional speckled granite look.”

I was shocked to read this. (Of course, we have kept our retro white Formica countertop, long suspecting that speckled was over rated.) You may wonder what are the new stones that are titillating those in the know. First is quartzite, a stone that “tends to give you the drama” of marble but without that pesky “acid sensitivity.” What else could you desire in a countertop? Now, whether these quartzite are true quartzites is hard to tell, as names in the building trade mostly reflect the whims of marketers and less the reality of geologists.

Quartzite is a metamorphosed sandstone that can consist of as much as 99% quartz. It is usually extremely hard. One place where is what used as a building tone is in Sioux Falls, South Dakota. It has a lovely pink hue.

Two additional contenders are basalt and schist, described as providing “a monolithic-gray, minimal-looking countertop.” Again, it is unclear what these stones are. Schist is another metamorphic rock, usually identified by the alignment of minerals such as mica. I came across one popular variety, Pietra Cardosa, listed as a schist, quartzite, slate, limestone, and granite, which actually makes it an ideal stone to use because you can call it what you what depending on what sort of fashion statement you want to make.

I think it’s great that we are seeing these new rock types becoming trendy. Any time the language of geologists can enter the popular lexicon is good. Stay tuned for more style updates.

 

Following up my last post, I wanted to turn to bird houses made of stone. These were designed by Italian designer Raffaello Galiotto in cooperation with Arredo di Pietra. I learned about them from a nifty site, Stone-Ideas.com. Galiotto and his design team also produced houses for other beasts, including dogs.

The houses are made of travertine, one of the most commonly used building stones in the world. Because of the potential for diseases, each house has been treated with a protective coating. Known as the Redoxstone system, it is made of nano-particles of titanium dioxide or titanium (IV) oxide. According to the Stone-Ideas web site, ” This naturally occurring oxide of titanium can oxidize oxygen and organic materials directly giving it sterilizing, deodorizing and anti-fouling properties.” I imagine that this will make the birds happy.

I do wonder how birds will take to these beautiful houses and whether the human owners would want birds dirtying these works of art. Please let me know if you order one and who visits it.