(Historic images courtesy of Special Collections, UVM Library)
Marshall and Seward Jones began their monument granite industry on September 22, 1882. The firm was originally located in Boston, not Barre, and dealt in foreign granite (a light pinkish material from Scotland and darker granites from Sweden, Norway and Finland) as well as native granite from Quincy, Mass. Even after the Jones Brothers Company moved their base to Barre and began to specialize in monument and memorial production, they continued to import granite from Finland.
In 1884 Dayton Jones joined the firm as partner, followed by the admittance of the youngest brother, Hugh J. M. Jones, seven years later. In 1886, the Jones Brothers purchased from Mackie and Simpson a dark granite quarry on Millstone Hill just outside Barre. Sources indicate that this was the site of the first granite quarry of Robert Parker, who began the granite industry in Barre in 1781.
At the same time, the Jones Brothers began to rent the former Mackie and Simpson building and land on Granite Street in Barre to be used as a granite cutting plant. The granite was brought down from Millstone Hill to the cutting plant on Granite Street by horse-drawn wagons or sleds. In 1889, the Barre and Chelsea Railroad made this transportation of materials considerably easier by installing the "Sky Route," a rail line down the hill to the City of Barre from Millstone Hill. This four mile line was the steepest grade east of the Rocky Mountains.
Before 1891, granite was cut solely by man or horse power. In 1891, the Jones Brothers introduced the pneumatic tool to this industry, revolutionizing the granite cutting process. Previously, granite was primarily hand cut and polished with only the help of a few small machines brought over from Aberdeen. The 1894 purchase of the Jones Brothers rental property from Mackie and Sons carried included the rights as sole distributors to the Barre area of the McDonald Machine, a device used for cutting the flat surfaces of large stone. In 1898, the Jones Brothers Company added to their granite resources with the acquisition of the C.E. Tayton Granite Quarry, a quarry that produced light granite. The additional acquisition of the Wells-Lamson Quarry followed in 1907, after the Jones Brothers Company had moved to its present site. One source reports this quarry as depleted and abandoned in 1915, although a different source from 1942 claims that this quarry was still in use then. From its creation in 1882 until 1948, the Jones Brothers Company was a family run business. In 1948, Heber G. England, who had been involved on the company since 1927, took over as president though the family continued to retain shares. The company was bought out by Maurice Kelley in 1963, who eventually sold the Guardian Trademark to the company of Beck and Beck and shut down the Jones Brothers Company in 1975.
