Tyndall Stone is a registered trademark name by Gillis Quarries Ltd. Tyndall Stone is a

dolomitic Dolomite () is an anhydrous carbonate mineral composed of calcium magnesium carbonate, ideally The term is also used for a sedimentary carbonate rock composed mostly of the mineral dolomite. An alternative name sometimes used for the dolomiti ...

limestone Limestone ( calcium carbonate ) is a type of carbonate sedimentary rock which is the main source of the material lime. It is composed mostly of the minerals calcite and aragonite, which are different crystal forms of . Limestone forms whe ...

that is

quarried A quarry is a type of open-pit mining, open-pit mine in which dimension stone, rock (geology), rock, construction aggregate, riprap, sand, gravel, or slate is excavated from the ground. The operation of quarries is regulated in some juri ...

from the Selkirk Member of the

Ordovician The Ordovician ( ) is a geologic period and System (geology), system, the second of six periods of the Paleozoic Era (geology), Era. The Ordovician spans 41.6 million years from the end of the Cambrian Period million years ago (Mya) to the start ...

Red River Formation The Red River Formation is a stratigraphical unit of Late Ordovician age in the Williston Basin. It takes the name from the Red River of the North, and was first described in outcrop in the Tyndall Stone quarries and along the Red River Valley ...

in the vicinity of Garson and

Tyndall Tyndall (the original spelling, also Tyndale, "Tindol", Tyndal, Tindoll, Tindall, Tindal, Tindale, Tindle, Tindell, Tindill, and Tindel) is the name of an English family taken from the land they held as tenants in chief of the Kings of Engla ...

Manitoba Manitoba ( ) is a Provinces and territories of Canada, province of Canada at the Centre of Canada, longitudinal centre of the country. It is Canada's Population of Canada by province and territory, fifth-most populous province, with a population o ...

, Canada. It is a cream-coloured limestone with a pervasive mottling of darker dolomite. The mottling gives the rock a tapestry-like effect, and it is popular for use as a building and ornamental stone.Glass, D.J. (editor) 1997. Lexicon of Canadian Stratigraphy, vol. 4, Western Canada including eastern British Columbia, Alberta, Saskatchewan and southern Manitoba. Canadian Society of Petroleum Geologists, Calgary, 1423 p. on CD-ROM. . Tyndall Stone is highly

fossil A fossil (from Classical Latin , ) is any preserved remains, impression, or trace of any once-living thing from a past geological age. Examples include bones, shells, exoskeletons, stone imprints of animals or microbes, objects preserved ...

iferous and the fossils contribute to its aesthetic appeal. It contains numerous fossil

gastropods The gastropods (), commonly known as snails and slugs, belong to a large taxonomic class of invertebrates within the phylum Mollusca called Gastropoda (). This class comprises snails and slugs from saltwater, from freshwater, and from land. Ther ...

brachiopod Brachiopods (), phylum Brachiopoda, are a phylum of trochozoan animals that have hard "valves" (shells) on the upper and lower surfaces, unlike the left and right arrangement in bivalve molluscs. Brachiopod valves are hinged at the rear end, w ...

cephalopod A cephalopod is any member of the molluscan class Cephalopoda (Greek plural , ; "head-feet") such as a squid, octopus, cuttlefish, or nautilus. These exclusively marine animals are characterized by bilateral body symmetry, a prominent head ...

trilobite Trilobites (; meaning "three lobes") are extinct marine arthropods that form the class Trilobita. Trilobites form one of the earliest-known groups of arthropods. The first appearance of trilobites in the fossil record defines the base of the At ...

coral Corals are marine invertebrates within the class Anthozoa of the phylum Cnidaria. They typically form compact colonies of many identical individual polyps. Coral species include the important reef builders that inhabit tropical oceans and sec ...

s, stromatoporoids, and others. The mottling results from burrowing by marine creatures that occurred during and shortly after limestone deposition. The identity of the burrowing organisms is not known, but fossil burrows of this type have been given the name ''

Thalassinoides ''Thalassinoides'' is an ichnogenus of trace fossil used to refer to "dichotomously or T-branched boxworks, mazes and shafts, unlined and unornamented". Facies of ''Thalassinoides'' increased suddenly in abundance at the beginning of the Mesozoic ...

''. Tyndall Stone was first used in 1832 for building

Lower Fort Garry Lower Fort Garry was built in 1830 by the Hudson's Bay Company on the western bank of the Red River, north of the original Fort Garry (now in Winnipeg, Manitoba, Canada). Treaty 1 was signed there. A devastating flood destroyed Fort Garry in ...

, and has since become popular for building purposes throughout

Canada Canada is a country in North America. Its ten provinces and three territories extend from the Atlantic Ocean to the Pacific Ocean and northward into the Arctic Ocean, covering over , making it the world's second-largest country by tot ...

and the

United States The United States of America (U.S.A. or USA), commonly known as the United States (U.S. or US) or America, is a country primarily located in North America. It consists of 50 states, a federal district, five major unincorporated territorie ...

. The

Canadian Parliament Buildings The Canadian Parliament Buildings are the parliament buildings housing the Parliament of Canada, located on Parliament Hill, Ottawa, Ontario, Canada. Parliament Buildings The Parliament Buildings are three edifices arranged around three sides ...

Ottawa, Ontario Ottawa (, ; Canadian French: ) is the capital city of Canada. It is located at the confluence of the Ottawa River and the Rideau River in the southern portion of the province of Ontario. Ottawa borders Gatineau, Quebec, and forms the core ...

, the

Saskatchewan Legislative Building The Saskatchewan Legislative Building is located in Regina, Saskatchewan, Canada, and houses the Legislative Assembly of Saskatchewan. History The Saskatchewan Legislative Building was built between 1908 and 1912 in the Beaux Arts style to a d ...

Regina, Saskatchewan Regina () is the capital city of the Provinces and territories of Canada, Canadian province of Saskatchewan. The city is the second-largest in the province, after Saskatoon, and is a commercial centre for southern Saskatchewan. As of the 2021 C ...

, the

University of Saskatchewan A university () is an institution of higher (or tertiary) education and research which awards academic degrees in several academic disciplines. Universities typically offer both undergraduate and postgraduate programs. In the United States, t ...

Saskatoon, Saskatchewan Saskatoon () is the largest city in the Canadian province of Saskatchewan. It straddles a bend in the South Saskatchewan River in the central region of the province. It is located along the Trans-Canada Yellowhead Highway, and has served as t ...

, the Federal Public Building in

Edmonton, Alberta Edmonton ( ) is the capital city of the Canadian province of Alberta. Edmonton is situated on the North Saskatchewan River and is the centre of the Edmonton Metropolitan Region, which is surrounded by Alberta's central region. The city anchor ...

, the

Canadian Museum of History The Canadian Museum of History (french: Musée canadien de l’histoire) is a national museum on anthropology, Canadian history, cultural studies, and ethnology in Gatineau, Quebec, Canada. The purpose of the museum is to promote the heritage of C ...

Gatineau, Quebec Gatineau ( ; ) is a city in western Quebec, Canada. It is located on the northern bank of the Ottawa River, immediately across from Ottawa, Ontario. Gatineau is the largest city in the Outaouais administrative region and is part of Canada's ...

, the

Manitoba Legislative Building The Manitoba Legislative Building (french: Palais législatif du Manitoba), originally named the Manitoba Parliament Building, is the meeting place of the Legislative Assembly of Manitoba, located in central Winnipeg, as well as being the twelfth pr ...

Winnipeg, Manitoba Winnipeg () is the capital and largest city of the province of Manitoba in Canada. It is centred on the confluence of the Red and Assiniboine rivers, near the longitudinal centre of North America. , Winnipeg had a city population of 749,6 ...

, the Empress Hotel in

Victoria, British Columbia Victoria is the capital city of the Canadian province of British Columbia, on the southern tip of Vancouver Island off Canada's Pacific coast. The city has a population of 91,867, and the Greater Victoria area has a population of 397,237. Th ...

, les Apartements Le Chateau in

Montreal, Quebec Montreal ( ; officially Montréal, ) is the second-most populous city in Canada and most populous city in the Canadian province of Quebec. Founded in 1642 as '' Ville-Marie'', or "City of Mary", it is named after Mount Royal, the triple-pea ...

and many others include Tyndall Stone in their construction. The Tyndall Stone quarry is operated by Gillis Quarries Ltd. and is located approximately 40 kilometres northeast of

. The quarry has been in operation, and owned by the same family, since 1910.

Cultural reference

Author

Carol Shields Carol Ann Shields, (née Warner; June 2, 1935 – July 16, 2003) was an American-born Canadian novelist and short story writer. She is best known for her 1993 novel ''The Stone Diaries'', which won the U.S. Pulitzer Prize for Fiction as well as ...

described Tyndall Stone in her

Pulitzer Prize The Pulitzer Prize () is an award for achievements in newspaper, magazine, online journalism, literature, and musical composition within the United States. It was established in 1917 by provisions in the will of Joseph Pulitzer, who had made h ...

winning

novel A novel is a relatively long work of narrative fiction, typically written in prose and published as a book. The present English word for a long work of prose fiction derives from the for "new", "news", or "short story of something new", itsel ...

, '' The Stone Diaries''.

References

External links

{{Wiktionary
Tyndall Stone at Manitoba Industry, Economic Development and Mines

Tyndall Stone® at Geological Survey of Canada

GeoCache of Tyndall Stone® building with fossil descriptions
Quarrying Limestone Dolomite (rock) Building stone Architecture in Canada Stratigraphy of Manitoba Geologic formations of Canada