Carolina Alumni Review - July/August 2011

cut into square-cornered blocks to build flat, formal walls suited to the gothic grandeur of its architecture. (So when you think of Duke, think of squares.) Carolina’s stone walls, composed of rocks as nature made them, give the campus a casual, rustic feel in keeping with its agrarian traditions. Several times, students have suggested smooth, flat caps for the walls, to make sitting easier or to save wear and tear on their stone-washed jeans. But Coleman says caps would spoil the rustic look of stone.

Maintaining a consistent look has gotten
tougher as Chatham stone becomes harder

A tree grows next to one of the taller walls, in the Forest Theatre area; a newer wall on the side of Memorial Hall has what Coleman says is out of step with the tradition — too-small stones that don’t seem to fit with larger ones; a low wall curves elegantly around the Memorial Grove ashes burial ground.

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Rocks in My Head

Last summer, to atone for 31 years of office work, I set about building a wall. I may have overdone it a little. I read, reread and memorized Stone Masonry by Kern, Magers and Penfield. Every day, I prowled the woods around my house, kicking the leaf mat for half-buried chunks of Chatham granite. When I found something promising, I pried it away from its bed in the soil, brushed off the spiders and ants, and lugged or rolled it to the site. By late July, I had rounded up several hundred candidates and sorted them by shape (round, flat, wedge). I laid out dimensions with batter boards and string, dug below the frost line, spread gravel for drainage and began to wrestle rocks.

I wanted to build a wall like the oldest ones on campus — dry-stacked, without mortar. It was very slow going, at first. Each time I laid a new stone it conspired with its neighbors to pose a geometry problem with no apparent solution. Imagine solving a giant jigsaw puzzle in three dimensions, except the pieces weigh as much as family members. I must have hoisted, tested and rejected 10 stones for every one I placed. I learned them all by heart.

The job consumed eight weeks, spanning the worst of a heat wave. Most days, I worked from dawn till noon, took a breather and went at it again until dark. My back held up just fine, but I destroyed six pairs of work gloves. It was filthy, brutal toil, and I loved it. Rocks don’t equivocate. They fit and bear weight or they don’t. Gravity is the boss. Gravity has the final say.

What did I gain from all this? A modest but sturdy stone wall that weathered the winter intact and now retains several tons of soil for my rose garden. Best of all, I have a ready supply of leftovers — misfits that never found a home. They loiter at the foot of a hickory tree, nagging me to start another wall.