Looking for New England stonewalls...

[JCitron]

Does anyone know if there's anything like this on the DLS or elsewhere?

These stone walls are ubiquitous to my area in New England and mark the property lines of many old farms, and are seen along many, many backroads today. They are made of local stones, mostly granite and quartzite which have been piled neatly on top of each other as can be seen in the photo above.

 

[ministerfarrigut]

There is a spline asset called Dry Stone Wall. It looks a lot like the wall in your picture. I'm not sure if it's exactly the one you are looking for, but that's what I've got. Hope I helped.

 

[JCitron]

There is a spline asset called Dry Stone Wall. It looks a lot like the wall in your picture. I'm not sure if it's exactly the one you are looking for, but that's what I've got. Hope I helped.

Thanks. I'll check that out.

 

[Roy3b3]

Does anyone know if there's anything like this on the DLS or elsewhere?




These stone walls are ubiquitous to my area in New England and mark the property lines of many old farms, and are seen along many, many backroads today. They are made of local stones, mostly granite and quartzite which have been piled neatly on top of each other as can be seen in the photo above.

Hey John,

Clam has a number of dry stone walls on the DLS. See under "CL Wall Stone"

Cheers mate,
Roy

 

[edh6]

Also look at the assets with names beginning "MLK DSD" by masontaylor, which are a Scottish style dry stone wall.

 

[Ghost42]

Does anyone know if there's anything like this on the DLS or elsewhere?

These stone walls are ubiquitous to my area in New England and mark the property lines of many old farms, and are seen along many, many backroads today. They are made of local stones, mostly granite and quartzite which have been piled neatly on top of each other as can be seen in the photo above.

'settle and Carlisle' runs through dry stone wall country, could be worth checking, the pattern can be regional.

 

[JCitron]

I'll check out those assets, which I probably already have installed. Heck, I probably have the complete DLS installed!

These are very regional, but very predominant in the Colonies in New England. They were used right through the 19th century as well and surround many farms and properties even today, though sadly many are disused and poorly maintained. My old house Victorian farmhouse ca. 1874 had one between our neighbor's property and along the back end, which was in excellent condition. The one in the front of the property, however, had fallen down and was turned into a garden. Overall they're not very tall, maybe a foot or two high, and are made from glacier stones dug up from the farm as the farmers were ploughing their fields. New England is notoriously rocky and even digging a few inches into the ground is painfully slow in some places.

Thanks!

John

 

[ministerfarrigut]

No problem. You may already have the one I suggested.

 

[Bill69]

Also look at the assets with names beginning "MLK DSD" by masontaylor, which are a Scottish style dry stone wall.

Yes but in Scotland it is called a "Dry Stane Dyke"

Cheers,
Bill69

 

[JCitron]

I'm sorry to say these assets are not quite what I'm looking for.

Thanks for your help anyway.

 

[clam1952]

Mine are all stone block type walls not roundish ones, try Jankvis's new ones just up loaded a few days back.

 

[JCitron]

Mine are all stone block type walls not roundish ones, try Jankvis's new ones just up loaded a few days back.

Thank you, Malc. I'll check those out.

Yeah. The English walls are a bit to uniform while ours are nothing more than local stones piled up along the property line.

 

[TSwenson]

John,
You hit this one right out of the park....

New England is notoriously rocky and even digging a few inches into the ground is painfully slow in some places.

These ubiquitous walls are almost as iconic a feature of New England as the white churches and are more prominent as one gets into rural areas.
There are actually several types of walls, the two chief differences being that the stones are piled (dropped in place.. ish...) or laid [set intentionally with skill] and these reflect the purpose of the walls. The broad piled wall is a field border to mark the property and results from the accumulation of debris from farm fields chiefly rocks, but not limited to that, and can include stumps and other large debris. The other chief type is a laid wall and is a planed construct to contain and tend to have been narrower and taller when they were built. The laid wall does in fact require some skill to build correctly and the British influences can be found in them in addition to local variations. There are actually a number of books on the subject and can be a fun diversion to read (more so if you work trying to repair and rebuild said walls).

T. Swenson

 

[JCitron]

John,
You hit this one right out of the park....



These ubiquitous walls are almost as iconic a feature of New England as the white churches and are more prominent as one gets into rural areas.
There are actually several types of walls, the two chief differences being that the stones are piled (dropped in place.. ish...) or laid [set intentionally with skill] and these reflect the purpose of the walls. The broad piled wall is a field border to mark the property and results from the accumulation of debris from farm fields chiefly rocks, but not limited to that, and can include stumps and other large debris. The other chief type is a laid wall and is a planed construct to contain and tend to have been narrower and taller when they were built. The laid wall does in fact require some skill to build correctly and the British influences can be found in them in addition to local variations. There are actually a number of books on the subject and can be a fun diversion to read (more so if you work trying to repair and rebuild said walls).

T. Swenson

Hey thank you for that information. I no longer have walls like that on my property. Heck my house is 92 years newer being built in 1966. I never knew there were several different kinds of walls, although I have seen the neater ones near some houses in areas such as West Newbury and Newbury out to Newburyport along Route 113. These homes range from the 1680's through the 1790's with some as late as the 1810's.

These walls, if you're into metal detecting are a great source of coins and other artifacts. My brother is a detectorist and has found some interesting artifacts along the walls and old hunting paths that follow them. These items include some Colonial period pennies (large cents), and much later bullets, musket balls, and some "newer" coins. The walls I suppose were great resting spots on hunts and people dropped their pocket loads as they rustled about.

But back to topic... We still don't have anything like the old piled stone ones on the DLS or as DLC. I had to make use of some of the old UK walls in places.

 

[TSwenson]

John,

I used to work landscaping around Acton (MA) in the late 80's/early 90's and did work on a fair number of stone walls, as well as having a keen interest in history and architecture, and learned a fair bit about them. At the time I found several books on the subject at the local library but couldn't now tell you the names thereof (some thirty years later). I'm sure your local library has or can get plenty of books on the subject and as I recall Newbury may be part of the regional (Minuteman?) library group that Acton is in. I have lived in Maine for the last 25 years now and am not as connected to the area as I used to be.

On subject... The traditions of stone wall building came from the UK along with the settlers from those areas with noticeable influences from specific regions. Many walls were removed when agriculture was mechanized (as I'm sure was the case in the UK and Europe) as the size of fields changed; from a day by a team of horse or oxen, to a day by tractor. However some of the older larger conservation areas can provide a look at historic field sizes as opposed to the "modern" post mechanization field sizes seen today. I'm currently working on a route representing New England scenery and have found <kuid2:425700:100128:1> CL Wall Stone - 03 to be a fair "stand in" at a distance as its irregular top gives the bumpy gray line look we are familiar with.

Tangentally... New England has some serious iconic looks in its architecture. From the white clapboard churches and stone walls to the large brick mills of places like Lowell, there are many structures that say you are in New England. One of my favorites is the connected farmhouse and barn some times known locally as "big house, little house, back house, barn" and was a way of making a small (New England) farm more competitive against larger farms in places like the Midwest.

Perhaps one of these days I'll learn the graphics programs to make some of these for Trainz, but until then we can only hope to interest some of the wonderful content creators in this unique area.

Thor

 

[Forester1]

Something happened to the original posted image....