This volume is an essential addition to the Bechers' body of work, devoted to their images of rock-processing plants and lime kilns taken in Germany, France, The Netherlands, Belgium, Switzerland, Austria, and Great Britain throughout the 1980s and '90s. Each structure is unique, its details dependent upon the region and the date of its construction, and the book features buildings whose essential function is ancient but remain important today. Although a small number of these images have been included in previous monographs, this is the first publication to showcase a comprehensive collection of the Bechers' study of stonework and lime kilns. Whether presenting single shots or their signature typological grids, the Bechers created a photographic testament to the industrial revolution that so emphatically shaped the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. At the same time, however, they also captured a much-older manufacturing tradition: the quarrying and processing of stones.

Lime is a white, powdery substance widely used in construction, agriculture, and industry. It is manufactured by heating limestone. Small amounts may be produced in an open fire but more effectively when enclosed. Early pits were lined with stone and in time enclosed in an oven or kiln. The 19th-century lime kiln, of Roman design, was a large "pot" dug into a hillside, surrounded by a stone box resembling a huge fireplace. Many thousands were built in the Susquehanna River valley. During settlement of "Penn's Woods," large tracts were subdivided many times, and by 1925 we find 12,000 farms in Lancaster County alone, and nearly every farmer wanted to produce his own lime to sweeten the fields and make mortar, plaster, and whitewash. In the most recent record, the 1875 county atlas, we find more than 500 kilns, a peak time for "do it yourself" lime burning. Commercialization relieved the farmer of the hard and dangerous work of lime burning, and the kilns fell idle around the turn of the century. Today we find evidence of 128 extant kilns in the county. Some are little more than remnants of former stonework, but others remain sturdy and sound. Their photos in this book reveal the art and labor of our ancestors who played a major role in the development of our nation.

Explores a lavishly illustrated look at an important part of our industrial history with Lime Kilns.

The Small Scale Vertical Shaft Lime Kiln covers in depth the design, construction, and operation of a particular type of lime kiln: a continuous, natural draught, mixed feed, vertical shaft kiln (VSK). The manual focuses on 'small-scale' production and is aimed at lime-burners, technologists and fieldworkers in developing countries, as well as those interested in burning lime on any scale.