An 83-ton block of granite is en route to Southern Adventist University. This is the largest stone ever shipped out of Vermont, according to the Rock of Ages quarry.
It will arrive in Collegedale by train, where a crane will place the stone on a special tractor-trailer made to accommodate heavy loads. The stone will then be transported to the sculpture worksite at Southern, where it will stand 20 feet tall.
The block is Barre granite, the hardest rock known to man. Using a special technique, it will be chiseled to form the second figure in a public work of art for the university campus. The sculpture will portray the Biblical account of Elijah passing the mantle to Elisha, symbolizing passing knowledge from the old generation to the young.
The sculptor, Wayne Hazen, dean of the School of Visual Art and Design, began “Passing the Mantle” in 2001, when the stone for the first figure arrived. That stone weighed 40 tons.