American Experience

Interview with Mr. Garavelli, Stonecutter

Interviewee: Mr. Garavelli
Age: In his fifties
Ethnicity: Italian
Occupation: Stonecutter
Location: Barre, Vermont
Interviewer: John Lynch

Interview Excerpt: "Is the dust bad in the stonesheds?"

It was tough for everybody in the early days. Lots of stonecutters die from the silica. Now they've got new and better equipment; they've all got to use the suctions. It helps a lot; but it ain't perfect. Men still die. You bet your life my kid don't go to work in no stoneshed. Silica, that's what kills them. Everybody who stays in granite, it gets... I don't get so much of it myself. Maybe I'm smart. I don't make so much money, but I don't get so much silica. In my end of the shed there ain't so much dust. I can laugh at the damn granite because it can't touch me. That's me. I ain't got no money, but I ain't got no silica either. My end of the shed don't get so much dust. It's like a knife, you know, that silica. Like a knife in your chest.

Excerpt from the Library of Congress, Manuscript Division, WPA Federal Writer's Project Collection, Transcript #38021309.

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