Pink Domes of Texas Pride EarthCache

GRANITE MOUNTAIN THE COMMUNITY: Granite Mountain was on the Austin and Northwestern Railroad and Farm Road 1431 three miles west of Marble Falls in southwestern Burnet County. It grew as a result of the quarries at nearby Granite Mountain. A post office called Granite was established there in 1886 with Nimrod Norton as postmaster. The post office name was changed to Granite Mountain in 1890. The Granite Mountain and Marble Falls City Railroad was chartered in October 1889 and constructed by the Austin and Northwestern Railroad Company; the new track provided easier access to the quarries by the following year. In the early 1890s Granite Mountain had a population of sixty; among the companies working in the community were the Texas Capital Granite Company, the Texas and New York Granite Company, and the Galveston Construction Company. The Granite Mountain post office was discontinued in 1911, and mail for the community was sent to Marble Falls. The number of residents was reported at twenty-five in 1933, at seventy-five in 1943, and at thirty in 1945; no population estimates were available after the 1940s. BIBLIOGRAPHY: Darrell Debo, Burnet County History (2 vols., Burnet, Texas: Eakin, 1979).

THE BATHOLITH: Granite Mountain is a solid dome of pink granite (pink granite is also known as Sunset Red) rising over 860 feet one mile west of Marble Falls, Texas. Since quarry operations began in the late 19th century, the distinctive pink-red colored rock has been used in the construction of the Texas State Capitol in Austin, Texas, and also for the construction of the Galveston Seawall. The mountain no longer looks like a geographic feature because of the heavy mining, which has fully covered its surface. A similar but much larger area known as Enchanted Rock State Natural Area can be seen in its undisturbed state west of Marble Falls near Fredericksburg, Texas. (Wikipedia)

GRANITE Granite is a type of igneous rock formed from the magma that consists of quartz, mica and feldspar with colors ranging from pink to gray. It forms from the slow crystallization of magma below the earth's surface. The grains are large enough to be easily seen with the naked eye. It is often used in construction due to its massive, durable, and hard properties including sculpture, memorials, building and curling stones. It is easily polished to a high lustre which also lends it well to use as both and interior and exterior surface. This particular batholith, along with Enchanted Rock is part of the Llano Uplift, a series of granite formations that took shape in the Precambrian era in central Texas. It is surrounded by metamorphic Packsaddle schist, into which it originally intruded. It was then covered by sedimentary Edwards limestone which was formed during the Cretaceous period. Over the ages, erosion exposed the hard granite surface to the surface as the softer sedimentary and metamorphic rocks were worn away.