2022-05-10_GENERAL DOCUMENTS - M1993041

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44 In 1880 E. S. Lyons settled in the area that was to be named after him. Recognizing the market for stones, he began quarrying and hauling to Longmont for shipment to Denver. Lyons also engaged in promotional and construction work in the Lyons area. The quarry business proved very successful and by 1900 it was the third largest stone producing region in the United States. The Romanesque Revival architectural movement of the 1880 and 1890s had a major effect on building materials. These houses often were large, "rambling, " structures of brick and sandstone with high pitched gable roofs. Public buildings adopted the Romanesque style with large, intricately laid stone work. Some of the architects designing in this style were H. T. E. Wandell and Frederick Sterns. One of the most popular purveyors of this style was H. A. Richardson whose style "Richardsonian" or "Richardsonian Romanesque" was popular in the Midwest and West. In addition to the characteristics described above, Richardson used heavy walls of stone, arches, French Romanesque and Byzantine motifs. Richardson's popularity in the 1880s was coincidental with the growth of cities and towns and with the stone quarrying operations at Lyons and elsewhere. In addition, the rural Italian style of the University of Colorado at Boulder made extensive use of Lyons quarried stone. Quarrying constituted a major industry near the Study Area. By the early 1900s, cement, which was strong and reasonably inexpensive, began to replace stone as a major building material. Cement plants developed in the Study Area, notably the Ideal Cement Company (later Ideal Basic) that purchased Dowe Flats in 1957. In 1969 Martin Marietta established a plant southeast of Lyons . (Personal Communication, E. E. Drake, former Corporate Secretary, Ideal Cement/Ideal Basic Industries) . In 1984, this became the Southdown plant that will utilize the Dowe Flats quarries. 2. 4 .6 The Great Depression and world War II, 1929-1945