Hokie Stone is a grey dolomite limestone named for the Hokie mascot of Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University where the stone is the primary finishing material on campus buildings. Hokie Stone is limestone infused with magnesium and calcium under intense pressure and temperature. Formation of the stone began 450 million years ago when local area was covered by a shallow sea.[1] Hokie Stone with impurities such as siltstone and sandstone is multi-colored, and found on some of the newer structures. Although use of Hokie Stone can add as much as $1 million to the cost of a building, Virginia Tech remains committed to its use in all future construction.[1]
Eighty percent of the stone is quarried from a 40-acre (160,000 m2) Virginia Tech-owned quarry a few miles from campus near the Highland Park subdivision of Blacksburg, Virginia.[1] Twenty-five to thirty Virginia Tech employees use black powder each day to dislodge the stone into block sizes required by campus construction projects and finish the blocks by hand using hammers and chisels. In 2010 Virginia Tech upgraded the equipment at the quarry in order to reduce costs, including a computer-driven saw.[1] Hokie Stone from this quarry can only be sold to Virginia Tech.[1] The remaining 10% of stone, which is black is mined once per year from an additional quarry located on a local farm near Lusters Gate. About 50 tons can be quarried each week.[1] The university-owned quarry has been in operation since the 1950s.[2][3]
When the university was founded in 1872, buildings were simple brick constructions, reflecting the architecture of Blacksburg at that time. The first Hokie Stone was cut in 1899 for the YMCA Building (now the Performing Arts Building) was the first to be constructed of Hokie Stone. In 1971 McBryde Hall introduced the Hokie Stone clad neo-gothic style (similar to many old European universities) which became the official architecture of the campus.[1] The native woodland Indians are believed to have made tools from Hokie Stone.[1] During the 1960s and 1970s, concrete and brick structures absent of Hokie Stone such as Dietrick Hall and Cassell Coliseum were built. In 1975 the Tech Foundation bought the quarry from the local Cupp family.[1] In 1983 the Virginia Tech Board of Visitors required that some Hokie Stone be incorporated into the construction of every new building on campus.[4] Today each campus project uses an average of 1,500 tons of Hokie Stone, with each ton of stone covering only 30-35 square feet.[2][4]
In additional to building exteriors, Hokie Stone is used in important monuments such as biographical markers outside each campus building providing a brief history of the person for whom the building is named. Thirty-two Hokie Stones were quarried by university stonemasons and engraved with the names of students and professors killed in the April 2007 school shooting. The memorial is a permanent version of one created spontaneously by students with smaller stones.[5] The Virginia Tech football team enters the playing field through a tunnel with an exit topped by a block of Hokie Stone which is touched by each player.[6] In 2011, Virginia Tech even offered Hokie Stone as an option for the centerpiece of class rings.[7]