An almost forgotten wall.
The National Institute of Standards campus in Gaithersburg, MD is hiding in plain sight. I have driven by the main gate dozens of times over the years on my way to the MVA and have probably been too distracted and grouchy to realize there was anything there but trees and cheeseburger wrappers on the side of I-270.
After making an appointment and checking in at the visitors’ center, I drove through gunmetal gray checkpoint. The campus is so vast and the buildings so indistinct that the friendly staff in the Visitor Center needs a stack of maps that they highlight with a marker to get you where you have to go.
I met the NIST engineer, Paul Stutzman, in the lobby of Building 226, not a very poetic name for a building, but apt for the nondescript edifice. We hopped in my car, as the wall was not a quick walk from 226. The campus consists of wide open spaces, undulating hills of mown grass, a few large trees and drab rectangular buildings. We drove past a particle laboratory building that is tucked behind and earth berm lined with huge boulders that look more like a tactical barrier than landscaping as the surrounding tall ornamental grasses might have you beilieve. Then we passed a gargantuan metal cube with enormous ducts emanating from the roof and running in different purposeful directions; the scale of the ductwork makes the huge building somewhat resemble a home attic hvac system, but big. Very big. It is the fire testing facility. When this building was completed, the highlight of the holiday parrty was when a Christmas tree was torched. Note to self: get invited to the NIST Christmas party this year!
The road curves through a hollow and rises past the Fire Test Laboratory and dead ends almost at the top of a hill. I parked next to a large pile of stone rubble left over from some construction project elsewhere on campus. Paul said that the rubble replaced a huge tangle of twisted steel girders that had been placed there right after 9/11. Twin Tower steel sent to NIST for testing. At the crest of the hill, 75 yards from the parking spot sits a lonely wall.
No trees are there to give the test wall shade. No structures are nearby to soften the wind or the rain. This multicolored patchwork of stone from all over the country and the world stands at attention to receive whatever mother nature feels like dishing out. Alone.
From a distance it was difficult to discern the variety of color and texture through the low winter sun glare, but up close the wall reveals a huge array of hue and composition.
The wall is divided in half on the south facing wall by an emerald green sedementary rock vertical band. The right and the left sides are roughly mirror images; the main difference being that the mortar on the right is lime mortar, the left, cementitious. The lime mortar (similar to the stuff used to build the University of Virginia) has significant wear; the cement based mortar, almost none.
The wall was constructed in 1948 where University of the District of Columbia is today. By 1977 the wall and the National Bureau of Standards had definitely outstayed their welcome in the up and coming neighborhood and was moved, en masse, by a house moving team about 18 miles north to its current perch. That slow rolling behomoth must have been quite a sight for early risers out buying bagels on Sunday morning 37 years ago. Now Paul is one of the few people on staff to visit the wall, usually on occasions like this, when a visitor wants to see what can be learned there.
Paul’s fascination for stone is obvious. His knowledge of the geological marvels on the wall seem limitless. He pointed out anomolies like “garnets”, “crows’ feet” and “flow rings” (wavy lines formed in the rock when it was in a liquid state). He showed me a granite sample that has almost dissolved entirely on its surface while others almost appear to be freshly polished. Of course none of the stone is freshly polished, and few are ever even touched, as it is, NIST policy is to not handle any of the stone. Oils and acids from visitors fingers do not need to be enterred into the equation.
The mason that built this wall laid every stone himself for the sake of consistency. His hand is most likely the last human contact most of these stones will receive for generations to come. I can’t help wondering what he was like . One solitary man, Vincent Di Benedeto, painstakingly laying stone after stone, recording the origins of each for the archives under the watchful eye of the NBS Chief of Building Stone Section, Daniel Kessler.
Paul spoke volumes about the varieties of stone technical characteristics and other data, but it was the beauty of the colors, textures and patterns that seemed to rise to the surface of his comments. Consulting a legend in a crusty old yellow book with diagrams that look more like Valentine’s Day chocolate box treasure maps, Paul was able to locate the Pennsylvania county of origin of a sample sandstone I brought with me. Paul pointed out that the texture had actually improved with the weathering.
One stone down low had chips that almost look like the work of a vandal with a pick axe. Paul says that he concluded just that when he first saw the wall, but twenty five years of insightful and caring observation have taught Paul that the stone is naturally decaying in this way because of random deposits of a mineral that isn’t as hearty as most when exposed to DC sun, sleet and rain for 66 years. There are several corner locations that were obviously damaged during the move of ’77. The corners must have been the clamp down points when in transit.
I couldn’t help feeling like we were the only people to bother to go back to the wall besides the lawn mowing crew in years. The wall, although a significant feature, doesn’t even have a label on the map given me at the Visitor Center. Paul says that people do, in fact, visit the wall; maybe just not very often. Paul was not the weary tour guide with the well worn catch phrases; he seemed every bit as interested in the stone as I was. He spends the bulk of his time working with concrete and cement testing and analysis, but taking the drive to the far reaches of the NIST campus was not a dreaded activity, but obviously another cherished opportunity to get out in the brisk air and review his wall.
I have spent the last twenty years working with the shapes and forms of stone; after meeting with Paul, I’ll be thinking a lot more about what’s going on beneath the surface of these complex bundles of minerals.
As I drove Paul back to Building 226, I marvelled at the massive herds of deer grazing the grounds. Paul said the population is kept fairly stable through sterilization procedures performed after tranquilizing the deer with darts. I noticed several deer with ear tags, I’m guessing these are the does that are not producing fawns this spring.
By the time I got back on I-270 heading south, I’m sure the deer had reconvened atop the Test Wall hill, and the wall could get back to the business of aging. In peace.
