 Lakeland PBS presents Common Ground, brought to you by the Minnesota Arts and Cultural Heritage Fund and the citizens of Minnesota. Production funding of Common Ground is made possible in part by First National Bank Bemidji, continuing their second century of service to the community, a partnership for generations. Member FDIC. Welcome to Common Ground. I'm producer-director Scott Knudson. In this episode, Stonemason Tom Ravnick takes us along in his process as he builds a beautiful stone fireplace. Hi, I'm Todd Green. Hi, I'm Mandy Green. And welcome to our home. We've built our dream cabin here, and it's been a long process, but we're excited to have it finished. This actually used to be a barn built in 1860. All of the beams and posts and everything were hand-hewn with axes. Back in 1860, it was originally constructed right on the border of Ohio, Indiana. We had it torn down and moved up into the area, working with some people at Bigwood Timber Frames. And they reconstructed it here on the property and turned it into our home. We selected the barn just to kind of tip of the hat to what this area used to be. It was farmland at one point in time back in the day. And I liked the idea of reclaiming and reusing something as opposed to new construction. And fell in love with the old look. The timbers are gorgeous, beautiful, and the amount of work that originally went back into those when, you know, 1860s with no tools other than an axe is quite remarkable. So it was just something that I kind of fell in love with and became passionate about. We watched the whole process of the timbers being at the lumber yard in a big pile and being brought over here on a truck and being assembled and raised up with a big crane. So it was pretty impressive to see the big equipment and to think about in the past how these pioneers built these without any big equipment and how it took the village to construct these and make them fit together and stood the test of time. I love the idea of honoring our past and also our future. So we tried to have both the old and the new mixed together here in our new home. To think about how old the trees actually are and what they've experienced and seen in life and then the fact that it's put together without nails really. It's still with wooden pegs back from that day too that have withstood the test of time as well is quite a remarkable feat. We're situated on about a 100 acre lake in the Brainerd Lakes area. It's not too far from where our kids went to high school. We've got an acre and a half here in our property that this cabin is built on but we also are part owners of a large piece of land around this that makes it really kind of a wilderness area. We've got trails through the woods and things like that that really allow us to take in nature and enjoy the area. We knew we wanted the fireplace to be kind of the central point of the great room specifically and didn't want it to just be an ordinary fireplace and had met Tom through my builder actually had got his name and we went out and Tom was kind enough to drive us around to some other fireplaces that he'd built and to me they're a piece of art. They're a craftsmanship like nothing else I've ever seen. I'm Tom Ravnick and I'm a stone mason. I only use rocks from the area. I use either in the whole form or I do split them for projects but pretty much rocks from the area. I pick rocks from the area but one of my favorite pits belongs to a friend of mine, Warren Bunquist. It's always good just to go out and visit him because he helps load the rocks too and you can't get away without having breakfast. That's what I call my hunting season. I'm looking for trophies all the time and behind me here there's some rocks that I look for and find and I know where they're going to go. So it's fun. It really is a fun process. When it comes to laying stone it's a lot easier to lay something with shape to it like triangles and squares and rectangles although rocks never come that way. But if you can find one that's concave most rocks are a little bit convex so if you find one that's concave it doesn't matter what it looks like pick it up and throw it on because you'll know it'll fit perfectly somewhere. It just whatever catches your eye and being that this is whole stone I have the luxury of having depth to work with and so I can pick out anything, any size because it'll work in this project that I'm working on. These fireplaces allow me to use a lot of depth. The stones look best when you can lamb with a recessed joint where you can show off the shoulder, show off the rock. There again they're two to three billion years old and they deserve to be as placed as well as you can. And if you pan this rock pile here they all kind of look blah but I'm looking for color and character. So whenever I see a red one or a dark one or anything with character I pull it out. One bad thing about picking them in the fall I want to get that red rock there but Mother Nature has froze it tight so I got to get my hammer. This old hammer is a rock splitting hammer. It's tool steel and you can split rocks just like you split wood and this old head split a lot of rock. It's kind of wedged in there by this other bigger rock. There we go. And I'm sure that was worth the effort. Well right now on the job site I have 13 ton. I'll get a couple of ton out of here and I think the project will be about 10 ton so I'll probably have 5 ton left over but they end up going to the next job too. For building a fireplace especially I like to get a good selection and it does make it a lot easier because you're always hunting for the right rock and the more selection you've got the more chance you're going to find that rock. And the general rule of thumb is that the ton of rock will cover about 40 square feet. That's what I use for a rule of thumb and I'm not too sure how accurate it is but it's something to go by anyway. Now this rock I don't know if it shows up in the picture now but it's got a green tint to it. A lot of times green means there's copper. This process is what makes the project turn out the way they do. And I've worked for a number of people who have picked their own rock off their own property. I worked for a guy one time who his parents had died. They sold the family farm and he wanted part of that farm with them at his new place. So he went out and picked a bunch of rocks and I built a fireplace and so he feels really good that he got some of his family's rocks off the farm before they sold it. And here's one of those rocks that's just a little bit concave. And boy that one will fit really nice against something else besides it's got some really good color. Anything with any character too will really look good. The fireplace is beautiful. It's one of a kind. It looks different every time you look at it. You can pick out a different favorite rock every time you're sitting in front of it and notice different features as far as sparkles and colors and shapes. It's just an amazing fireplace. This one here is kind of interesting. It'll make a nice corner but it's got that fleck in it and it's got this divot in there and any time you can show off something like this in a rock it really looks good. Here's a stone that would work as a keystone for building of an arch because it's triangular shape and symmetrical. Although the keystones I got picked for this project are bigger than that but it's a nice rock that's symmetrical shaped and when you build an arch you build it like the Romans do when you key everything in and this is the center stone and you're looking for something that's symmetrical and that'll be a nice keystone. But whenever I see a rock that's that shape I'll know I'll find a home for it if probably going over a window or a door. Most of the time I stay away from stuff that's really flat like this because it really doesn't have any character but on the green project they want a raised hearth that's probably 16 to 18 inches tall above just in front of the fire box so it's going to be a sitting area so for that I pick out really flat rocks and this might work for the hearth so it's good to know the project that you're going to do so you get the right material and this green fireplace it's seven feet wide it's 23 feet tall on the inside and it tapers to about four feet at the top so there's going to be lots of corners Now here's another one of those flat ones that make probably good for a hearth especially here you got that concave area you know that you're going to be able to fit that to a rock pretty neatly I learned my trade from an old stone mason named John Brown and he was all about being very simple, very basic good symmetry about color and size and having as small a cement joint as you can The best way I can explain is I heard somebody talk about mosaic and they said mosaic is very simple principles but it takes you a lifetime to perfect it and I haven't built anything perfect yet but I'm still working on it In-laws had a home built in 1972 it had a split rock fireplace and they hired this guy named John Brown and he was well noted in the area he came down from Ely to work in the Emily area The in-laws hired him to build the fireplace and when I was watching him I thought I kind of like what he does and I know I can do that and so the next summer I spent a day a week with him and so I heard his stories about three times and then we built a house in 74 and I built my first fireplace in 74 time went on and I was working for a company that went bankrupt and I thought well I like doing this stonework so when I turned 40 years old I just advertised a little bit and started doing stonework and it's been a roller coaster ride but I tell people that I haven't worked since I was 40 years old because I really enjoy what I do and I feel really, really lucky that I'm able to do this The fireplace and home are really a legacy for us and for our children To me it's almost a piece of art I mean it's the craftsmanship that went into it originally it still has that Northwood's feel to it which I love but it's unique it's different than a log cabin where you can look and feel and we've been in it for a while now but you continue to look around and see new things that catch your eye so every time you look at something it's a little bit different the amount of detail that is in that fireplace and how hard we watch Tom work without any kind of mechanical tools really to put that together it is a remarkable thing to watch him work and what it ends up with This fireplace starting now at the hearth here so I put in three-quarter inch wood and shimmed it so when I'm done here I'll pull out my Y wood and they'll be able to tuck their flooring underneath it make a nice clean look did the same thing where there's a cabinet going in here it's all berries in a couple inches and same with the sides the wood will bury in there will be a grout line that will be hidden and to do stonework I put up strings and I put up a plum line and then I just site between the strings to make sure things line up and you can do a pretty good job of making a rock look good and then if you site here to that plum line it helps you keep things straight without wandering around and you don't have to drag a level around all the time because it's a give and take thing all the time trying to make them look good and then we put a radius hearth on here in a Rumford fireplace and yesterday I set this arch I built it on the floor first to a pattern put it up here and had to support it and it's going to be a self supporting arch there's no steel in here when I get done, when this gets all pulled out there'll just be a nice grout line around the face fame of the fireplace I found both of the keystones right next to each other in the garrison pit this is going to be a coin operated fireplace you put quarters in the hole well I think I'm going to try to set this quarter right here those are always the toughest things to set when I first learned stonework from John Brown we did all split rock work and all the rocks that we used were cut to fit and so we always used a folding ruler to determine what shape or size rock we needed and I want to be something about that size then I've gotten so I don't use it but I'm hoping that I can inspire somebody to get started in doing this type of work this will be a good tool until you get a knack for it well now I'm going to go out and try to find a rock this size that'll fit there so let's see if we have any luck well I think that's it when we were in Warren Lundquist pit we picked out a corner that was concave on the bottom and I said always look for rocks that are concave because they always fit most rocks are convex and so now that's pretty doggone close and it's a real neat rock but watch this rock come to life when it gets wet it's got some neat character okay now what I've done in split rock work you always cut rock to make it fit tighter and the whole theme of what I do is there again it's back to John Brown's philosophy is to make really controlled joints keep things balanced symmetrical color and size and just keep those joints as nice and tight as you can well this one fits really really good except if I just take off a little bit of stuff right here it'll actually sit a little bit better I'll put this red pencil under this is really important to have a red pencil because it shows up on rock if you did it with a black you'd never see it and one thing it'll get rid of that point too right now it's balancing like an egg so when I get rid of that point it's going to help me set better too because it'll be sitting on a couple points rather than just one so now what I've got is just basically a skill saw with a diamond blade and I'm going to score this where I put that mark and what I have here are two stone chisels these are the two basic stone tools that I have so now what I'm going to do with this saw I'm going to cut a slice on here and then the next thing I'll do is I'll use these chisels to remove this material here so that the rock will set a little bit better so now I've cut that slot in there and now I'm just going to use this tracer here and I'm just going to blow the material away this is a really hard rock this is a type of rock that you couldn't split because it doesn't have really any green it's like it's marbles put together one thing you learn about stone I don't know if you could tell but there was you hear that ringing of a hammer and then there was a sound that was kind of sounded really dull that dull sound means it's breaking and so you learn to notice that sound because sometimes it breaks where you don't want it to and you don't want to ruin the rock it should be ready for cement okay so now it's sitting better it's not rocking like an egg ideally I want it to sit like about like this which makes this area a little bit too tight but it's recessed I'm just going to remove a little bit of that but I'm also going to remove this little bit of a knob out here because my next stone is going to be laying in this pocket and this is going to be in the way so it'd be easier to get rid of it and both of these marks will be hidden by the joint line so they won't show alright now I'm going to take it back out there and I'll saw a little bit here and chip out just a little bit here then we'll mix some cement this is where that handset comes in easy because if you stick it right here it'll blow that right out of there okay she's ready for cement I'll use the John Brown recipe he used a recipe that was three shovelfuls of sand two shovelfuls of Portland and then one shovelful of a type of a mortar mix type S or N or M whatever you can get and I've used it ever since I started in my first fireplace I built in 1975 it's still standing so I think it's a pretty good mix you just have to mix it dry it's all the same color you get it all mixed together this is the other half of my inventory I got two shovels and a wheelbarrow and so if you ever want to do this you're going to have an investment of under $500 and just a little bit of ambition is all you need so now I just want to clean up this area here get rid of the loose stuff that doesn't belong there and my mud's a little bit dry but it's easy just to doctor it up a little bit what you want is a consistency that'll make a ball that'll hold the weight of that rock it's important to fill up the mud bed more than what you need and let the mud ooze out so you know it's sitting on a good base because this is what holds her together I'm just going to set this guy up here I'm going to be paying attention to my string I want to keep this rock in line with my string and my plumb line on the wall and I'm going to keep them in line with my strings across the face here don't mind if a little bit of it sticks out I can't let too much of this stick out because of this door I don't want a knob that'll come in the glass will hit it so I'll check that before I'm completely done with this rock I think we're going to be pretty good like I said there's kind of a happy medium into setting the rock but now I want to pound it down now I just have to rake the cement out of that joint and to make the joints look real even if you have kind of a fat joint you can just rake it in further or if it looks too skinny you can bring it out like the guy I learned from old John Brown that was important to keep the joints as even as you could as tight as you could anybody can do this there's nothing hard about it it's just a matter of doing it and if you set yourself a goal of just putting in one rock a day the next thing you know your project will be done now I'm going to clean it up with a brush and water and I'm really going to concentrate on that shoulder getting that shoulder it's not so much about the joint although you watch now when I do this here this joint blends in with this one and the neat thing about using this whole rock like this is the depth because that's what makes the stonework look good is when you can show off the depth of it there now he's two to three billion years old and now this is his new home for I don't know how long but you know something that's been around that well you got to treat it with respect you got to show it off the best you can we've become a disposable society right and this is not a disposable place and the natural stone ties directly into the reclaimed wood it's nature it's who we are you know what they make some beautiful products out there but it does not match the beauty of what mother nature provided for us and it's the beauty and the uniqueness of it is fantastic I mean it kind of blows your mind when you come in here and take a look at it and think about not only how the rocks were formed but then how Tom you know went out and picking these rocks by hand one by one and bring him here and knowing exactly where they're going to go it's something that I'll never forget Join us again on Common Ground If you have an idea for Common Ground in North Central Minnesota email us at legacy at lptv.org or call 218-333-3014 To watch Common Ground online visit lptv.org and click local shows Episodes or segments of Common Ground Call 218-333-3020 Production funding of Common Ground was made possible in part by First National Bank Bemidji continuing their second century of service to the community a partnership for generations member FDIC Common Ground is brought to you by the Minnesota Arts and Cultural Heritage Fund with money by the vote of the people November 4th, 2008