granite

     

Granite (pronounce /ˈɡrænɪt/) is a common and widely occurring type of intrusive, felsic, igneous rock. Granite has a medium to coarse texture, occasionally with some individual crystals larger than the groundmass forming a rock known as porphyry. Granites can be pink to dark gray or even black, depending on their chemistry and mineralogy. Outcrops of granite tend to form tors, and rounded massifs. Granites sometimes occur in circular depressions surrounded by a range of hills, formed by the metamorphic aureole or hornfels.

Trivia about granite

  • The pink material used to build the state capitol in Austin, Texas has to be "taken for" this stone
  • New Hampshire's state rock of coarse is this common building material
  • (Jimmy of the Clue Crew shows off a rock in the University of Wisconsin-Madison Geology Museum.) The University of Wisconsin-Madison Geology Museum has the state rock of Wisconsin; not to be confused with the state rock of New Hampshire, it's the red type of this
  • New Hampshire quarries provided this type of stone for building the Library of Congress
  • Among the oldest rocks on Earth are 4-billion-year-old pieces of this, from which New Hampshire gets its nickname
  • (Cheryl of the Clue Crew stands in front of the State House in Concord, NH.) Here in Concord, America's oldest State House, using its original chambers, was built in 1819, mostly of this stone--naturally
  • The town of Barre is a world center in the production of this stone used for monuments
  • A coarse-grained igneous rock composed of quartz & feldspar
  • The Pilgrim Monument in Provincetown is the tallest structure in the U.S. made entirely of this