Light burst from every storefront on Merchants’ Row. Outside, shoppers wandered the shadowed sidewalks that lined the three- and four-story buildings in the center of downtown. Thin red and white awnings hugged the windows, trolley rails weaved through the city carrying residents and visitors to the north part of town, and electric lines hummed above the roads zipping in and out of businesses and apartments that lined the street. It was Rutland, Vermont at the turn of the century—a far cry from the picturesque farmhouses and cows that overwhelm Vermont lore today.

 

Just west of the city, the marble quarries thundered with the boom of wood-beamed cranes lifting thousands of tons of rock from five hundred feet below ground. Only a shouting distance away, dozens of industrial saws cut the harvested stone into thinner slabs. Men shouted in Polish, Irish, Italian, and English. The train rumbled straight through the mining site--so close to the buildings that if one were to stick a hand out the window at a most inopportune time he would never see it again. Thick smoke billowed from the leading car, and the drum of the wheels on their steel ushers added to the chorus of the city.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

One hundred years later, the picture is vastly different. The quarries lie silent and waterlogged. A passenger Amtrak replaces the freight cars that carried marble from Rutland to the rest of the country. What was once a thriving industrial and cultural hub of Vermont now suffers an identity crisis. As demand for marble as a building material began to decline throughout the country in the late 1900s, Rutland lost touch of who it was. Since this uprooting of its industrial traditions, Rutland has faced a number of challenges that have damaged the city’s reputation. “There’s a real pride in Rutland that not enough people focus on,” said a Rutland High School English teacher. “They focus more toward the negative that was brought out in the heroin article.” In 2014, reports of unprecedented heroin use placed the small city in the national spotlight. The article, “A Call to Arms on a Vermont Heroin Epidemic”, was published on the front page of the New York Times back in February 2014. It reported, “There’s probably not a person in Rutland County whose life has not been affected by opiate addiction in one way or another,’ said Jeffrey D. McKee, director of psychiatric services at the Rutland Regional Medical Center. Yet, there is more to Rutland than drugs and eye-catching headlines.

 

Unknown to many Americans, Rutland provided building materials for much of our nation’s capital.  Marble used in the Jefferson Memorial, the US Supreme Court Building, and the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier all originated in Rutland County. Born in the 1830s, the marble industry grew to international renown by the late 1800s under the direction of Senator Redfield Proctor. Having bought the bankrupt Sutherland Falls Marble Company in 1869, Proctor merged the enterprise with the Rutland Marble Company (in current-day West Rutland) in 1880 to form the Vermont Marble Company (VMC). The political influence Proctor gained in Washington D.C. as a Senator allowed him to procure contracts for many of the Capitol’s marble monuments and buildings on behalf of the VMC. The ensuing national popularity for “Rutland White” marble propelled his company to the top of the industry.

As demand for marble grew, so did a need for more labor. In response, Proctor stationed  company agents at Boston’s ports, Ellis Island in New York City, and overseas in Europe, attracting immigrants to Rutland with the prospect of jobs, homes, and livable wages.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

modern materials like steel, concrete, and glass. On the surface, Rutland had everything--a downtown center, a bustling population, and a developing infrastructure. Yet, with its keystone resource obsolete, the reality was one of lost jobs, an unsupported infrastructure, and an unstable economy. The transition left both the city and the media with a blurred idea of what Rutland was, how it functioned, and where it fit in with greater Vermont.

 

When tourists come to Rutland, they expect a quaint Vermont town and are quickly disappointed. “My friend calls it “faux-mont,” said high school history teacher Jennie Gartner. “Everyone has this view of us going to our farmers markets, milking our cows, and listening to Phish all day.” Yet Rutland was never a small, agricultural village; it was a thriving, working city centered on the marble industry. Marble was who it was. Marble was what it did best. With the decline of industrialism in the United States and decreasing demand for marble as building material, Rutland has struggled to regain an economic foothold while maintaining its city character.

Faced with a changing identity, the city sought new ways to stimulate community and economic growth. In the early 2000s, the Vermont Council on Rural Development received grant money from the state to work with twelve towns in Vermont as part of a four month planning process to advance the town’s creative economies.

 

Developing cultural assets and investing in a creative economy is a popular trend in strategic city growth. Entertainment, arts, museums, recreation, and creative technology (the segments of the creative economy) all attract young people and families to cities that twenty or thirty years ago people considered “broken.” “Rutland is, in a way, a poster child for how towns pick themselves up,” said Paul Costello, Executive Director of the Vermont Council on Rural Development. “Rutland was really hungry for some kind of new vision.” He recalled the four hundred people who filled the bleachers in Rutland High School at the first creative economy planning session. At the end of the night half the crowd volunteered to participate in the new initiative. “People point to Austin, Texas, they point to Burlington. You think of South Burlington… twenty years ago the Pine Street area and a lot of the south end of Burlington was post-industrial warehouses beat up buildings with very little economic value and very little tax value,” said Costello. Cultural and innovative spaces redefined these areas.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

  

 

Similar innovations of creative capital can be found throughout greater Rutland County as well. The northwest corner of the city is home to Pine Hill Park, a green space that holds recreational trails for hiking, mountain biking, and a creek for swimming. While still in its developmental stages, the Rutland Creek Path will offer bikers and pedestrians a direct connection between Pine Hill Park and the downtown neighborhood of Rutland City. And just five miles to the west is The Carving Studio & Sculpture Center in West Rutland. Once the location of the Vermont Marble Company’s abounding stone quarries, the site is now a design hub that offers lectures and workshops for carving technique, an artist-in-residence program, communal dinners, and an interactive sculpture garden.

 

Rutland’s creative economy is still in its infancy. Yet, the promise of rebuilding post-industrial cities can be seen throughout the U.S. in places like Moab, Utah. Moab experienced remarkable economic growth in the 1950s when the discovery of uranium and vanadium in the city coincided with the advent of nuclear power. Increasing demand for nuclear weapons during the Cold War launched Moab into economic prosperity as the “Uranium Capital of the World.” For thirty years, Moab built an industrial empire and population in the city grew nearly five hundred percent in less than two decades. But as the Cold War ended, Moab’s economy deteriorated nearly as fast as it grew. By the early 1980s, decreasing demand forced all of the uranium mines to close—a story not unlike Rutland.

 

In 2014, however, Moab thrives due to an economy based on tourism, recreation, and artistic vision. Even second home owners are buying property in and outside of the city. Further along in their creative development, Moab serves as a matured example of how creative economy initiatives can be successful.

 

Even larger cities that suffered from post-industrial fallout seek answers in creative economy initiatives. A non-profit in Detroit called Write-A-House launched a campaign at the end of 2013 that aims to fix up thousands of vacant and destroyed homes to provide housing for writers. “Writers will lease the homes from the nonprofit, a small amount to cover taxes and insurance,” reported Ashley Woods for the Huffington Post. “If they stay for 24 months, they'll be awarded the deed -- and Detroit will count another resident to its comeback.”

 

Stories such as Moab and Rutland replay throughout history. More populated cities like Detroit are widely recognized among Americans. Yet, smaller cities like Rutland are scattered all over the country, forgotten by the nation that benefitted so highly from their service, and cast aside for the new best thing. In using creative economy initiatives as a tool for economic growth, these cities are able to thrive using economically and environmentally sustainable strategies. These initiatives are not dependent on a single natural resource. Rather, they rely on human capital—a resource more resilient to changing global markets and environmental conditions. Marble remains an important cultural artifact of Rutland, but the city has moved on.  

 

“All around the world, the ‘creative economy’ is talked about as an important and growing part of the global economy,” wrote the British Council in their 2010 report, Mapping the Creative Creative Industries: A Toolkit. “Governments and creative sectors across the world are increasingly recognizing its importance as a generator of jobs, wealth and cultural engagement. ” In 2009, New England’s nonprofit arts sector—only one segment of the creative economy— provided over 53,000 people with jobs, and gross spending amounted to nearly $3.7 billion. Over three thousand of those jobs are in Vermont, accounting for one percent of total state employment.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Like anything else, the creative model is a work in progress. Leaders in the creative industries movement in Rutland continue to work on improving participation and inclusion so that all residents may benefit from the city’s revival. “In community development, you’re never done,” said Paul Costello. “You’re always going to have challenges.” While Rutland may have challenges ahead, Rutlanders’ commitment to rebuild their city is a resource that no market can change. “You can talk about development of roads, political status, etc.,” said Jim Davidson—a 54-year resident of Rutland, who has been volunteering for the Rutland Historical Society for over 40 years. “But probably the real one thing that you have going for you, and I always sensed it coming here as a newbie, is the people. They are a special kind of people.”