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The same rust-colored mineral is exposed in patches of countryside near the Catoctin Mountain range and on Little League fields nearby. The 7-mile-wide stretch of Gettysburg Shale, ideal brick material, runs from Lewistown to Gettysburg, Pa., just an inch under the topsoil.

Despite the financial strain from the slow housing market, company president and CEO Joseph Miles said Redland is poised to produce bricks for at least the next 100 years.

The privately held Williamsport company revamped the Rocky Ridge manufacturing plant in 2006, secured land-use changes for 432 more acres of mining through the Thurmont Region Plan passed July 31, and is launching its first brick paver product in two weeks.

The pavers, used for patios, walkways and driveways, are the industry's first mass-produced, large-sized bricks for this purpose, Miles said.

Redland Brick, a subsidiary of privately held Belden Brick Co. of Canton, Ohio, has two plants in Maryland and one each in Pittsburgh and South Windsor, Conn. At full speed, the Rocky Ridge plant in Frederick County can churn out 35.5 million bricks per year with its new energy-efficient kiln, 15 million more than before the upgrades.

Barry Miller, manager of safety, environmental and quality, recalled a recent time when "every plant in the U.S. was making every possible brick they could and we still could not fill the demand." Now the plant runs at roughly half-capacity, producing 16 million bricks per year, and its brick machine is shut down on Fridays.

"We're not anywhere near that [maximum] point because the market's down," Miller said. "Whenever the market rebounds — and it will — we'll be quite prepared for it. … We're going to be here a long time mining. All we're doing now is hanging on."

Most of the plant's 35 hourly employees are maintenance technicians and operators who replaced many of the manual laborers who once toted tons of bricks from station to station. Miller anticipates hiring more workers when business picks up.

"Had we not mechanized, it would have only been a matter of time until we would have to close," Miller said. "And there would have been no jobs."

Redland scratches surface

of shallow shale patch

Redland Brick on Rocky Ridge Road has been mining the soft, crumbly shale for eight years, after purchasing the operation from Boral Brick in April 2000, producing a variety of bricks used by luxury homebuilders such as Toll Brothers.

Unlike the deep pit that Miller said neighbors and visitors envision when they think "quarry," Redland's mining site is little more than a couple of acres of exposed dark red earth.

Local contractors mine roughly three months of the year with a ripper, a large hook that loosens the surface. The resulting shale is crushed, bulldozed into a pile, re-crushed and later transported for storage. Redland uses the supply year-round to make bricks of all colors, using sand coating for shading.

There are no blasts or explosions at the site. When the softer mineral is tapped, Miller said, the company will move to new ground and return the quarry its original condition with topsoil and grasses. Hundreds of Redland's un-mined acres are leased to farmers growing corn and soybeans this season.

"We've been mining in here for seven years and this has supplied 100 percent of our raw material for every brick made in this plant," Miller said. "The way we are mining hasn't changed in a thousand years. We just have more toys to play with."

Redland slides pavers

into product stream

This week, Miles has nearly a full inventory of 6-by-9-inch and 6-by-6-inch pavers, a line called the Tuscan Series, to start selling to distributors including Frederick Brick Co. and Potomac Valley Brick Co.

Cement companies have long dominated the niche of producing the larger pavers, and Redland's move is considered a breakthrough in the brick industry. Miles said he had been planning the product since the 2006 renovations and should start selling them in the next two weeks.

"We can now price the product competitively," said Miles, who declined to disclose company revenues.

Richard Wheeler, Potomac Valley Brick's vice president of operations, said Redland is the only one of his company's 25 manufacturers across the U.S. to produce non-cement pavers. Potomac has already accepted one order of the pavers, and is testing demand for them.

"They're the first I know of to come out with this," Wheeler said. "I think it's on par with concrete. … Time will tell."

U.S. brick industry

Employees: more than 200,000.

The mid-Atlantic region produced 5.1 percent of the brick inventory in 2001 and consumed 6.4 percent.

Number of brick manufacturers in 1950s: several thousand.

Number today: 83.

An estimated 8.1 billion bricks were sold in 2002, generating $1.7 billion for manufacturers.

Source: Brick Industry Association 2002 data, most recent available