CALIFORNIA BRICKS
Brand name: GM-60-A/FB-1321
Company: Gladding, McBean and Co.
Location: Lincoln, Placer County, California
Years: 1890-1943
Type: Fire brick
Description: Brand name impressed on the face with GM-60-A on the first line and FB-1321 on the second line.
Equipment: Mixer, grinder, pug mills, wood-fired 15 circular, 2 long furnaces, 6 oil-fired round down-draft
kilns used brick, 12 oil-fired round down-draft kilns used for sewer pipe, 11 oil-fired muffle kilns used for
terra cotta, 4 dry pans, 14-mesh screen, storage bins, waste-heat tunnel driers, side-cut and end-cut auger machines.
Capacity: 3,200,000 per year face brick, 1,600,000 per year fire brick.
Deposit: Clay pits 1 mile NW from plant on 480 acres. North pit had 10 ft. fire clay, 6 ft. pipe clay, 20 ft.
terra cotta clay. South pit had 8 ft. light sandy clay and 7 ft. sandy yellow clay.
Comments: This brick was photographed at the Lincoln plant, Placer County, CA.
Source: California State Mining Bureau Report 12, 1893-94; California State Mining Bureau Report 15, 1917, p. 322-325;
California State Mining Bureau Bulletin 99, 1928, p. 151-156; Friends of Terra Cotta, Fall 1981 newletter.
Plant of the Gladding-McBean Co., Lincoln, CA. Taken by author, 2001.
Comments or questions are welcomed.
Please send email to Dan Mosier at danmosier@earthlink.net.