The quarrying industry predates even agriculture and arguably began when man first began using stone to build homes and monuments. One of the most famous prehistoric examples of quarried stone is Stonehenge in Salisbury, England. When Neolithic people built henges -- prehistoric earthwork structures -- and Stone Age, they relied on rock displaced by glacial melting or rivers. The biggest challenge was transporting the stone, sometimes more than 200 miles, with only primitive technology to rely on.
Ancient Greece and particularly Rome required enormous amounts of stone to build palaces, coliseums and roads. Enormous fortifications were required at the borders of the Roman Empire to defend against belligerent hordes of Goths, Gauls and Picts, who sought to recapture lost territory. Enormous roads provided the vital infrastructure necessary for such an enormous empire while marble temples asserted Roman dominance in conquered lands and glorified Roman deities.
As wars over territory and religion split Europe into hostile factions, the need for stone to build castles and fortifications led to a demand for quarrying not seen since the decline of the Roman Empire. Until the introduction of cannons in Europe in the 13th century, castles offered almost impenetrable protection against invading armies.
The Industrial Revolution in Western countries created an unprecedented demand for stone as wooden harbors could no longer sustain the huge increase in shipping. Stone harbors were constructed at every major seaport, and the cities that dramatically expanded around these lucrative regions required even more stone to build houses, prisons, town halls and courts. Similarly canals, train tunnels and bridges all fed the demand for stone.
The two world wars that ripped the world apart at the beginning of the 20th century placed even greater strain on European quarries in particular. Extensive bombing campaigns destroyed huge sections of many European cities, meaning a huge amount of stone had to be quarried in order to rebuild. In the 1960s, highway construction programs in Europe and America required tons of crushed stone sourced from quarries. The new commercial demand for stone created a larger, more business-savvy industry, and in the 1970s and 1980s, smaller quarries began to disappear or were subsumed into larger, more successful companies.