The lesson took place while Dierauer was an art student in the 1970s at UW-Stout and long after the quarry had closed.

"Stanley gave me a lesson how to use the tools and how to read stone and look for veins and soft spots," Dierauer said.

After finishing college, she became an artist and art teacher in Minneapolis. Six years ago she returned to teach in central Wisconsin.

She learned through a UW-Stout alumni newspaper about fellow alumni Aaron Keopple reopening a sandstone quarry with his company, Dunnville Cutstone.

She became the resident stone sculptor for Dunnville Cutstone. The company recommends her if people are looking for sandstone garden pieces or other sculptures.

Dierauer, who lives and works in Marshfield and Menomonie, can be seen sitting Fridays and weekends on the stoop of the Empire in the Pine Lumbering Museum or on a nearby bench carving sandstone sculptures.

The stone is donated by Dunnville Cutstone.

Dierauer, 51, also a tour guide at the museum, donates her artistic endeavors to create abstract sandstone sculptures.

The pieces sell for about $10 each, with all proceeds going to the Dunn County Historical Society.

"I am influenced by the Inuit," Dierauer said. "I sit on the stoop because the outdoors is my studio. It is sort of a metaphysical thing for me.

The sculptures also give "people a chance to take a bit of history with them," she said.

The museum has stone carving and lumbering tools that belonged to Borm and his father, Fred.

Dunnville sandstone is very consistent and has very few soft spots, Dierauer said.

"It files and sands out to a wonderfully smooth surface," she said. "It textures out great."

For abstract sculptures, she first makes a drawing then then uses a grease pencil to outline her idea on the block before carving.

"I use the same type of tools Stanley Borm did," Dierauer said. "They are old, old techniques, and they still are used today."

Keopple said Dierauer's abstract works are interesting because they engage the viewer's imagination. "Julie is bringing the stone deeper into the community because it is being used in landscaping projects," Keopple said.

Frank Kennett, Dunn County Historical Society curator of collections, said Borm had the last of the sandstone quarries and owned Downsville Cutstone in the 1930s and 1940s.

He noted it is exceptionally fitting to have Dierauer, who learned from Borm, working at the lumbering museum.

"It teaches people who come into the Empire museum the history of stone carving, and they can actually see someone carving," he said.

Kennett has about four of Dierauer's pieces.

"The shapes are very flowing and feel good in the hand," he said.