Don and Mary Pemberton, owners of Bandera Stone, Inc. are in the process of restoring and remodeling the storefront on the north side of Uniontown’s square.

The building is located at  103 Third Street.

Their business offers stone products for both interior and exterior, commercial and residential projects, all from local quarries.

“Bandera Stone quarries and fabricates natural limestone and sandstone: full depth veneer, thin-cut veneer, landscaping, pool coping, sills, caps, hearths, mantels, countertops, and other dimension stone products,” Mary Pemberton said.  “At our Bronson Quarry, we also have a crusher plant and provide a wide range of crushed stone products including road rock, ¾”, 1-1/8” and 2” clean, crusher run, ditch liner, and agriculture lime with a CCE in the mid to high 90’s.”

They offer a range of stone colors, with the product drawn from the several quarries in Kansas and Missouri that the Pemberton’s operate.

“We specialize in custom cutting each order using these unique stones,” she said.  “Our stone is shipped all across the country but primarily west of the Mississippi River.  Our biggest markets are in Montana, Idaho, Colorado, California, Tennessee, and more locally in the Kansas City area.”

“You can find our stone on projects throughout Bourbon County including the LaRoche Stadium and the Fort Scott Community College baseball fields, (Fort Scott’s)Heritage Park, the Fort Scott National Cemetery, Uniontown City Park, as well as numerous private residences,” she said.

The business needed to relocate its office and wanted to combine it with a showroom to better display their stone products and enable customers to visualize options for their project, she said.

“We considered several options, including building new, but always liked the idea of restoring an older masonry building,” she said.  “We decided on Uniontown for the location and just began asking building owners if they would be interested in selling.  We were able to purchase the former café building, one of the few older structures left on the Uniontown square.”

They discovered their newly purchased building was in very poor structural condition.

“In October, we started a total gut-job remodel which included changing the flat roof to a gable roof as well as refacing two of the exterior walls which were extremely deteriorated,” she said. “Inside, absolutely everything will be new.  The front half of the interior is the showroom which will display a variety of our veneer and cut stone products installed as it would be on a residential project.  The back half of the interior contains restrooms, a conference room, file room, etc. ”

“We expect to have the remodeling completed in late January, barring delays with materials or contractors,” she said.  “In the spring, I hope to begin painting murals which will cover the brick exterior east wall.  Once the remodeling is finished and stone installed in the showroom we will have an open house so everyone can come and see.”

History Of Bandera Stone

“Don was a second-generation stone and brick mason so he had 15 plus years of masonry experience before founding Bandera Stone in 1988,” she said.  “We purchased the Bandera Quarry near Redfield and initially only supplied veneer stone.”

Within a few years, the Pemberton’s started a Bronson quarry that supplies Winterset Limestone, which has become the most popular and versatile stone they sell, she said.

They also bought the former school building in Redfield to expand into cut stone.

“Over the years we have continued to expand, adding quarries and buildings, and equipment at the cut stone mill, as we could afford it.  In Bourbon County, we now have our stone mill in Redfield, our primary quarry just east of Bronson, and soon to be our office and showroom in Uniontown.”

For more information call or text 620-223-3920  or email [email protected].

The website is www.banderastone.com