A stonemason was building a new blacksmith shop for I.J. Lytle, in Girggsville, Ill., but he left town with the job unfinished. One of Lytle’s sons tried to finish the building but he couldn’t make the mortar stick to the stones. A younger son, Eris, says he “gave it a try and didn’t have any trouble at all.” Eris Lytle spent the next 60 years building with brick and stone, fully dedicated to each job.

Lytle joined the union in 1924 and had to drop out during the Depression because there wasn’t enough work to pay union dues. In 1934, he rejoined and, 50 years later, was awarded the coveted gold card and lifetime union membership. He laid a few Italian marble fireplaces mantles for a prominent Columbia architect after he was 80 years of age!

Eris Lytle was born in 1904 and learned blacksmithing from his inventive father. When he wanted a car, he “rummaged around for parts from seven different junk piles,” he says, “and finally had enough to assemble a skeleton Model T Ford.” In 1927, he drove that car to Columbia, got a job with contractor Shorty Hathman, and moved his wife and some of her family here later. He finally drove that Ford to the Whippet dealership and went home in a brand new yellow convertible!

Central Missouri is dotted with public buildings that have felt the skillful touch of Eris Lytle’s trowel. He worked for the John Epple Construction Co. for most of his career. His most challenging and demanding assignment came in the 1960s. Epple contracted to rebuild a war-damaged London church on the Westminster College campus in Fulton. He chose Lytle and the late Reinzo Palmer to see the project through. Lytle was responsible for the stone masonry. “It seemed like any other job at first,” he said. However, he soon realized that no such ancient structures had been built on this side of the Atlantic and the centuries-old plans of Christopher Wren were not available.

Wren designed St. Paul’s Cathedral and nearby St. Mary Aldermanbury church. Adolf Hitler’s firebombs had gutted the church, leaving the four walls with gaping holes and no roof. London workmen cut numbers into the stones as they dismantled the ruins. “One big problem, ” Lytle says, “was that the numbers were all mixed up because the stones had to be repacked at the dock, to fit in the ship’s hold. Another was that number one stone on all four walls was on top and it had to be on top when we finished the job.” That meant working with the numbers in reverse.

When the 7,000 stones were unpacked, they were spread out on two acres of ground. “One man spent all of his time hunting various numbered stones,” Lytle says. For example, four No. 206 stones were marked for north, south, east or west.

Lytle patched broken stones and cut and glued lots of damaged corners using uncounted gallons of stone epoxy. To keep ahead of the other stonemasons he repaired stones before and after normal working hours and on weekends and holidays. “At night, I was white with stone dust except where my mask covered my mouth and nose.”

This story has a happy ending. Drive to Fulton and see the beautiful memorial to Winston Churchill. Walk around the building and marvel at this fact: Lytle recently said, “We had to be careful about the width of mortar joints but only one of the 7,000 stones had to be trimmed. I had to take off a quarter of an inch to make it fit!”

The London Times called Lytle “a foremost authority on Sir Christopher Wren,” and the late John Epple said, “He solved the most gigantic jigsaw puzzle known.”

Eris moves slowly but was in great shape for the celebration of his 92nd birthday last week.