brooks: applied geology 41 



The chief purpose seems to have been a classification of the public 

 lands — a work which was to be interrupted for over half a cen- 

 tury and then resumed as the proper function of federal geologists. 



According to Doctor Merrill 2 the first epoch of state surveys 

 declined even more rapidly than it arose, due, largely to the 

 financial crisis of 1837. An era of promotion, inflation, and strain- 

 ing of state credits to their uttermost, accompanied by a waste of 

 the borrowed millions and the lack of any sound federal financial 

 policy, resulted in a money panic, the collapse of many ill-advised 

 enterprises, the repudiation of their public debts by several of the 

 states, and a wide-spread commercial depression. It is no wonder 

 that, under these conditions, geologic surveys were regarded as 

 luxuries that might well be spared; particularly since these first 

 governmental surveys, it must be admitted, hardly justified 

 themselves from the standpoint of practical results. This fact 

 does not detract from the credit due the pioneer geologists who 

 carried on these surveys under almost insuperable difficulties. 

 They learned much about real distribution of the larger geologic 

 units, but most of the investigations were not detailed enough to 

 yield results of practical value. Moreover, even in that day 

 many geologists were still living in "flat land" — they considered 

 formations in only the two horizontal dimensions; for while the 

 vertical element was by no means ignored, it was not closely 

 understood. 



During the decade following the panic, few states had surveys 

 and no great progress was made in the science, beyond the pub- 

 lication of results attained in the previous era. Though the con- 

 tributions to geologic literature by the class of professional geolo- 

 gists' — whose appearance was perhaps the most important result 

 of the activity of the previous decade — were not unimportant, 

 yet as a whole both pure and applied science were at a rather low 

 ebb. 



The panic was but a temporary check to the industries, how- 

 ever. The estimated production of pig iron was 347,000 tons in 

 1840, and 600,000 in 1850, while the coal production during the 



2 The extensive use 1 have made of "Contributions to the History of American 

 Geology" by G. P. Merrill will be evident to all who have read that work. 



