30 SEVENTH REPORT. 



was reversed. The ice re-advanced, closing an outlet which had served 

 for a considerable time, and raised the level of the lake so as to submerge 

 beaches which had been made at lower levels. Indeed, significant evidence 

 was found for three such episodes, and there may have been more. One 

 of these episodes is established by evidence so abundant and clear that 

 its reality seems a matter of entire certainty. It is of this one especially 

 that the present paper gives an account. 



Lake Maumee was the earliest and highest of the glacial lakes in the 

 Erie-Huron basin. Thus far, two stages have been recognized for this 

 lake. They stood at different levels and had different outlets. During ita 

 first stage the lake lay mostly in northwestern Ohio, with an arm running 

 up to Adrian, Michigan, and its western point projecting into Indiana. 

 Its outlet was through the city of Fort Wayne to the Wabash and 

 Mississippi rivers. At the second stage the lake was much the same, 

 except that it reached considerably farther east and northeast. It also 

 stood ten to twenty-five feet lower and had its outlet near Imlay, Mich 

 igan, and thence westward by way of the Flint and Grand River' valleys. 

 The beaches marking the two stages are known as the Upper and Lower 

 Maumee beaches. They are both of such character as makes it appear 

 quite certain that neither of them has been modified by submergence 

 since it was made. In its last phase the outlet of Lower Lake Maumee 

 emptied at Flushing into Early Lake Saginaw, which in turn discharged 

 through the Grand River channel and Lake Chicago to the Mississippi 

 river. 



After Lower Lake Maumee had endured for a considerable time there 

 came a change which caused the waters to fall with relative suddenness to 

 a lower level. It is with this event that the present account begins. 

 It has been supposed hitherto that at this time the waters fell to the 

 level of the Belmore beach of Lake Whittlesey, which is the first strongly 

 developed shore line below the Lower Maumee. But it has been found 

 that the waters fell first to the Arkona beaches, which are below the 

 Belmore, and then after pausing for a considerable time at each of the 

 three or four Arkona beaches in descending order, the waters were then 

 quickly raised from the lowest Arkona to the Belmore level. In this 

 change the lake level was raised 44 to 45 feet, and in this new position 

 the waters stood for a relatively long time with only slight changes of 

 level. The Belmore is one of tlie most prominent of the old beaches of 

 the lake region, and during all the time that it was being formed — an 

 interval which covered the whole period of Lake Whittlesey's existence — 

 the Arkona beach ridges were submerged under its waters. 



Lake Whittlesey was a very large lake. The expanse of its surface Avas 

 about twice that of present Lake Erie. It reached from the Indiana-Ohio 

 state line on the Maumee river to Marilla in western New York, twenty 

 miles east of Buffalo, and from near Port Huron, Michigan, to Ottawa 

 and Norwalk, Ohio, and to Konioko and Brantford in Ontario. Storm 

 waves on a lake of this size would be expected to do effective work and 

 to disturb the water to a considerable depth. It would be expected that 

 beach ridges of gravel submerged under such waters twenty-five to forty- 

 five feet would be much modified. And such is the fact. The shores of 

 Lake Whittlesey which were exposed to a wide sweep of water, affording 

 opportunity for powerful wave action, extended, within the boundaries 

 of Michigan, from Spring Hill, a small hamlet fourteen miles northwest 



