III. 



CHANGES IN DRAINAGE IN SOUTHERN OHIO. 



By Frank Leverett. 



With One Plate. 



In connection with a study of the Ohio Valley and its tributaries, 

 carried on for the U. S. Geological Survey, for a period of several 

 months the past year (1896), I was so fortunate as to discover an aban- 

 doned valley departing from the present Ohio at Wheelersburg, Ohio, 

 about ten miles above Portsmouth, and passing northward in a some- 

 what winding course to the Scioto River opposite the city of Waverly. 

 (See map, Plate II). The valley is fully a mile, and perhaps i^ miles 

 in average width, and is cut to a depth of nearly 300 feet below the 

 general level of the bordering upland, and to within about 150 feet of 

 the present level of the Ohio. A part of this valley was long since 

 noted by Dr. Edward Orton as the channel of a large stream, but its 

 connection with the Ohio was not worked out. (Geology of Ohio, Vol. 

 II, 1874, pp. 611-12). 



This valley is plainly the channel of a north flowing stream, and 

 carried the Great Kanawha and Big Sandy drainage, as well as that of 

 several smaller tributaries of the Ohio, together with a small section of 

 the present Ohio Valley. Evidence of the northward flow is found 

 both in the slope of the rock floor and in the character of the river 

 debris. A series of careful aneroid determinations indicate that the 

 rock floor falls 25 feet in passing from Wheelersburg to Waverly, a dis- 

 tance by the windings of the valley of about 30 miles. 



On the rock floor is a deposit of well rounded pebbles and larger 

 stones such as characterize river bottoms. These deposits though now 

 covered with 25 to 50 feet of silt are exposed by modern ravines which 

 show them to be usually several feet in depth. The stones range in 

 size from a foot or more in diameter downward to fine pebbles. 



The significant feature in connection with this river debris is the 

 kind of rocks. They are very largely made up of quartzite and peb- 

 bles formed from vein quartz, such as are abundant in the terraces 

 of the Kanawha System of West Virginia. The fact that such stones 



