The Comaiichean of Central Kansas. 215 



ing. This locality is near the present little village of Bavaria 

 (] :7).* He referred the fossils to the Dakota, and mentions 

 that Professor Mudge had collected fossils near the same place. 

 This was in 1867. 



Subsequently (1871), Professor Mudge gave some details 

 of the locality where he discovered the shells (2 :38) , and these 

 were later described without figures by Meek (3:297). Four 

 years later Meek revised his descriptions and accompanied 

 them by figures (4, pi. 2), and two years afterward Professor 

 Mudge gave further details relating to the places from which 

 he obtained the fossils (5 :67 ; 6 :291) . 



Of more recent date are the articles of Prof. F. W. Cragin, 

 A\ho first clearly recognized the Comanchean or Lower Cre- 

 taceous age of the Mentor beds and carefully sought for their 

 outcroppings, particularly in Saline county. It was he who 

 proposed the name of Mentor for these strata, and he de- 

 scribed several new species therefrom (11). Prosser com- 

 piled the results of the labors of previous students and extended 

 the knowledge of distribution and details of stratigraphy 

 (9:182), while later papers have been prepared by Gould (14 

 and 15). 



The existence of strata in central Kansas with both the lithic 

 and faunal aspect of the Kiowa shales^ appears to have been 

 first recognized shortly prior to 1889 by Professor Cragin, his 

 note calling attention to their presence appearing in that year 

 (10:37), and the following year he gave details relating to dis- 

 tribution (11 :80) . Prosser gave further details (9 :179) , while 

 Prof. A. W. Jones, of the Kansas Wesleyan College, has given 

 the latest word on these strata (12:111). 



GENERAL RELATIONS. 



In southern Kansas the Comanchean beds rest unconform- 

 ably on the red beds of the Permian and are overlain by thin 

 unfossiliferous sands and shales which have been called the 

 Dakota, or by the overlapping continental deposits of the 

 Plains Tertiary, and in some places both the Dakota and 

 Comanchean are absent, so that the Tertiary rests directly on 

 the Permian. In central Kansas the relations are similar so 

 far as the underlying strata are concerned, the Comanchean 



' See bibliography. 



1. The Kiowa shales and the underlying Cheyenne sandstones are the divisious o£ the 

 nianchean which occur in southern Kansas. 



