XIX. A FOSSIL-BEARING ALLUVIAL DEPOSIT IN SALT- 

 VILLE VALLEY, VIRGINIA. 



By O. a. Peterson. 

 (Plate XL VI 1 1.) 



In the month of June, 1917, there was brought to the Carnegie 

 Museum for identification a small collection of fossils from Saltville, 

 Smyth County, Virginia. This material suggested a preliminary 

 investigation of the locality, whence it came. The writer was there- 

 fore sent to the spot to examine the deposit. By the kind permission 

 of Mr. W. D. Mount, the General Manager of the Mathieson Alkali 

 Works, on the property of which the deposit is located, I was able to 

 commence an investigation on June 23. 



Saltville Valley is drained by a tributary of the North Holston River, 

 and lies between a series of high and rounded hills in the early Pale- 

 ozoic. (See Plate XLVIII.) A great deal of the valley was formerly 

 covered by water during certain portions of the year, but is now 

 drained by a series of canals and ditches. The approximate width of 

 the valley is from one and one-quarter to one and one-half miles at its 

 widest part. The surface is covered by rich black alluvium and clay 

 which rests on a yellowish brown layer of clay heavily charged with 

 gypsum. 



-About -^5 feei 



: Lst/er' 



Pleistocene?- 



]:, BLACK:: soii^;^^. - ',. , :"; 



^,LlGHT BflOW/^ AND I 



STICKY CLAY ^ 



FRAGMENTS OF RIVEH SI/ELLsX 

 -1 ,,^.4 e -.J., -v.. ..<..- ,...■....■■>,;- v.- I 



^LLOW CLAY HCAI/ILY C//AHC£p;i.^ 







Fig. I. Diagram showing deposits at point where the bones were discovered. 



This stratum of yellow clay is probably of Pleistocene origin. Its 

 thickness has not been accurately determined. Water is struck every- 

 where in the valley at a depth of about eight feet below the surface, 

 and this may account for the fact that the depth of the formation 

 alluded to is not more certainly known. In the deeper strata, to a 

 depth of about one thousand feet, are various layers of salt, which are 



469 



ANN. CARN. MUS., XI, 3I, DEC. 20, IQI?. 



