1893. ] NEW YORK ACADEMY OF SCIENCES. 225 
more definite conclusions in regard to the same strata, and 
under the heading ‘‘ Upper Secondary System, I., Long Island 
Division,” says: ‘‘The reasons for believing that the principal 
mass of this formation is older than the Tertiary will be seen 
in tracing the equivalency of these beds to those of New Jersey, 
Maryland, Delaware and Virginia, where it is considered as 
established that the corresponding strata belong to the upper 
secondary of the epoch of the cretaceous and greensand forma- 
tions.’’ So that stratigraphically and lithologically the true 
relationship between Long Island and the rest of the Atlantic 
coastal plain was beginning to be appreciated. Tertiary and 
later fossils had been found on the island, but the palzon- 
tological evidence of its cretaceous strata was wanting. About 
this time a discovery was reported which caused considerable 
discussion, the echoes of which have been heard to within a 
few yearsago. At the meeting of the New York Lyceum of 
Natural History on December 19, 1842, a specimen of Exogyry 
was shown, said to have been found in digging a well in Brook 
lyn. I quote as follows from the minutes of that meeting : 
“Dr. Jay exhibited a fossil Exogyra, found sixty feet below the 
surface, in digging a well in the city of Brooklyn. Referred to 
Messrs. Jay and W. C. Redfield to report upon the authenticity 
of the locality and other matters respecting the geological rela- 
tions of the fossil.’ Inthe minutes of the meeting of January 
9, 1843, the report of this committee is included, from which the 
following facts are abstracted: The fossil was found in 1834 
by and Newman, well-diggers, while excavating a 
well in Clark street, between Willow and Pineapple streets. It 
was taken by them to Mr. Smith, late Mayor of Brooklyn, who 
descended the well and examined personally the location where 
it was found, about sixty-five feet below the surface. The shell 
was said to have contained ‘‘ a dark colored earth or residuum, 
differing from the earth in which the fossil was imbedded.”’ 
The discovery was again mentioned at the Albany meeting of 
the Association of American Geologists and Naturalists in 1843, 
by Mr. Redfield, who said: ‘‘This is believed to be the first 
authentic memorial of the cretaceous formation found in the 
State of New York.”* It is also mentioned by Issachar Cozzens, 
Jr., who evidently considered it as significant, and who prophe- 
sies as follows:’’+ ‘‘It is more than probable that this mem- 
* Abstract of the proceedings, 4th session. Assn. Am. Geol. & Nat.in Am. 
Journ. Sei. xlv. 135-165 (1843), 
( 1 OR ais i History of Manhattan or New York Island,” ete., pp. 114 
1843). 
Transactions N. Y. Acad. Sei. Vol. XII. July 15, 1893. 
