Contributions to the Mesozoic flora of the Atlantic coastal plain — I, 
North Carolina * 
EpwaRD WILBER BERRY 
(WITH PLATES I1~16) 
Although Winchell mentioned the occurrence of fossil plants 
in Alabama as long ago as 1856,+ and Meek & Hayden refer 
to them in 1857,{ the first collections were made, so far as I am 
aware, as recently as 1884. These were sent to Lesquereux. 
Subsequently additional collections were made by Smith, Lang- 
don, Fontaine, and Ward, but none of these have ever been studied, 
although Ward furnished Smith with a provisional list of thirty- 
five species which was published on page 348 of his Geology of the 
Coastal Plain of Alabama in 1894. 
These plants conclusively prove the Mid-Cretaceous age of 
that part of the Tuscaloosa formation from which they were col- 
lected, although it is quite possible that the great thickness 
assigned to this formation by the Alabama geologists may indi- 
cate the presence of beds of Older Potomac age, especially since 
beds of this age are now definitely known from both North and 
South Carolina, and are said by Darton to be present in Georgia. 
The most southerly outcrops heretofore known of plant-bear- 
ing beds of Raritan or Magothy age, with which the Alabama 
beds are comparable, are those found in Maryland, and it is the 
purpose of the present paper partially to bridge over this interval 
of nearly eight hundred miles, and to add another link to the 
chain which has come to connect the Cretaceous floras of Marthas 
Vineyard, Block Island, Long Island, Staten Island, New Jersey, 
Delaware and Maryland. 
No Cretaceous plants have ever been described from North 
Carolina, although we find lignite mentioned by Olmsted as early 
as 1827 3 as occurring along the Neuse river.§ In Emmons's s | first 
* Published by permission of the North Carolina Geological Sareey. 
ft Proc. Am. Assoc. Adv. Sci. 10?: 92. 1856. 
t Proc. Acad. Nat. Sci. Phila. 9: 133. 1857. 
3 OLMSTED, D, Rep, Geol. N. C. part 2. 1827. 
185 
