A CENTURY OF GEOLOGY IN INDIANA. 103 



since they must contain a mixture of the earthy ingredients, salts and bases, 

 highly favorable for supplying the required elements for thrifty growth, and 

 must possess, at the same time, the mechanical properties favorable for the 

 retention of moisture, the permeation of air, and for the reception of the 

 nitrogenous principals deri^"ed from the atmosphere." 



This change of opinion was doubtless due to the fact that Agassiz and otlier 

 geologists studied and evolved the glacial tlieorj' and the transportation of 

 boulder soils in the early forties, and Agassiz's "Systeme Glaciarie," on which 

 our modem knowledge of glacial action is mainly based, was issued in 1847. 

 Before I learned that the 1859 edition of the report, which is the one I possess, 

 was not a verbatim report but in part a revised edition, I thought that Owen 

 had evolved the glacial theory of the transportation of soils ahead of Agassiz, 

 but the wording of the original 1837 edition proves the contrary. 



Not foreseeing the great railway development of the future or the use of 

 fuels other than coal, he stated that "The western counties of Indiana must 

 ultimately become the piincipal manufacturing districts of the State, from 

 the fact of their geological position ^^ithin the Indiana coal field; for all ex- 

 perience proves that manufactories have most generally sprung iip and 

 flourished in coal regions." 



Of building stones he praised very highly what he called the "shell marble 

 rock" of a quarry known as "Marble Hill," located fifteen miles below Madi- 

 son, in Jefferson County, and belonging to the Niagara Division of the Upper 

 Silurian. In the revised edition of the 1837 report no less than 14 of the 69 

 pages are devoted to a description of the building stone of this particular 

 quarry. His only reference to the oolitic stone, now so famous as a building 

 material, in the 1837 edition was as follows: "Most of the limestones in the 

 oolitic series, that is those occurring in the counties of Crawford, Oi'ange, 

 Lawrence, Monroe, Owen and Putnam, make good building materials and 

 the soil formed from them has a calcareous character and is admirably adapted 

 for the growth of grass." In the 1859 edition this was revised to read : "]SIam^ 

 of the beds of the Subcarboniferous limestone make good building stones. 

 Some of the oolitic limestones take a polih and furnish Sj cream colored 

 marble." P'or building purposes, aside from the stone of Marble Hill quarry 

 he recommended only the freestones (sandstone) at the base of the coal forma- 

 tion in Wan'en, Fountain and Orange Counties. Also those of the Knobstone 

 formation above the black slate and gray shales, but gave warning that these 

 should be used only with proper precautions and bj^ experienced stone 

 masons. 



He did not foresee the use of the shales of the Carboniferous or Knob- 

 stone formations for the making of clay products, but stated only that they 

 "afford locally both argillaceous iron ore and carbonate of iron." 



The wording of another paragraph in his summary impresses the geologist 

 of to-day as rather curious, until he realizes that Owen's work was wTitten 

 before the doctrine of Evolution Avas set forth, and at a time when most 

 people believed in Divine creation of the earth and its living forms. He was 



