PREGLACIAL DRAINAGE CONDITIONS IN THE 

 VICINITY OF CINCINNATI. 



By Gerard Fowke. 



At the winter meeting of the Ohio Academy of Science, 

 in 1897, I offered a paper upon the above subject. This was 

 pubHshed as a Bulletin of the Scientific Laboratories of Denison 

 University, in volume XI. Recently the opportunity has been 

 afforded by the Academy, through the ]^Ic]Millan fund, for further 

 exploration of the region. Some discoveries resulted which con- 

 siderably modify so much of that article as relates to the section 

 below Cincinnati. 



In order that the reader may arrive at a correct understand- 

 ing of the matter herein presented, it will be necessary to utilize 

 such portions of the report already published as refer to the ter- 

 ritory east of the Great ^^liami river, and acknowledgment is 

 hereby made to the Denison University for permission so to do. 



The initial point of this part of the Ohio was near Man- 

 chester, at the col (A). A few miles below. Cabin creek entered, 

 and at Maysville it was joined by Limestone creek. For dis- 

 tinction, the name of the latter is given to the stream. At short 

 intervals below, other tributaries put in, each marked by a large 

 area of bottom land. Between them the valley is somewhat 

 narrower. This is because gravels and silt cover the low points 

 at the junction of the streams, where the combined valleys are 

 widest. These features continue to the mouth of the Little Mi- 

 ami. The distance between the hills bordering this tributary is 

 very much greater than the width of the main valley at any 

 place above; and the shrunken stream which winds its devious 

 way from side to side of the included level, seems entirely inade- 

 quate to the task of carving out such a basin. Immediately be- 

 low this, at Dayton, Kentucky, opposite the upper end of Cin- 

 cinnati, the Ohio contracts almost at once to a narrow channel, 

 very much less than that of the Little Miami. It is evident that 

 a col (B) at this point formerly deflected the waters of old Lime- 

 stone to the northward. On passing through this gap, the Ohio 



