WINONA COUNTY. 265 



Quarries.] 



This underlying blue clay is the cause of the accumulation of the peat-bog, 

 since it sheds the surface waters as effectually as the beds of shale within 

 the strata. It is highly probable that the water of the spring derives its 

 qualities mainly from the bog through which the water slowly seeps after 

 its issue from the St. Croix formation. This is rendered more probable 

 from the fact that at many other places where springs rise from the same 

 formation, their water shows no such qualities; and especially from the fact 

 that other springs near the same place, situated so that their water does not 

 pass through this bog before rising to the surface, though they feed the bog 

 along its upper margin, do not in any known case possess these qualities. 



MATERIAL RESOURCES. 



Stone quarries in Winona county. The principal quarries of the county 

 are at Winona, in the lower strata of the St. Lawrence limestone. These 

 have been prosecuted for many years (since 1854), both for building-stone 

 and for quicklime.* They are owned by John O'Dae, C. H. Porter and 

 E. 0. Wallace, and they supply an excellent material for building-stone and 

 for quicklime. The character of the stone has been sufficiently described 

 in giving the characters of the St. Lawrence limestone. The quarry in the 

 same formation at Dresbach is owned by Mr. S. V. Brown. Outside of the 

 city of Winona but little use has been made of stone for construction in 

 Winona county. Brick is more common. Mr. Bottle Ringley has a stone 

 farm house, about two miles east of Utica. The Pickwick flouring-mill is 

 built of stone quarried at Pickwick on land owned by the mill company. 

 The flouring-mill at Troy is constructed from the Shakopee limestone at 

 that place. 



The new quarries in the St. Croix sandstone at Dresbach and Dakota, 

 which promise to become very important to the county and to the state, 

 have been fully described in the proper place in the chapter on the build- 

 ing stones of the state. There are a few quarries also in the Trenton in the 

 southwest part of the county, which supply stone to St. Charles. 



Quicklime. The lime burned at Winona, and generally in the county, 

 has the superior qualities that dolomitic limestones impart. It is slow to 

 slack and set, evolves less heat, and is believed to be more enduring when 



'Compare the chapter on the building-stones of the state. 



