WASKCA COUNTY. 413 



Material resource*. 1 



up his experience in boring some two hundred wells in this and neighboring counties: The yel- 

 lowish upper till is harder to bore than the blue till next below, which is moist and sticky, the 

 auger going down five feet in the latter as easily as two feet in the former; but a third kind of till, 

 called " hardpan," darker than the soft blue till, is generally as hard as the yellow till, and often, 

 probably in half the instances of its occurrence, it is harder. The upper, yellow till is character- 

 ized by sandy streaks, and crevices which yield seep-water, found in half of all the wells. It is 

 almost always directly underlain by the soft and moist blue till, which has no crevices with 

 seeping water, but bears sand-veins from two or three inches to four feet thick, which contain 

 water. The very hard, darker till is similar in yielding water with the last. 



The maximum thickness of the yellow till found by Mr. Converse was 35 feet, in Spring Lake, 

 Scott county. The greatest thickness of the soft blue till found is 88 feet, at his home in sec. 27, 

 Freedom. The thickest bed of the very hard, darker till was 40 feet, occurring at French lake, 

 in Bice county, six miles northwest from Faribault. An average of the thickness of this dark 

 hardpan may be eight or ten feet; and about a quarter or a third of its beds are only from one to 

 five feet thick. Fragments of lignite, up to four inches in diameter, are often met with in these 

 drift deposits, most frequently in the dark hardpan. Pieces of wood, up to one foot long, are 

 found rarely, but no shells nor other organic remains have been noticed. 



MATERIAL RESOURCES. 



The agricultural capabilities of Waseca county, its fertile soil, and its 

 good supply of timber, have been spoken of on page 409. 



No water-powers have been utilized in this county. 



Drift boulders are the only stone found for the construction of founda- 

 tions, walls of cellars and wells, culverts, etc. These boulders occur quite 

 commonly upon the morainic belt, and are found sparingly in all parts of 

 the county. They are mostly varieties of granite, syenite, and gneiss, with 

 occasional blocks of limestone. In size they reach to five feet, and rarely 

 to ten feet in diameter. 



Lime has been burned from the boulders of magnesian limestone in the 

 drift by E. R. Tuttle in Janesville, during the last twelve years, producing 

 annually from 100 to 200 barrels, selling it at about SI. 25 per barrel. The 

 greater part of these boulders, estimated to be three-fourths or more, make 

 white lime; while the remainder yield lime of yellowish or darkish gray 

 color. 



Brick have been made also by Mr. Tuttle about a third of a mile north- 

 west from Janesville during the past twelve years, producing from 100,000 

 to 400,000 yearly, selling at about $7 per M. He uses stratified yellow and 

 gray clay, which contains sandy layers so that it needs no intermixture of 

 more sand. Tt is excavated to a depth of five feet. These bricks are red 

 and of good quality. 



In the northwest \ of sec. 2, losco. close to the north line of this county, 



