HIGH-GRADE SILICA MATERIALS 9 



for grinding pebbles and liners in tube mills. This will be discussed 

 in part 2. 



Operating facilities and transportation. The situation appears 

 to be very favorable for both quarrying and transportation ; the best 

 rock is exposed as an outcrop for over a quarter of a mile, and hence 

 but little stripping would be necessary. It is massive, well jointed, 

 and should break out easily into readily handled blocks. 



Peekskill creek lies only a few hundred feet away, the Hudson 

 river is less than a mile distant and the main line of the New York 

 Central and Hudson River Railroad runs close by, with yard and 

 freight facilities at Peekskill; transportation, therefore, offers no 

 problem whatever. Provided this material has any economic value, 

 it seems certain that it can be quarried and placed ready for ship- 

 ment at a minimum cost. 



POUGHQUAG QUARTZITE IN DUTCHESS COUNTY 



General description. The quartzite in this section 1 is most 

 extensively developed about 10 miles east of the city of Beacon, 

 4 miles east of Fishkill, and in the immediate vicinity of the villages 

 of Wiccopee (formerly Johnsville) and Shenandoah. 



Two northeasterly-extending spurs of the Fishkill mountains 

 form the " hooks " of a roughly crescentic area, convex southwest- 

 erly. The quartzite fringes the inner slopes of the mountains, lying 

 on the eastern and western margins respectively of the two spurs 

 or " hooks," and on the northern (or inner) slope of that part which 

 forms the bow of the crescent. 



An outcrop of conglomeratic quartzite is exposed for a short 

 distance on the eastern flank of Honness mountain (the western 

 hook), about one-third of a mile south of Wiccopee; but most of 

 the quartzite in this vicinity is covered by drift. The best rock 

 occurs 2 miles south of Wiccopee on the farms of Ward Ladue and 

 Garrett Smith ; here it forms large prominent ledges extending 

 southerly for about one-fourth of a mile. 



This rock is a massive, well- jointed, grayish pink, vitreous quart- 

 zite, so highly indurated that surfaces polished by glaciation have 

 an appearance as though varnished ; it is extremely tough and hard. 



Lithologic character. In thin section it is seen to be a beautiful, 

 typical, most intricately interlocked, highly indurated, very pure 



1 An excellent description of the occurrence of the quartzite and its rela- 

 tion to the gneisses of the Highlands is contained in New York State 

 Museum Bulletin 148, entitled " Geology of the Poughkeepsie Quadrangle," 

 by C. E. Gordon. 



