20 RESOURCES OF TENNESSEE. 



Along the eastern border of the lake, there is a bluff more 

 than 100 feet high, composed of soft beds of Tertiary age at the 

 bottom, and a deposit of fine sand and clay at the top, known 

 as loess, with a thin layer of gravel between the two. This 

 bluff extends northward to Hickman, Kentucky, where it runs 

 into and becomes a part of the bluffs of the Mississippi, and 

 southward below Vicksburg, with the exception of breaks by 

 such streams as Obion River, Forked Deer River, Hatchie 

 River, Wolf River and others entering the Mississippi River 

 from the east. This bluff is in places the present bank of the 

 Mississippi River, as at Memphis, and in others a former bank, 

 as east of Reelfoot Lake. A look at it from Hickman 

 southward to Obion River, is enough to convince any one 

 familiar with the shifting from side to side of the Mississippi 

 River, that it is an old river bluff, and th#t Reelfoot Lake 

 occupies a former river bed. The bluff is in no way due to the 

 earthquake, as some interested in prospecting the area have 

 supposed. The earthquake affected it, as may yet be seen, by 

 forming fissures and terraces of limited extent on its surface. 

 Such of these as the writer has seen are in the nature of land- 

 slides, and do not represent true fissureing. 



Conclusive evidence that the site of Reelfoot Lake is a former 

 river course may also be seen by one who has observed land 

 surfaces in areas of shifting streams, in the gradual slope 

 from the rich level, alluvial plain west of the lake, to the water's 

 edge. This is plainly to be seen from a point east of Tipton- 

 ville, southward to the end of the lake. 



That the site of the lake was an old river course, and was 

 low land before the earthquake, is stressed for the purpose of 

 eliminating the notion held by many that there was excessive 

 sinking in this area, caused by the earthquake. It was an area, 

 like all young river bottoms of flood-plain origin, made up of 

 low ridges with intervening troughs, some of the latter filled 

 with water a part or all the time, the whole having been 

 drained by a stream of considerable size and probably several 

 tributaries. It appears that this stream was called Reelfoot 

 Creek before the earthquake, and it was this that gave the 

 name to the lake. 



