NO. 2 SMITHSONIAN EXPLORATIONS, I924 23 



The past season was the hottest and driest ever recorded for the 

 western part of our country, in consequence of which snow banks 

 that had never been known to disappear, melted away. Most of the 

 mountain streams had Httle more than a fourth or half of their 

 normal flow and the roads became almost impassable at places because 

 the soil, having turned to soft dust, was blown away leaving large 

 stones exposed. Difficult travel was consequently encountered at many 

 places. 



The latter part of the season was spent in continuing the study of 

 various parts of the great Wasatch Range, to determine the strati- 

 graphic position of the beds from which some of the earliest collec- 

 tions of fossils were made by exploring parties sent out previous to 

 the settlement of the country. 



GEOLOGICAL FIELD-WORK IN MARYLAND AND CONNECTICUT 



Mr. Earl V. Shannon, assistant curator, division of physical and 

 chemical geology, U. S. National Museum, made several short trips 

 into Maryland during the year to visit mineral localities in that state. 

 The most noteworthy was that made in May to Cecil County, where 

 several feldspar quarries and the historically famous locality known 

 as the State Line Chrome Mine were visited. Much material was 

 collected for study. The reopening of the Chrome Mine during the 

 war made available on the dump a quantity of freshly mined rock 

 and a fine series of specimens of chromite, magnesite, kammererite 

 and especially of the precious green serpentine known as williamsite 

 was obtained. 



In October, Mr. Shannon made a beginning in the cooperative 

 work with the Geological and Natural History Survey of Connecticut 

 leading toward the publication of a work on the mineralogy of that 

 state. Between two and three weeks was spent in a highly successful 

 collecting trip. A beginning was made in the southeastern corner of 

 the area, including a visit to many of the quarries, mines, and road 

 cuts in Groton, Stonington and Waterford. At the Mason's Island 

 quarry in Stonington. numerous pegmatite dikes occurring in the 

 gneiss were studied and some of them were found to contain notable 

 quantities of primary magnetite. In places biotite-rich streaks in this 

 quarry were found to contam golden-brown stilbite, and in one end 

 of the quarry a quartz vein was located which furnished associated 

 specimens of garnet, epidote, and stilbite. In Salter's quarry in 



