THE GUADALUPAN SERIES; AND THE RELA- 
TIONS OF ITS DISCOVERY TO THE EXIST- 
ENCE OF A PERMIAN SECTION IN 
MISSOURL.* 
CHarRuLEs R. Kevss. 
A most spirited controversy was the Permian Question 
in American geology during the middle of the last cen- 
tury. For more than 50 years was it warmly debated 
without tangible results. While some of the attendant 
problems still remain not fully solved it is with great 
interest that it may now be announced that recently data 
of a critical character have been secured for the definite 
settlement of the main question. 
Singularly, during all of this period of nearly two gen- 
erations of discussion the only real evidences favoring the 
occurrence of strata of true Permian equivalent in this 
country are contained in papers first read before our 
Academy and published in the initial volume of its Trans- 
actions. To this record I desire to call especial attention 
at this time, and also to refer to the significance of cer- 
tain discoveries which bear directly upon the general 
question that the Far Southwest and Mexican tableland 
have recently afforded. 
Among the earliest communications made to our St. 
Louis Academy of Science were several presented by. 
one of its most active and distinguished members, Dr. 
B. F. Shumard. One of these papers in particular, read 
at the regular meeting of March 8, 1858, was an announce- 
ment of the discovery of true Permian fossils in the white 
limestones of the Guadalupe mountains on the southern 
boundary of New Mexico, not far from El Paso.t. Soon 
*Presented by title to The Academy of Science of St. Louis, Novem- 
ber 21, 1910. 
*Trans. Acad. Sci. St. Louis, 1:113; 387-403. 1860. 
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