AMERICAN GEOLOGY SURVEY UNDER KING. 



609 



the Green River Basin, the Uinta and Elk Mountains and the inter- 

 vening Mesozoic and Tertiary valleys of the North Park and the Lar- 

 amie Plains, the Medicine Bow Range, and the northern extension of 

 the Front Range. 



The survey made no annual or preliminary reports, and as the 

 thorough study of the data collected consumed several years of time, 

 some of the results obtained were anticipated by other organizations 

 through priority of publication. 



The published reports, which appeared in the form of quarto vol- 

 umes, named in the order of their appearance, were: Vol. Ill, Mining 

 Industry, by James D. Hague, 1870; Vol. V, Botanj 7 , by Sereno Wat- 

 son, 1871; Vol. VI, Microscopical Petrography, by Ferdinand Zirkel, 

 1876; Vol. II, Descriptive Geology, by Arnold Hague and S. F. 

 Emmons, 1*77: Vol. IV, consisting of Parts 1 and 2, Paleontology, 

 by F. B. Meek. James Hall, and R. P. Whitfield, and Part 3, Orni- 

 thology, by Robert Ridgeway. 1877; Vol. I. 

 Sytematic Geology, b} 7 Clarence King, 1878; 

 and Vol. VII, Odontornithes, by O. G. 

 Marsh, in 1880. The first volume was ac- 

 companied by a geological atlas containing 

 ten large double maps. 



To properly summarize the work of the 

 survey, as made known in these volumes, 

 is a practical impossibility in the space that 

 can be devoted to it. It was noted that, 

 in the grand total of 120.000 feet of sedi- 

 mentary accumulations found, the main 

 divisions of Archean, Paleozoic, Mesozoic, 

 and Cenozoic were all distinctly outlined by 

 divisional periods of marked unconformity. 

 Considered as a whole, there was a noteworthy fullness in the geolog- 

 ical column, none of the important stratigraphical time divisions being 

 wholly wanting, excepting some of the obscure intermediate deposits 

 which in other localities have been found lying between the base of 

 the Cambrian and the summit of the Archean series. 



From the data furnished by Emmons and Hague, and his own 

 observations, King felt himself able to reconstruct with a considerable 

 degree of accuracy the topographical configurations of the Archean 

 surface, and pictured with great clearness the growth of that portion 

 of the American continent included within the area surveyed. He 

 conceived that, at the close of the Archean age, there was a great 

 mountain system built up of at least two sets of nonconformable 

 strata, referred to Laurentian and Huronian, which was coextensive 

 nat mus 1904 39 



Fig. 110.— Robert Parr Whitfield. 



