CHAPTER XVI. 

 THE GLACIAL LAKE WARREN. 



INTRODUCTORY. 



The names Lake Warren, Warren Waters, and Warren Grulf have been 

 applied by Spencer to the most extensive sheets of water in the Grreat Lakes 

 region, and have been variously applied by other geologists. This has led 

 to some confusion, and in order to make the application more specific Taylor 

 has proposed to restrict the name Lake Warren to the body of water which 

 existed when the fourth beach of Gilbert was forming. At that time the 

 water in the Erie-Huron Basin seems to have had its greatest extent, and 

 this meets as nearly as practicable the application made by Spencer. As 

 this restriction of the name is a matter of some consequence, Taylor's 

 reasons are here given : ^ 



When Dr. Speocer had traced parts of the Forest, Arkona, and Ridgeway 

 beaches in Ontario, he named the water which made them Lake Warren, in honor 

 of Gen. G. K. Warren, whom he regards as "the father of lacustrine geology in 

 America." This name was tirst published in Science for January 27, 1888, page 4:9 ; 

 but in this and in all his subsequent publications relating to these beaches, Dr. 

 Spencer had stated his belief that they are really of marine origin. Besides calling 

 the waters that made these beaches Lake Warren, he has as frequently called them 

 Warren Water and Warren Gulf. The current ideas of their size and origin have 

 been diverse from the beginning, so much so as to make the application of the name 

 rather uncertain. Dr. Spencer has always defined Lake Warren as covering the 

 whole of the Great Lakes area, and Upham and Lawson have supposed it to cover 

 all but Lake Ontario. The whole series of beaches has been regarded as the work of 

 one lake at as many halts in the fall of its level. This is true in a wide sense, but 

 there were so many elements of change as the waters fell that it seems appropriate 

 and necessary to consider the several stages as separate lakes and give a special name 

 to each. The waters changed their shape, size, and level as they tell, and, what seems 

 still more important, they changed the place of their outlet several times. 



The need for the restricted use of the name Lake Warren here proposed is a 

 natural result of the progress of discovery. With the finding of outlets and terminal 

 moraines intimately related to the beaches, the moraines marking the place of the 

 ice barrier that held the waters up, it becomes a positive necessit}'- to recognize the 



1 Bull. Geol. Soc. America, Vol. VIII, 1897, pp. 56-57. 



