Vor. III] ANDERSON—NEOCENE DEPOSITS OF KERN RIVER 77 
Agassiz that the formation was of Miocene age. Blake 
described in detail the beds with which these fossils were asso- 
ciated to the thickness of about 160 feet, though he inadvert- 
ently conveyed the impression that they were a part of a series 
at least several hundred feet in thickness. 
After the discovery of oil on the Kern River, Mr. W. A. 
Goodyear,’ and later W. L. Watts,” both mention these forma- 
tions. Mr. Watts gives a meager description of the beds 
occurring along the river, and lists of the fossils contained in 
them. Incidentally he leaves the impression that the beds have 
a thickness of at least 2000 feet, though he does not directly 
say so. The fossils collected by Watts were submitted to 
Dr. J. G. Cooper for identification. 
Dr. Cooper® noticed the resemblance of some of the species 
to Pliocene and living forms, and concluded that either several 
periods were represented in the Kern River section, or that 
the series could only be described collectively as Neocene. 
The fossils, however, all came from about the same horizon. 
In 1902 Geo. H. Eldridge* published a brief statement of 
the surface geology and structural features of the Kern River 
oil-field, giving by far the best description of the same that had 
yet appeared. He believed that the section contained both 
-Lower and Upper Miocene beds, and perhaps also Pliocene. 
The structure he believed to be, in the main, monoclinal over 
a wide area, and to contain minor undulations resulting in 
subordinate folds, in which the dip was commonly below 10°. 
The entire series of beds, he states, has the appearance of a 
shore deposit along the granite range of the Sierra. The wells 
of the Kern River field, according to Eldridge, are drilled into 
the upper part of the series, though he does not specifically 
say SO. 
In 1904 Dr. J. C. Merriam,” in a brief paper on the Fauna 
of the Lower Miocene, recalled the fact that at least some of 
the Kern River beds are of that age, chiefly on the evidence of 
such forms as Agasoma gravidum, A. kernianum, Turritella 
ocoyana, etc. Incidentally he called attention to the fact that 
17th Ann. Rept. State Min., 1888, pp. 67-68. 
? Bull. No. 3, Calif. State Mng. Bur., 1894, pp. 38-41. 
* Bull. No. 4, Calif. State Mng. Bur., p. 51 et seq. 
* Bull. U. S. Geol. Surv. No. 213, pp. 310-312. 
Bull. Geol. Dept. Univ. Cal. v. 3, pp. 377-381. 
