42° GUIDEBOOK OF THE WESTERN UNITED STATES. 
Fergus Falls moraine. Its summit, which is crossed by the railway 
near milepost 59, attains an altitude of 1,454 feet, or 528 feet higher 
than Fargo on the east and 209 feet higher than Valley City on the 
west. On the west there is a sharp descent from Alta Ridge down 
to a broad plain formed by the outwash of material from the glacier 
when it lay just east of the ridge. It is supposed that at the time 
the moraine was formed Sheyenne River was flowing at the same 
level as this plain and that the present valley of that stream had not 
been cut. 
West of Alta Ridge the old line of the railway turned slightly to 
the south and descended into the valley of Sheyenne River, crossing 
the stream but little above the general level of the 
valley bottom. Recently a new “high line” has 
been carried across the valley on a steel trestle 150 
feet high. From this trestle a fine view of Valley 
City and the river can be had. (See Pl. III, p. 11.) 
Here the rock underlying the glacial drift is exposed, and it is the 
first exposure of this kind that can be seen from the train west of the 
Mississippi Valley. Soft dark shale may be seen in either bluff from 
the ‘‘high line’’ or in the sides of the coulee? as the train descends 
by the “low line” to the bottom of the valley. This shale contains 
fossil shells, which are similar to those of animals living in the ocean 
of to-day; hence it is believed that it was deposited when this part of 
the country was beneath the waters of a sea. 
At Valley City the Northern Pacific is crossed by the branch of 
the Soo Line that connects Moose Jaw, on the main line of the Cana- 
dian Pacific Railway, with St. Paul. 
1 This is the altitude at the old station, 
which is near river level. 
tion is about 150 feet higher. 
? The term ‘‘coulee’’ is generally applied 
throughout the northern tier of States to 
any steep-sided gulch or water channel 
and at times eyen to a stream valley of 
considerable length. The term was 
doubtless derived from the French verb 
couler, signifying to flow. This meaning | the silt covered up the sand; the sand 
of “ coulee”’ should not be confused with | was cemented together as sandstone and 
the geologic meaning of the word, which 
signifies a solidified stream or sheet of 
lava. 
’ During the later half of the Creta- 
Valley City. 
Elevation 1,245 feet.1 
Population 4,606. 
St. Paul 310 miles. 
this area was due to the relative sinking 
of the land. As the land sank the waters 
advanced, and the waves and currents 
washed and sorted the sediments brought 
down by the streams. The coarser sand 
mingling and interbedding of sand and 
silt, so that numerous beds of sandstone 
ceous period the sea covered what is now 
the region of the Great Plains and the 
Rocky Mountains as far west as the 
Wasatch Range in Utah and extended 
from the Gulf of Mexico to the Arctic 
Ocean. The incursion of the sea over 
and of sandy shale are now encountered 
in drilling into the ancient deposits. 
The long duration of the period in which 
these beds were laid down is indicated 
by the great thickness of fine sediment 
which then accumulated. 
