GEOLOGICAL SURVEY OF THE TEEEITOEIES. 41 

 ADDITIONAL NOTES ON SARPY AND DOUGLAS COUNTIES. 



Sarpy County borders on the Platte Elver and the Missouri, and thus 

 has a large share of bottom-land, as well as the rather rugged or hilly 

 portions along those streams. It has superior advantages over the more 

 northern counties in its numerous quarries of limestone, which are des- 

 tined to prove of great value. 



Already do the quarries along the Platte and the Papillion furnish 

 the greater portion of the lime and building stone used at Omaha, and 

 most of the rock needed for the contemplated railroad-bridge across the 

 Missouri must of necessity be obtained there. 



The basis rock which underlies the surface of the greater portion of 

 Sarpy and Douglas Counties is Carboniferous limestone. These lime- 

 stones are evidently of the age of the Upper Coal-Measures, as their fossil 

 remains indicate. 



The western portions of the counties are occupied by the rusty varie- 

 gated sandstones of the Dakota group. The soil is of great fertility, 

 seeming to be composed of a mingling of the eroded materials of the 

 sandstones and limestones with the yellow marl of the Loess deposit, 

 which covers the surface of the country here to a greater or less depth. 



The result is a surface- soil eminently adapted for the growth of all 

 the cereals, as wheat, oats, and corn. The scenery is beautiful indeed 5 

 the rolling or undulating character of the country, while it relieves the 

 monotony, does not obstruct the vision, so that objects may be seen with 

 distinctness ten to twenty miles on every side. 



The river-bottoms, especially through Missouri and the Platte, are of 

 inexhaustible fertility. With a soil not unfrequently ten to thirty feet 

 in depth, they sustain a most luxuriant vegetation, while during the 

 greater portion of the year the broad upland prairies are clothed with 

 grass and flowers of great variety and beauty. 



The yellow siliceous marl covers the greater part of Douglas County, 

 so that the limestones are exposed only in a few localities. 



Near Omaha City a few beds are revealed at the water's edge, perhaps 

 ten to fifteen feet, and over these layers is a deposit of gravel and marl 

 one hundred to one hundred and fifty feet in thickness. 



At Florence, about five miles above Omaha, these limestones are again 

 seen at very low water in the bottom of the Missouri, but as a rule the 

 rocks of the country are concealed from view by this great deposit of 

 marl. In consequence of this fact, the limestone quarries along the 

 Platte assume a far greater importance and value. 



There is a quarry of limestone at Bellevue Landing, near Sarpy's old 

 trading post, which has been wrought for many years; but the most 

 valuable layers of the rock are not visible in time of high water. Wat- 

 son's quarry, on the Papillion, three miles west of Bellevue, has been 

 worked for many years, and contains several layers of valuable rock for 

 building purposes. This quarry is a source of considerable revenue to 

 the owners, and the materials are taken to Bellevue and Omaha in great 

 quantities. 



The following is a section of the beds, in descending order: 



6. Vegetable soil, two to four feet thick, with a few stray water-worn 

 rocks. 



5. A bed like No. 3, with fragments of fossils capped with loose layers 

 of limestone, eighteen inches to two feet thick. 



4. Three inches of light-yellow clay — a hard layer. 



3. Yellow, indurated, calcareous clay, full of shells ; ten inches. 



