264 J. W. GOLDTHWAIT— GLACIATION IN THE WHITE MOUNTAINS 



glaciation preceded the last regional glaciation — a conclusion in disagree- 

 ment with those of Louis Agassiz, Prof. C. H. Hitchcock, and Dr. Warren 

 TTpham in New Hampshire, and of the late Prof. B. S. Tarr in Maine. 

 Having the opportunity during the past summer to study the problem 

 further, I chose a field more particularly known to the three pioneers in 

 New Hampshire glacial geology. With a small party, organized in en- 

 operation with the Dartmouth Outing Club, I spent four weeks in the 

 Ammonoosuc Valley, Franconia Mountains, and Mount Moosilauke, ex- 

 amining in detail the evidence hitherto published and gathering new 

 pieces of evidence where opportunity offered. During most of the time 

 the party camped in tents, but while working in the district around North 

 Woodstock and Mount Moosilauke we occupied a newly completed cabin 

 of the Outing Club at Agassiz Basin. For generous support of the project, 

 I am indebted to Eev. J. E. Johnson of the class of 1866 of Dartmouth 

 College, the Honorary President of the Dartmouth Outing Club. While 

 it is realized that we have collected by no means all the interesting evi- 

 dence of glaciation which could be gathered in this field, it is thought 

 that the observations presented in this paper will at least show that the 

 evidence of glaciation of the White Mountains by local alpine glaciers, 

 or by a local ice-cap, at the close of th\e last Glacial epoch are fictitious, 

 although, as suggested by the studies of three years ago, it is clear that 

 there was a limited development of alpine glaciers on the highest moun- 

 tains at some stage or epoch prior to the passage of the last ice-sheet 

 over them. 



Glaciation related to the Bethlehem Moraine 



qve8ti0n8 raised by reports of earlier observers 



The country between Bethlehem and the Ammonoosuc Biver is classic 

 ground for glacial studies. In it Louis Agassiz, fresh from his investi- 

 gations of Swiss glaciers, in 1847, saw what he confidently described as 

 "unmistakable evidences of the former existence of local glaciers." These 

 evidences he reported in considerable detail after a second visit to the 

 district, in 1870, in the only paper he ever published on glacial geology 

 in New England. 2 A series of sixteen terminal or recessional moraines, 

 composed of material believed to be derived in part from the south, were 

 attributed by Agassiz to a local glacier which had moved northward from 

 Mount Lafayette across the valley of Gale Biver and the ridge near Mount 

 Agassiz, over the site of Bethlehem village to the Ammonoosuc Biver (see 



2 Louis Agassiz : On the former existence of local glaciers in the White Mountains, 

 proc. Araer. Assoc, Adv. Sci.. vol. 19, 1870, pp. 161-167. 



