306 D. WHITE — POTTSVILLE SERIES ALONG NEW RIVER, W. VA. 



on the stratigraphic position of the well-known New River coals mined 

 at numerous points from Quinnimont down to Hawks Nest. 



Use of term "Pottsville" and Formations included in "Pottsville 



Series." 



The Pottsville series, or the " Conglomerate series," as it is perhaps 

 better known in West Virginia, embraces the group of sandstones, con- 

 glomerates, sandy shales and coals lying between the green and red cal- 

 careous Mauch Chunk shales below, and the softer, more argillaceous 

 terranes of the " Lower Productive Coal Measures " above. It is essen- 

 tially a sandstone series, though it includes some of the most valuable 

 soft coals of the Appalachian region. Its massive ledges, rising often 

 abruptly at short intervals from one another, support a more or less 

 clearly defined terrace plateau, across which for more than 30 miles the 

 river has cut its celebrated gorge. The outcrop of the series is conform- 

 able to the general Appalachian trend. It is fringed on the east by cer- 

 tain high knobs northeast of Hinton, and it descends westward to the 

 falls of the Kanawha, below which it passes under water level. 



The general characters of the group in southern West Virginia have 

 been well described by Professors W. M. Fontaine^ and I. C. White.f 

 To the New River section the former gave the name '' Conglomerate 

 series," so defining it as to include the lowest and the uppermost con- 

 glomerates in the Piney Creek section, he supposing the uppermost to 

 represent the Kanawha Falls sandstone. Fontaine's Conglomerate series 

 was in large part referred by Professor White to the " Pottsville," both 

 authors regarding it as the equivalent of the Pottsville conglomerate, the 

 lower boundary being drawn by the latter author at the top of the red 

 and green shales. The reference of the entire series to the Pottsville has 

 been made, so far as I know, almost wholly on the basis of the strati- 

 graphic evidence, the facts being, first, that it is more or less distinctly 

 conglomeratic, and, second, that it occupies the interval between the 

 Lower Carboniferous marine beds and the true Lower Productive Coal 

 Measures (XIII of the Pennsylvania geologists) of the Appalachian basin. 



Purpose of this Study. 



The present paper will necessarily be limited to a few somewhat gen- 

 eralized conclusions, resulting from a preliminary paleontologic and 



* The Great Conglomerate on New River, West Virginia. Am. Jour. Sci., third series, vol. vii, 

 1874, pp. 459, 573. The Conglomerate Series of West Virginia. Am. Jour. Sci., third series, vol. xi, 

 1876, pp. 276, 374. 



t Bull. tJ. S. Geological Survey, no. 65, 1888, p. 179 et seq. 



