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



tion, which I have chosen because the series in this vicinity has been 

 selected for description by Professor I. C. White.* 



The features of the "Homewood," which completes the Pottsville 

 series, and the superimposed basal portion of the Lower Productive Coal 

 Measures I have taken from the section at Hawks Nest. 



The examination of a number of measurements indicates the thickness 

 of the Pottsville series along New river to be approximately 1,600 feet, if 

 we measure from the base of the lower conglomerate on Piney creek, the 

 base of Professor Fontaine's " Conglomerate series,'' to the top of the 

 Homewood, or about 1,300 feet if we follow Professor White in measuring 

 from the top of the red and green shales, a result which agrees in the 

 main with that published by the latter author. 



NUMBER AND POSITION OF COALS MINED ON NEW RIVER. 



A comparison of the sections, which were made at nearly every mine 

 above Sewell, shows almost conclusively that along New river only two 

 seams are mined in the Pottsville series. In fact, instead of finding 

 that the operations cover two or three veins below the- upper Piney Creek 

 conglomerate, as has commonly been supposed, all the openings appear 

 to be at the same horizon and in the same stratigraphic sequence — the 

 Quinnimont coal being the same as the Fire Creek coal. 



Although my sections of the series are barometric and were sometimes 

 made under unfavorable conditions, they cover so many localities within 

 a distance of about thirty miles along the river, and they are so remark- 

 ably harmonious in showing that the workable coals fall so closely within 

 the same limits, as to establish a probability, so strong as to justify the 

 assumption as a working hypothesis at least, that all the mines below 

 the upper Piney Creek conglomerate are in the Quinnimont-Fire Creek 

 seam, the mines between that conglomerate and the Homewood being 

 confined to the Sewell coaLf 



QUINNIMONT-FIRE CREEK HORIZON. 



In the Piney Creek section (see figure 1) I have marked as " Quinni- 

 mont " a coal having precisely the same position and local characters as 

 that found in the mines on the Quinnimont seam in that vicinity. Its 

 distance from the top of the upper Piney Creek conglomerate in this case 

 is the same as that measured on Mill creek, at Quinnimont and Alaska, 

 the stratigraphic association being exactly that at the Royal mine, near 



* Bull. U. S. Geol. Survey, no. 65, p. 197. 



t So close, if not identical, are the Quinnimont and Fire Creek coals that a number of leveled 

 sections will be required to fully establish their relations. Considering the circumstances of ex- 

 posure and existing developments it seems improbable that two workable coals should be so close 

 together in one section of this region without the discovery of both in the same section. 



