SUBDIVISIONS OF KINDERHOOK 51 



the name apparently has been extended by Williams* to em- 

 brace also the lower Carboniferous littoral deposits ( Waverly 

 grits, etc.), as well as the more open sea depositions of argil- 

 laceous and calcareous material ( Kinderhook shales and lime- 

 stone). 



From the foregoing it appears that in the states bordering 

 the Mississippi river, the term Kinderhook has priority in the 

 naming of the inferior member of the Lower Carboniferous as 

 now generally understood. Whether or not Waverly or Mar- 

 shall, as rocks of probably the same age in Ohio and Michigan 

 are called, should replace Meek and Worthen's name, remains 

 to be seen. These probably represent the littoral deposits of 

 the more westerly limestones just referred to. Both lithologi- 

 cally and faunally, they are sufficiently distinct from the west- 

 ern deposits to make a separate designation for them desirable, 

 at least for the present. 



Louisiana Limestone. — The Louisiana limestone (Swallow's 

 Lithographic) is exposed best perhaps at Louisiana, in Pike 

 county, Missouri, where it attains a maximum thickness of 

 more than 60 feet. As its early name suggests, its texture is 

 very similar to that of the stones used in lithography, being 

 very iine-grained, compact, and breaking with a sharply con- 

 choidal fracture. In color it is usually ashen, often with a bluish 

 tinge. But these characters do not persist throughout its 

 range. According to both Swallow and Broadhead, it becomes 

 elsewhere coarse-grained, less homogeneous and more heavily 

 bedded than at the typical locality. It is usually rather thinly 

 bedded, the layers being from four to six inches in thickness, 

 and wherever exposed stands out in high, rural escarpments, 

 with every appearance of artificial masonry. (Plate v.) The 

 lower layers are more or less arenaceous, and yield numerous 

 fossils. At Louisiana this limestone rests on a dark, clayey 

 shale, whose thickness is about six feet, and this again on a 

 compact, buff, magnesian limerock, probably of Silurian age. 



In southwestern Missouri this division of the Kinderhook 

 has received but little attention, and its true relations as yet 



*Bui: U. S. Geol. Sur. No. 80, p. 169. 1891. 



