WEST VIRGINIA NORTH OF KANAWHA RIVER 185 



on the Buckhannon river 31 miles below Sago, where it is double and 

 5 feet thick. The Roaring Creek sandstone above it is shown for 50 feet, 

 beginning at 10 feet below the Stockton. 



Returning now to northern Randolph, near the Barbour line, 12 miles 

 southeast from the reappearance of the Stockton on the Buckhannon 

 river and a little more than 20 miles east from the well in Lewis county, 

 one finds the Roaring Creek sandstone beginning at 10 feet below the 

 Stockton coal bed and continuing for 282 feet, the coals in the respective 

 borings being at 



292 and 395 to 408 feet, with black shale at 354 feet. 

 292 and 538 feet, with black shale at 350 feet. 



The coal at 395 to 408 feet in the southerly boring is absent in the 

 other, as the great sandstone, 141 feet, begins at 400 feet. It is unfortu- 

 nate that no boring in this immediate region has been carried down to 

 the Lower Carboniferous, as the great change in thickness and type of 

 the Pottsville rocks takes place here. Only 8 or 9 miles southwest the 

 Lower Pottsville is between 400 and 500 feet. On Rich mountain it has 

 been called the Pickens sandstone by Taft and Brooks, who give the 

 thickness as from 400 to 500 feet, increasing southwardly. It is 



Light gray or white sandstone. 



Brown sandstone shales and coal beds. 



Massive gray to white sandstone to conglomerate.* 



The lowest division is about 100 feet. The principal coal bed is 3 to 

 5 feet thick, and at only a little way above the third or lowest portion. 



Stevenson describes the Lower Pottsville of Rich mountain along the 

 Staunton pike as a coarse sandstone, with pebbles at times 2 inches in 

 diameter, with micaceous sandstone. In the lower portion quartz crystals 

 occur in great numbers, some of them three-fourths of an inch long and 

 doubly terminated. A coal bed about 3 feet was seen at several localities. 

 The thickness of the mass on the Staunton pike, by barometer, was found 

 to be about 600 feet.f 



Passing northward into Barbour county, one finds the great sandstone 

 underlying the Stockton coal bed distinct along the Valley river to 

 within 3 or 4 miles of Philippi, as well as along Buckhannon river to 

 its junction with the Valley river, 4 miles south from that village. The 

 sandstone has been in view all the way down the Valley river from 

 Pickens. At Philippi, 12 or 13 miles north from the Randolph line, a 

 well was bored, the record of which is reported by Doctor White. The 



• * J. A. Taft and A. H. Brooks : U. S. Geol. Survey folios, Buckhannon, 1896. 



f J. J. Stevenson : Notes on Geology of West Virginia, vol. ii. Proc. Amer. Phil. Soc, vol. xiv, 

 1875, p. 388. 



