542 PROCEEDINGS OE THE SAINT LOUIS MEETING 



citizens. The boy had extra good school advantages for the time and 

 prepared for Yale college, which he entered in 1845. Owing to feeble 

 health he was obliged to leave college at the end of his freshman year 

 and to spend a year in travel, meanwhile keeping up his sophomore 

 studies. The succeeding autumn he entered Kenyon college, from which 

 he graduated in 1849. The next two years were spent in charge of an 

 Illinois farm belonging to his father, but the life did not accord with his 

 inclinations, and he returned and entered the theological seminary at 

 Gambier, getting his degree in 1854. At the expiration of two years 

 spent in the ministry his health became again uncertain, an annoying 

 throat trouble especially proving an obstacle to the practice of his pro- 

 fession. He did not withdraw from the ministry until ten years later, 

 and did occasional ministerial work during the interval, but his time 

 was mainly occupied with other pursuits. 



During 1853-1854, at Gambier, he had been associated with Professor 

 Hamilton L. Smith, of Kenyon, in experiments to perfect his invention of 

 taking pictures upon iron plates. He obtained a patent " for the use of 

 japanned metallic plates in photography " in 1856, and built a factory 

 for japanning plates in Cincinnati. These he called " melainotype' 1 

 plates. To aid in their introduction he published a pamphlet describing 

 the process and a booklet which was a general treatise on photography 

 on collodion. About this time he invented and patented a varnish for 

 melainotypes and collodion pictures. In 1856 he was awarded a bronze 

 medal by the American Institute, New York, for the best melainotypes. 

 In 1859 he sold his factory and buildings and went out of the business. 

 An exhibit was made at Philadelphia in 1876, it being labeled " Relics 

 of Photography." The material comprised in this exhibit was later 

 turned over to the Smithsonian Institution at its request.^ 



In 1860 Mr Neffwentto Gambier to reside, lived an out-of-door life, and 

 became interested in the local geology. Noting the so-called oil signs 

 in the region, he visited and studied the Oil Creek territory, in western 

 Pennsylvania, in 1864. With the knowledge thus gained in hand he 

 commenced a reconnaissance in southern Ohio. To use his own words, 

 he " felt that on the western border of the Appalachian basin there must 

 be a duplicate of the Venango oil territory." Commencing at the Ohio 

 river, he followed the strike of the Waverly rocks to the northward until, 

 in Coshocton county, he decided that he had found the territory he 

 sought. He leased land for drilling and made an areal map of Knox 

 and the western portions of Coshocton and Holmes counties, a map so 

 correct that it was practically adopted by the succeeding geological sur- 

 vey of the state. 



* Smithsonian Report, If 91, part 2, pp. 797 and 821. 



