REPORT . 



TO DR DAVID DALE OWEN, 



Geologist of the State of Kentucky. 



Sib, : In accordance with your instructions I accompanied Mr. Leo 

 Lesquereux in an excursion for the purpose of examining the coal field 

 in the western part of Kentucky, with the view to collect palseontolog- 

 ical data, that might greatly aid in identifying the different veins of 

 coal, one with another, throughout the counties embraced in its extent; 

 especially by means of the organic remains found in the roof-shales 

 and accompanying rocks. 



The merited celebrity of Mr. Lesquereux as a fossil Botanist, and 

 the important labor which he had bestowed upon the coal plants of 

 Pennsylvania and Ohio, made his selection for a similar work in Ken- 

 tucky, the very best it was possible to make. 



In connection with Mr. Lesquereux, I was especially instructed to 

 pay attention to the fossil mollusca, and collect every possible evidence 

 for identity from that source. This mode of establishing the position 

 of coal beds has only been practically pursued by Mr. Lesquereux in 

 this country ; and a beginning is now being made, for the first time, 

 to connect with the flora the testimony of the shells — an addition 

 much needed in western Kentucky, on account of the great scarcity 

 of the former, and abundance of the latter. 



Our investigations, for identity, commencing with coal No. 1, B, at 

 the bottom of the section in the first chapter of your report, and ter- 

 minating with coal No. 12, includes, in all the strata, a vertical thick- 

 ness of about eight hundred feet. It must not be supposed that these 

 members include the whole thickness of the western coal field ; though 

 they mark, probably, the limits of the profitably working coals, there 

 are one or two thin seams below No. 1, B, which, with a thick sand- 

 stone, usually pebbly, with underlying shale, make together one hun- 

 dred feet or more ; whilst above No. 12, there are a number of thin 

 veins with intervening shales, limestone, and sand-rock, in all up- 

 wards of five hundred feet, making the whole measures in the western 



