CHAPTER XLI. 



REPORT ON THE GEOLOGY OF HARDIN COUNTY. 



BY ST. H. WINCHELL. 



SITUATION AND AREA. 



Hardin county, like Marion, is situated on the watershed between 

 Lake Erie and the Ohio River. It lies directly west from Marion, bound- 

 ed south by Union and Logan, west by Auglaize and Allen, and north 

 by Hancock. It has an area of a little more than twelve towns. 



NATURAL DRAINAGE. 



In this county are some of the sources both of the Sandusky and the 

 Maumee, which flow northward to Lake Erie, and of the Scioto and 

 Great Miami, which empty into the Ohio. The Scioto, the chief river 

 of the county, first flows north, entering the Scioto Marsh, where its 

 channel is said to become lost in lateral expansion as in a lake. It 

 leaves this marsh in an easterly direction, and, receiving tributaries 

 only from the south, it maybe said to drain only the southern half of the 

 county. In a similar manner streams flow northward into Hog Creek 

 Marsh, in the northern part of the county, and are thence turned west- 

 erly along the channel of Hog Creek, which drains that marsh, and 

 finally reach the Maumee River. The Blanchard, which rises within a 

 mile of the Scioto at Kenton, also has a general northerly course. In 

 the township of Goshen there are several small streams, which find their 

 way into the Tymochtee Creek, in a north-easterly direction. The North 

 Branch of the Great Miami drains southward a small, narrow valley in 

 the south-western corner of the county. With this exception the gen- 

 eral slope of the whole county is toward the north. Two natural di- 

 vides, or ridges, cross the county. The most southerly is that which 

 prevents the northward drainage of the Scioto Marsh, deflecting the 

 Scioto River easterly across the county, instead of permitting it to fol- 

 low the natural slope. Were it not for this ridge it would probably con- 

 tribute its waters to the valley of the Blanchard, or through the Hog 



