172 E. Orton— Bituminous matter in Ohio Black Shahs. 



in the upper or Cleveland division of the great black shale, and 

 also in trie Berea shale, has been noted as one source of this 

 organic matter, and occasional strap-shaped leaves of fucoidal 

 origin occur in both formations, but neither of these sources 

 seems at all adequate to the supply. Dr. Newberry has 

 referred to a "sargasso sea" as affording the most probable 

 explanation of the facts involved, and offers "the su 

 that the carbon of the shale was derived from vegetation which 

 lined the shores and covered the surface of a quiet and almost 

 land-surrounded sea." This vegetation he is disposed to 

 regard as exclusively marine. (Geology of Ohio, vol. i, pages 

 155-6.) 



Professor E. B. Andrews, in the Ohio Geological Bepo 

 * riefly. He believed tha 

 i which the shale was deposited must have abounded i 



) discussed the problem briefly. He believed 1 



minute forms of vegetable or animal life, but he added that a 

 search for these forms had been unrewarded. 



Within the last few months I have discovered a new source, 

 ami, as I believe, a chief source of the bituminous matter of 

 these shales, in certain minute forms of vegetable origin which 

 they contain jn vast numbers. I herewith present a brief 

 account of the discovery and of the facts involved. 



In 1881, Mr. J. A. Flickinger, County surveyor of Ashta- 

 bula county, Ohio, sent me specimens of the drillings from a 

 deep well which was being sunk at Kingsville, Ashtabula 

 county, in the search for petroleum or gas. For 800 to Jmh.) 

 feet the drill passed through blue shale, quite uniform in 

 appearance, and destitute of fossils. This is evidently the Erie 

 shale of the Ohio scale. 



At about 900 feet layers of black shale began to be met, and 

 they continued to occur for 300 feet, when the boring was 

 stopped. 



In examining with a microscope the fragments of this black 

 shale I found many of them covered and filled with yellow, 

 aging from one one-hundredth to one tvvo- 

 humledth of an inch in their longest diameters. The discs 

 ] resent the appearance of empty and flattened spherical sacs. 

 When the shale is cut transversely, the discs appear as elonga- 

 te! and translucent yellow bars, roughly parallel to the bed- 

 ding, and sometimes' they present the appearance of flattened 



The discs have a decidedly resinous appearance, but they 

 yield but slowly, if at all, to ordinary solvents. When the 

 shale is raised to a red heat, they disappear entirely, leaving 

 empty pits in the shale. 



At some points, and especially at a depth of 1,000 feet, the 

 ■shale is so charged that every fragment contains them, while 



