THE 



AMERICAN JOURNAL OF SCIENCE 



[FOURTH SERIES.] 



•»»♦• 



Art. XXX. — Recent Changes in the Elevation of Land and 

 Sea in the Vicinity of New York City ; by George W. 



TUTTLE. 



The late Professor George EL Cook, long identified with the 

 Geological Survey of New Jersey, read an important paper at 

 the Montreal meeting of the American Association for the 

 Advancement of Science, August 13th, 1857, "On the sub- 

 sidence of the land on the seacoast of New Jersey and Long 

 Island,"* in which he stated that "an attentive examination of 

 these facts has led me to the conclusion that a gradual sub- 

 sidence of the land is now in progress throughout the whole 

 length of New Jersey and Long Island, and from information 

 derived from others I am inclined to think that this subsidence 

 may extend along a considerable portion of the Atlantic coast 

 of the United States." 



The evidence on which Professor Cook based this conclusion 

 was mainly of a geologic nature, and consisted of, 1st, sub- 

 merged forests and buried timber found in the marshes and 

 along the coast below tide level ; 2d, numerous Indian shell 

 heaps which have been found below tide level; 3d, the exten- 

 sion of the marsh on the upland, verified by many old residents, 

 and by the dying out of cedar trees on the margin ; 4th, less 

 fall of water at any stage of the tide available to operate the 

 water wheels of mills on tidal streams near the sea. 



It was the opinion of a number of mill operators, that within 

 their memory the loss of head available to operate their wheels 

 was of such an amount as would denote the sinking of the land 

 at the rate of two feet per century. Besides, sluices in banks 

 protecting meadow land, built about 150 years ago, were found 

 three feet below tide level and useless for their intended pur- 

 pose. 



Professor Cook's estimate of the amount of subsidence of the 



*This Journal, 2d Series, xxiv, 1857, p. 341. 



Am. Jour. Scl— Fourth Series, Vol. XVII, No. 101.— May, 1904. 

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