170 C. N. Gould — Series of Transition Beds 



dere and Clark count}' regions has been noticed by nearly every 

 geologist who has visited the localities. Professor Cragin says :* 

 '' The actual contact of the Dakota series upon the Fredericks- 

 burg division " (Comanche) " is well shown in the heads of Bear 

 creek and Little Sandy in Clark county. ... At the Blue Cut 

 hill S.S.W. of Belvidere in Kiowa county and on many high 

 points in this and neighboring counties bowlder-remnants of 

 the Dakota sandstone overlie the Fredericksburg shales." In 

 the upper West Bear creek section he mentions 40 feet of 

 " dark brown to yellow Dakota sandstone containing meager 

 fragments of dicotyledonous leaves. "f Professor Cragin after- 

 wards refers to the " leaf -bearing Reeder (Dakota ?) sandstone 

 which surmounts the Kiowa shales in the upper valley of the 

 Medicine Lodge river near the post-office at Reeder.":}: And 

 again, in speaking of the Tucumcarri shales (the upper member 

 of the Kiowa) says :§ " At their summit they frequently con- 

 tain bands and concretions of clay-ironstone, in the succession 

 of which, premonitory of the immense aggregation of concre- 

 tions that constitute certain parts of the Reeder sandstone of 

 Kiowa and Clark counties, the Gryphsea, now in its maximum 

 size, is lost sight of, becoming scarcer and more poorly pre- 

 served before wholly disappearing." 



Professor Hill describes the Dakota on Blue Cut Hill.| 



Professor Prosser mentions the occurrence of " Dakota " 

 sandstone in various localities^ and describes apparent contact 

 with the underlying Kiowa on upper West Bear creek (Cragin's 

 locality) and assigns to the Dakota at this place a thickness of 

 75 feet.** 



The writer has spent a good part of four summers in the 

 region, having worked with Dr. Williston and Professor Hill 

 in 1894, in the employ of Johns Hopkins University in 1895, 

 with Professor Prosser in 1896, and with Dr. Williston and 

 Dr. Ward in 1897. It was while acting as a member of Dr. 

 Ward's party that the Transition Beds, which form the title of 

 this article, were discovered. f f 



Of the following sections Nos. I, II and III were made on 

 Greenleaf's and Kirby's ranches on the upper Medicine river 

 some ten or twelve miles west of Belvidere, and twelve miles 

 south of Greensburg, Kiowa county, Kansas, while JSTos. IV 

 and V were taken on Little Sand and Chatman creeks twelve 

 miles northwest of Ashland, Clark county, Kansas. 



* Bulletin Washburn College Laboratory Natural History, vol. ii, March, 1890, 

 p. 74. 



flbid, p. 77. 



i American Geologist, vol. xvi, December, 1895, p 381. § Ibid... p. 382. 



I This Journal, vol. 1, September, 1895, p. 210. 



^[Loc. cit, p. 118. ** Ibid., pp. 162-161. 



ff Science, N. S . vol. vi, Nov. 26, 1897, pp. 814, 815. 



