120 GEOLOGY OF ILLINOIS. 



quite likely that some of these coals may not be found at all in the 

 western part of the county, or if found, will prove to be too thin to be 

 of any practical value ; but the outcrops are too meagre in that portion 

 of the county to enable any one to trace out the exact sequence of the 

 strata successfully. Borings have been made along the line of the 

 railroad west of Carterville, and are said to have found no workable 

 coal, but my efforts to obtain a record of the strata passed through in 

 these borings for publication in this report were unsuccessful. 



HI ' conomical Geology. 



Coal. — The great mineral resource of this county will be found in its 

 coal deposits, which are surpassed by but few portions of the State of 

 equal extent. Nearly one-half of tbe county, comprising its northern 

 portion, is underlaid by coal JSTo. 7, the thickest seam to be found in the 

 State, and it is probably nowhere more than from 75 to 200 feet below 

 the surface. It outcrops at many points in township 9 south, and 

 ranges 2, 3 and 4 east, and will be found underlaying nearly all the 

 area north of these outcrops. No. 5 lays from 100 to 150 feet below No. 

 7, but its development in the western portion of the county is at present 

 an unsettled problem. It is however developed over a large area in the 

 north-western part of the county. These two seams will yield from ten 

 to twelve million tons of coal to the square mile, and they probably 

 underlay nearly one-half of the entire area of the county. All that 

 is required to make this one of the most prosperous coal mining 

 regions in the State, is a ready market for the vast stores of mineral 

 fuel that are now hidden beneath the surface, awaiting the capital and 

 skilled labor necessary for their full development. This market could 

 be obtained by direct railroad communication with some large coal con- 

 suming city like St. Louis, Chicago or Cincinnati, where the coal 

 products of the county could be sent at a minimum cost for transporta- 

 tion, instead of passing over two or three different lines of road as is 

 now necessary in order to reach a reliable market, thus increasing the 

 cost of transportation until it equals or exceeds the full value of the 

 coal on its delivery in market. 



Building Stone. — Sandstone of fair quality for ordinary use may be 

 found in abundance in nearly every township in the county, and the 

 brown sandstone overlaying coal No. 7, north east of Marion and in the 

 vicinity^ of Crab Orchard, dresses well and hardens on exposure and 

 forms an excellent material for caps and sills, and for all the ordinary uses 

 for which a dressed stone is required. In the vicinity of Bolton, and 

 through the southern portion of the county, the sandstones associated 



