GLACIAL WATERS IN THE LAKE ERIE BASIN 



31 



940 feet, was determined by the hight of the water in the Ray 

 channel. 



The latest glacial overflow from the Tonawanda valley was 

 across from Batavia through the indefinite channels in the Batavia 

 moraine now drained west by Murder creek. This overflow pro- 

 duced the broad delta plain northeast of Crittenden, which bears 

 a series of Warren bars [see pi. 5]. All the region is half buried 

 moraine. The contour lines of the Attica sheet show a vast number 

 of morainic knolls with their bases buried in stream and lake de- 

 posits. The network of swamps and indefinite water courses 

 attest the work of sluggish waters falling over into Lake Warren, 

 the primitive shore line of which is buried in this region. The 

 better defined stream channels are indicated on the map, plate 5. 

 They lie south of Batavia and West Batavia and south of the 

 New York Central Railroad to within 2 miles of Corfu, where they 

 swing north of the railroad and village and as noted above terminate 

 at the Crittenden delta, the south bank forming a bluff north of 

 the highway. 



The lowest overflow at Batavia has an altitude of about 900 

 feet. The gravelly plain in the southern part of the town is 10 to 

 20 feet lower, and may represent some combination of leveled 

 kames, glacial outwash, stream delta and flood plain. The present 

 Tonawanda creek meanders northward across this plain into the 

 town, crossing the glacial stream courses, and then turns abruptly 

 west. A mile from the turn its altitude is 880 feet and in 2 or 3 

 miles further it reaches the Warren plane. It seems certain that the 

 west-flowing glacial waters would have followed the same course 

 if it had been open to them. Evidently they did not, for the 

 present stream winds sharply in a narrow channel among morainal 

 knolls. Here seems to be a critical point in the relation of glacier 

 and lakes. The ice front rested here on Batavia when the con- 

 ditions that compelled westward flow of the glacial waters suddenly 

 ended, and the glacial waters were sent eastward toward the 

 Mohawk. 



The large volume of water indicated by these capacious water- 

 ways seems beyond the possible supply of the Tonawanda valley 

 alone, and suggests that other territory further east also sent its 

 drainage westward through these channels; which suggestion is 

 found to be the truth, as will be explained. 



