﻿72 



INDIAJfA TOIYEESITT 



the Annual Reports of the Indiana Department of Inspection, 

 and the reports on Mineral Resonrees of the United States, is- 

 sued by the United States Department of Geology, have been of 

 service. The Fonrth Annnal Report of the Indiana Labor Com- 

 mission has been of great valne in the preparation of the sec- 

 tions on the nnions and the Bedford strike of 1903. 



The Bedford Oolitic Limestone.^ The Bedford oolitic lime- 

 stone- occurs in a simions band from two to fourteen miles in 

 Avidth. extending from Montgomery County south to the Ohio 

 River and beyond, outcropping in Indiana in the counties of 

 ]\Iontgomeiy. Putnam. Owen. ]\lonroe, Lav^-rence, Washington. 

 Floyd and Harrison. It does not occur in commercial quantities 

 north of Gosport. and the productive area is now within the 

 counties of Owen, Monroe and Lawrence: although some stone, 

 chiefly for lime burning, is quarried at Salem, AVashington 

 County. Beginning on the north, the first region of production 

 is at Romona in Owen County: the next, at Stinesville. Elletts- 

 ville and the Hunter Valley district in the northern portion of 

 Monroe County, and the active quarries at Clear Creek. Sand- 

 ers. Smithville. Victor and Harrodsburg in the southern portion : 

 the productiA^e area in Lawrence County is in and immediately 

 around Bedford, at Oolitic. Dark Hollow and Reed. 



The oolitic limestone is a remarkably pure carbonate of lime, 

 a sort of calcareous sand rock. The grains ha^^e the shape of 

 the fish roe. whence the name oolitic, and are made up of shells and 

 shell fragments, mostly foraminifera and bryozoa, upon whose 

 size the coarseness or fineness of the stone depends. The grains 

 are cemented together with calcite. Avhose relative amount and 

 purity determine the hardness and compactness of the stone. 



Geologically the stone belongs to the lower carboniferous age. 

 It is of sedimentary character, and was doubtless deposited in 

 the deep trough of the gi'eat inland sea which then covered the 

 larger part of the ^Mississippi Valley. Yet it is remarkably free 

 from bedding planes, although the deposits varA^ from a fcAV feet 

 to one hundred feet in thickness. The stone seems to occur in 

 practically inexhaustible quantities. 



The Bedford stone has an enviable reputation for building 



Thp material for this section is drawc largely from tlie annual reports of the 

 Indiana Department of Genloa'y and Natural Resources, especially from the study 

 by Hopkins and Siebenthal in the Twenty-first Annual Report. 



-The Bedford ooliti? limestone is the term which best describes geologically 

 that formation whicL is more porjularly known as the Bedford stone or the Indiana 

 oolitic stone. 



