Malott: The "American Bottoms" Region 17 



horizon appears. It is normally 30 feet thick along its whole 

 outcrop in Indiana, but is occasionally thinner or thicker. 

 The Cypress sandstone receives its name from its excellent 

 exposures along Cypress Creek, southwestern Johnson and 

 Union counties. 111., where it attains a somewhat greater 

 thickness than in Indiana.- It has been traced by Butts 

 around the crescentric outcrop of the Chester Series thru 

 Kentucky to the Ohio River.-^ Field work in 1918 by J. D. 

 Thompson and the writer has proved its wide extension in 

 Indiana. It appears everywhere its horizon is due. Evidence 

 is at hand to show that it is an overlapping formation, and 

 that it is perhaps the most continuous and widespread of all 

 the formations in the Chester Series within the limits of its 

 horizon. 



The Cypress sandstone is usually a medium-grained sand- 

 stone, tho often quite coarse; it is yellowish to whitish in 

 color, except along its well-developed joints, where it assumes 

 a reddish brown color due to the concentration of iron oxide. 

 It is usually massive and non-bedded, but laminated, and 

 except along the joint planes and exposed surfaces, quite 

 friable. Since the rock is so well cemented along the joint 

 planes, its outcrop often exhibits great broad faces and rec- 

 tangular blocks along the wall-like outcrop (Fig. 2). In the 

 ''American Bottoms" region it is from 30 to 40 feet thick, 

 and rests everywhere directly upon the Beech Creek limestone. 

 It is usually cross-bedded near the contact (Figs. 1 and 2). 

 Toward the top it frequently becomes thin bedded, and rapidly 

 grades into the blue-gray to olive shale that underlies the 

 Golconda limestone. 



The Cypress sandstone is well developed high above Beech 

 Creek valley along its middle and lower course. It is found 

 everywhere along Cliffy Creek, reaching the valley level along 

 the lower course of the creek, and in conjunction with the 

 Beech Creek limestone causing characteristic bluffs and cliffs 

 (Figs. 2 and 3). It everywhere marks the rim of the 

 ''American Bottoms", usually causing an abrupt rise from 

 the monotonous valley flat. 



The Cypress sandstone, as indicated above, is everywhere 

 an important topographic and physiographic factor, ranking 



- H. Englemann, Geological Survcij of Illinois. Vol. I, 1866. 



^ Charles Butts, Mississippian Series in Western Kentucky. Kentucky Geological 

 Survey. 1917. 



3—16903 



