54 



GEOLOGY OF IvA SAI^IvE COUNTY. 



Artesian Wells.— All through the Illinois and 

 Fox river valleys, water that will rise above the sur- 

 face may be obtained by boring- from 100 to- 400 feet, 

 but on the prairies the rocks must be penetrated to a 

 much greater depth. About Ottawa, at Utica and at 

 Marseilles there are many of these wells, some obtain- 

 ing- their supply of water from the Coal Measures, 

 some from the St. Peters, while the larg-er number 

 pass throug-h the Calciferous into the Potsdam sand- 

 stone from thirty to eig-hty feet. The water is gener- 

 ally of excellent quality, but sometimes slig-htly 

 charged with iron or sulphur, and occasionally a little 

 salt. These wells are of less depth at Utica than at 

 Ottaw^a, as the strata rise in that direction, but 

 beyond Utica they again descend, and the boring-s must 

 be deeper after we pass the tunnel, indeed, much 

 deeper. 



On the prairies wells must be sunk 2,000 or more 

 feet, Peddicord's, 2,180 feet deep, situated north of 

 Marseilles, being one of the few that have been bored. 

 It 3nelds about three barrels of slig-htly salt water per 

 hour, the water rising about three feet above the sur- 

 face. 



The deepest boring* in the county is that at 

 Streator, 2,496 feet deep. The record of this well is 

 g-iven in the appendix, as well as that of a couple 

 of deep coal shafts and a genei'al section of the strata 

 on the Big Vermillion. The water of this well is too 

 salt for culinary purposes, very clear, and rises about 

 four feet above the surface, which at that place is forty 

 feet above lake Michig-an. It has a temperature of 

 about 85*^ Feh.; that of the wells about Ottawa is 

 about 52 ^ , winter and summer the same. 



