12 
Cranbrook Formation 
This formation consists essentially of a fine-grained quartz conglomer- 
ate of prevailing white colour. Some of the strata have pink and red tints. 
Coarse conglomeratic beds occur among the fine-grained varieties and were 
noticed particularly about the middle of the formation and at the base. 
The base of the formation was clearly exposed in the section on the St. 
Eugene Mission-Fort Steele wagon road (Figure 2). Underlying the white 
quartzose conglomerate is 3 feet of a reddish sandy conglomerate containing 
pebbles of the underlying purple and green metargillites. No fossils were 
found in this formation which is 600 feet thick. The outcrop of the con- 
glomerate formed projections through the overlying mantle of gravels and 
sands. 
Eager Formation 
This formation overlies the Cranbrook formation conformably. Near 
the top of the Cranbrook formation the conglomerate becomes more sandy 
and contains thin interbands of shale. In the section along the Cranbrook- 
Fort Steele wagon road the shales are chocolate brown and weather reddish. 
The joints in the shale are sometimes filled with an impure hematite 
evidently derived from the weathering of the shales. The fossils collected 
near the Cranbrook-Fort Steele road were identified by Dr. Charles D. 
Walcott, Secretary of the Smithsonian Institution, as follows : 
Callavia cf. nevadensis Walcott 
Wanneria n.sp. ? 
Mesonacis gilberti Meek 
Wanneria cf. t calcottanus (Wanner) 
Olenellus cf. fremonti Walcott 
Protolypus senectus Billings 
Dr. Walcott states concerning the collection: “This fauna belongs to 
the upper portion of the Lower Cambrian and it is essentially the same as 
that found above the tunnel at Mt. Stephen, B.C., and also found more or 
less all along the cordilleran system down into southern Nevada.” 
EVIDENCES OF AN UNCONFORMITY AT THE BASE OF THE 
CAMBRIAN IN THE CRANBROOK AREA 
The presence of an unconformity between the Beltian and the Cambrian 
rocks in the Cordilleras was long ago recognized by Walcott. In Cranbrook 
area, the locality near the Cranbrook-Fort Steele wagon road does not 
show an exposure of the exact contact, but the structure and the areal 
distribution of the rocks (Figure 2) show that an unconformity exists. 
The evidence may be briefly summarized as follows : 
(1) The Cambrian rocks foi*m a syncline whose axis strikes a little 
north of east and plunges towards the east, whereas the underlying Beltian 
rocks strike north and south with a dip to the east. In the immediate 
vicinity of the contact the strikes of the two groups are thus at right angles 
to each other. The underlying series exhibits an extremely well-marked 
shearing whose strike corresponds in general to the axial strike of the over- 
lying syncline of Cambrian rocks. 
