THE 
AMERICAN GEOLOGIST 
Vol. XXIII. MARCH, 1899. No. 3 
THE LIFE AND WORK OF JAMES HALL, LL. D. 
By Horace C. Hovey, D. D., Newburyport, Mass. 
( Plates IV and V.) 
On professor Hall's sixtieth anniversary as state geologist, 
an incident was given showing his readiness to aid others. A 
friend of his has asked me to repeat the facts, which may be 
done by way of introduction to this article, showing partly why 
at the request of the editor of this magazine it was undertaken. 
My father, the late Prof. E. O. Hovey, D. D., of Wabash 
College, was a pioneer in geology, at least so far as Indiana is 
concerned. He took his chair in 1835, and found himself sur- 
rounded by rich beds of fossiliferous limestone that fitted no 
classification then existing. In my boyhood I found what the 
Hoosiers called "Indian beads," and "petrified toads." These 
of course were crinoidal stems and heads, mostly from Corey's 
blufif (now my property), whence at a much later period Bas- 
sett, Bradley, and others, quarried literally thousands of crin- 
oids for the principal museums of this country and of Europe. 
Prof. Newberry, of Cleveland, whom Hall had lired with en- 
thusiasm, wrote offering me five dollars for a bushel of the so- 
called "Indian beads." He got his bushel and sent the money, 
but did not repeat the order. Newberry told Hall of this, and 
an agreeable correspondence was thus begun. 
In 1853 we visited Albany, and exhibited our crinoids. 
which Hall asked permission to examine and describe. After- 
wards he sent his expert assistant, Mr. R. P. Whitfield, to visit 
the region. In 1856 Hall read a paper before the .Albany In- 
stitute, describing new Indiana fossils, followed by other pa- 
