404 GEOLOGY OF OHIO. 
This is in all respects an excellent ore. With the volume re- 
ported, it must repay working, at least upon outcrops. 
A different condition of things is to be reported in northern Perry 
county. A block ore appears there, 15 feet below the Lower Mercer 
limestone, and this proves to be the chief ore of the horizon for a large 
territory to the southwestward. It is from 4 to 8 inches in thickness, 
and is persistent and steady. It has been largely mined at Junction 
City, Jackson township, and it is consequently known as the Junction 
City ore. It agrees altogether in character with the regular ore of this 
horizon, yielding iron of great strength and excellence. It is probable 
that a duplication of the limestone sometimes occurs at the same level, 
but in many cases the same general conditions of iron formation are 
shown in this ore that mark the main Lower Mercer block ore. The 
suggestion that this lower ore occurs in the place of the Lower Mercer 
coal can also be considered. 
The hills of Jackson township have been disfigured by extensive 
ore benches, along the railroad lines, in years past, but for several years 
no ore has been produced here. 
As has been already stated, a small amount of Baird ore, the lime- 
stone ore of Southern Ohio, has been mined in Perry county. The seam 
is light and uncertain, and prices for ore must range very high to justify 
working it in the scattered hill tops. The ore, though thin, is thoroughly 
characteristic in itself and in its associations. It is capped with the 
whitest clays of the series, and flint and limestone are frequently found 
supporting it. It occurs mainly in the form already described, of small 
shot-like concretions in a silicious clay. It is not an important element 
of mineral wealth in this region. 
There is a large area in the district now under consideration, which 
is properly situated to hold the ores already described, but in which no 
inducement to open or mine them has yet been offered. The surface 
indications in these townships are often excellent. In Madison, Clayton 
and Harrison, of Perry county, especially, there is every reason to 
expect full horizons of the block ores. The natural outcrop is in some 
cases unusually promising. 
