Wyoming. -Area, 400 square miles; population in 1880, 15,598.
This small lozenge-shaped county has the same geology as Sullivan County
on the west and Susquehanna County on the north, already described;
but the magnificent meandering canon-like valley of the North Branch
Susquehanna, which crosses it from its north-west to its south-east
corner, offers an unrivalled exhibition of the Chemung and Catskill
measures; the highland of Pocono sandstone, to the west, supporting
ridges of Conglomerate, containing at least one workable coal bed, mined
at various points on the northern Mehoopany heights, west of Forkston.
At the Company’s bank in the wilderness summit of Dutch mountain, the
bed is over 3` thick, and 2125` A.T. (See Report G7, p. 42.);
analyzing 73.5 free carbon, 10.2 volatile matter, 15 ash, 0.6 water,
and 0.7 sulphur. In the shale under the coal are Neuropteris, Cardiocarpus,
Cordaites; and in the sandstone roof Sigillaria stems nearly
two feet in diameter (flattened.) The underlying Pocono sandstones No.
X seem to be only 300` thick, the bottom (Griswold Gap) conglomerate
of which makes a great show. Under it lie 400` of Pocono-Catskill (transition)
greenish-gray sandstones, with several thin interpolated red shales,
the lowest member of which more coarse and massive than the rest is
the Mt. Pleasant conglomerate of the counties to the north and
east. Under this lie the proper Catskill series of thick groups of red
shale beds, separated by gray sandstone beds, and holding calcareous
fish-bone breccias, the lowest of which is assumed as the base of the
series, probably 1600` or 1700` thick in this county. A good section
of the upper 1231 feet of the formation can be got along the river from
Coxton up to the county corner, on a south dip. Here on the crown of
the great Bald Eagle anticlinal they turn over to a north dip and the
same section repeats itself ascending the river to the mouth of Bowman’s
Creek (575` A.T.) where Miller Mountain in Eaton Township, rises
from the river bank in an isolated mass 1600 feet (to 2175` A.T.) Its
flat top massive gray sand rock strata show no glacial scratches, such
as appear on the naked rock surfaces all over the county. It is one
of the lower sandstones that makes the charming cascade (50` high) in
the forest-clad ravine of Money-penny’s glen near South
Eaton. Four glacial terraces are visible at LaGrange: the lowest
is the flood plain of the present river 30` to 35` above low water mark;
the second, rising abruptly to 100` is full of small rounded
bowlders, many of them of rocks which must have come from northern New
York or New England, or from the Drift on the Mohawk river heights;
the third rises to 150`; and the fourth, at 200` (775`
A.T.) is marked by fine, white siliceous clay, showing still-water when
there was perhaps a temporary submergence of the United States to a
depth of a least 1000 feet. Vast heaps of glacial drift line the sides
of the river valley and its tributaries throughout Mehoopany township;
and on its west line is a great bowlder bed at 950` A.T. (235`
above the river at Scottsville) which seems to have been made by the
descent of the drift materials from the slope above, and their arrest
in standing water. In north-west township, where the Mehoopany breaks
out from the Dutch mountain plateau (2200` A.T.) is Lovelton (1020`
A.T.); 1 ½ miles N.W. of which (1350` A.T.) a well was bored for oil,
at the north foot of the Dutch mountain, which rises abruptly from it
about 900 feet, capped by the Griswold gap conglomerate; sixty
feet beneath which a brook descending the mountain side makes a cascade
of 75 feet; seventy feet lower another of 90 feet; ten feet of red shale
is followed by 130 feet of almost continuous cascade; 25` red shale;
55` flags; 35` red shale;cascade of 25`; interval 65`; cascade of 20`;
red shale 10`; cascade of 15`; red shale 10`; cascade of 20`; red shale
30`; cascade of 30`; red shale 10`; cascade of 20`; red shale 30`; cascade
of 40`; red shale to 1350 A.T. well mouth level. The well went through
alternate sands and shales 800`; then white sandstone 8`; red shale
200`; gray and red 175`; white sandstone 25`; interval 150`; gray sandstone
with small quartz pebbles; interval 175`; "big red" 40`; interval 35`;
"little red" 25`; hard blue micaceous sandstone 5`; gray green sandstone
"with a smell of gas" 20`; interval 53`; hard gray sandstone
beds 58`; red shale 12`; hard gray sands 20`; blue black shales 80`;
purple shales 52`; greenish gray sandstone 10`; white pebbly sandstone
"with some oil" 9`; sandstone 5`; shale 5`; sand 5`; blue shales
142`; shales 28` to bottom of hole; depth 2089`; total section of rocks
from top of mountain 2964`. Top of Chemung formation say 234` above
the bottom of the well. The Chemung rocks come up from under the Catskill
at the eastern corner of Mehoopany township, and continue to rise gently
along the river banks, as far as Skinner’s Eddy where they turn over
and descend again more steeply up stream into Bradford County. There
are no valuable minerals to be found in this county in the Pocono, Catskill
or Chemung strata; no iron ore; no oil; none of the precious metals;
but valuable quarry beds have been exploited at Meshoppen and at Black
Walnut in lower Catskill strata. The Black Walnut rock is a fine-grained
slightly greenish blue sandstone 50` thick, its layers furnishing either
flags, sills, steps or heavy building stone; a fish and plant bed
lies 10` above the quarry rock. Overfield’s quarry rock (30` thick)
is 100` still higher in the series and furnishes large flags. Under
it lie 40` of red shale with macerated fragments of Archaeopteris
hibernica. The great Meshoppen quarry layers (6" to 4` thick) make
up 45`, the best (bottom) bed being sawn and polished for ornamental
work; a breccia overlies the mass; and fine specimens of plants (at
least two species of Archaeopteris) can be got from the shales between
the courses.
From: A geological hand atlas of the sixty-seven
counties of Pennsylvania :embodying the results of the field work
of the survey, from 1874 to 1884. By J. P. Lesley. (Report of
progress (Geological Survey of Pennsylvania), v. X ) Harrisburg, PA
: Board of commissioners for the second geological survey, 1885.
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