USA > Iowa > Crawford County > History of Crawford County, Iowa, a record of settlement, organization, progress and achievement, Volume I > Part 44
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Again the sea receded and through long ages the land was subjected to erosion. Hills and valleys were carved out of the surface, and streams coursed their way across the country. Then the cretaceous sea invaded western Iowa and its sandstones and limestones and chalks were spread over the sea bottom. Crawford county received its share of these beds and these now are the first solid rocks reached after the loose clays are penetrated. It is many centuries, indeed millions of years, since the cretaceous ocean retreated from Crawford county, but never since that time has the sea overspread her sur- face. Through all the changing years, with two short exceptions to be noted later, summer sun and winter wind have played their part in modeling her prai- ries, her rivers have chiseled deep valleys and all the processes of land sculpture which nature employs have been busily at work.
For a long time after the cretaceous sea left Iowa the climate was warm and equable. We have no traces of the life forms of the state during this time, al- though we know that in other parts of the continent they were gradually ap- proaching those types with which we are familiar today. But in the course of time there came a change in conditions. For some reason the climate of North America, and indeed of Europe also, grew colder and colder. Vast snow fields accumulated in Canada and from several centers great ice sheets crept south- ward and covered the northern United States with a frigid mantle. The Mis- sissippi valley was overwhelmed and our local territory suffered the same fate as did the rest of Iowa. This was the Nebraskan glacier of the Pleistocene epoch. How long ago it was that this glacier came down or how long it stayed are questions which we cannot answer. Certainly the answer to the first ques- tion must be given in hundreds of thousands and possibly millions of years,
SYSTEM
SERIES
FORMATION NAME
COLUMNAR SECTION
THICKNESS IN FEET
CHARACTER OF ROCKS
Wisconsin
0-30 +
BOWLDER CLAY, PALE YELLOW VERY CALCAREOUS
Peorian lowan
0-30 :
BOWLDER CLAY. YELLOW, WITH VERY LARGE BOWLDERS
QUATERNARY
PLEISTOCENE
Illinoian
0-100+
BOWLDER CLAY, YELLOW
Yarmouth
SOIL, PEAT AND FOREST BEDS
Kansan
0 - 400+
INTERCALATED STREAKS AND POCKETS OF SAND AND GRAVEL
Aftonian
0-40 +
PEAT & FOREST BEDS. SOIL BANDS, AQUEOUS GRAVELS.
Nebraskaa
0-30 +
BOWLDER CLAYS, DARK FRIABLE
CRETA-
CEOUS
UPPER CRETACEOUS
Dakota
100
SANDSTONES
PER - MIAN
Fort Dodge
20
GYPSUM
Missouri
600
SHALES AND LIMESTONES
PENNSYLVANIAN
Des Moines
750
SHALES AND SANDSTONES WITH SOME BEDS OF LIMESTONE
St Louis
100
LIMESTONE, SANDSTONE & MARLY SHALES
MISSISSIPPIAN
Osage or Augusta
265
LARGELY CRINOIDAL LIMESTONE. WITH HEAVY BANDS OF CHERT, SOME SHALE
Kinderhook
120
SHALE SANDSTONE AND LIMESTONE LIMESTONE IN PLACES POLITIC
UPPER DEVONIAN
State Quarry Lime Creek Sweetland Creek
(40) (120) (20)
LIMESTONE , MOSTLY BRACHIOPOD COQUINA MOSTLY SHALES LOCALLY DEVELOPED FEATURES EACH IVING UNCOMFORMABLY ON THE SHALE MIDDLE DEVONIAN
DEVONIAN
MIDDLE DEVONIAN
Wapsipinicon
60-75
LIMESTONES. SHALES AND SHALY LIMESTONES
SILURIAN
NIAGARAN
Hopkinton
220
DOLOMITE, VERY FOSSILIFEROUS IN PLACES
CINCINNATIAN
Maquoketa
200
SHALE, SHALY LIMESTONES, AND, LOCALLY, BEDS OF DOLOMITE
MOHAWKIAN
Galena
340
DOLOMITE IN PLACES, IN PLACES UNALTERED LIMESTONES
Platteville
90
MARLY SHALES AND LIMESTONES
St. Peter
100
SANDSTONE
CANADIAN
Shakopee Prairie du New Richmond Chien
Oneota
150
DOLOMITE
Jordan
100
COARSE SANDSTONE
CAMBRIAN
POTSDAMIAN OR SARATOGAN
St Croix
St. Lawrence
50
DOLOMITE MORE OR LESS ARENACE OUS.
Dresbach
150
SANDSTONE, WITH BANDS OF GLAUCONITE
ALGON- KIAN
HURONIAN
Sioux Quartzite
25
QUARTZITE
Cedar Valley
100
LIMESTONES SHALY LIMESTONES. SOME DOLOMITE IN THE NORTHERN COUNTIES
Gower
120'
DOLOMITE NOT VERY FOSSILIFEROUS. LE CLAIRE PHASE EXTENSIVELY CROSS - BEDDED
ORDOVICIAN
80
DOLOMITE
20
SANDSTONE
Plate I-Geological section of Iowa, by Samuel Calvin
.
CARBONIFEROUS
Colorado
150
SHALES WITH SOFT LIMESTONES. IN PLACES CHALKY
20
RED SHALES AND SANDSTONES
SOIL BAND
Sangamon
SOIL. PEAT AND FOREST BEDS
BOWLDER CLAY, BLUE, JOINTED, WITH
393
HISTORY OF CRAWFORD COUNTY
while our knowledge of modern glaciers teaches us that this old-time ice sheet must have covered Crawford county for many, many years. But finally the climate again moderated, the ice was melted away and Crawford county again basked in the warm summer sun. But what a change its surface had under- gone! The river valleys were filled up and the hilltops were planed down. Where there had been a pleasing diversity of rolling prairie there was now spread out a monotonous plain, a plain very similar to that now seen in several of the counties to the northeast, as for example Pocahontas or Kossuth. Let us see how these changes were brought about. As the glacier passed over the surface of the land, it plowed up the loose material in its path and incorporated it into its own mass or shoved it along at its base. Much of this loose material, stones, clay, sand, and all the products of ages of rock weathering, was ground up and mixed into a heterogeneous boulder clay. Some of it was carried off in the streams which issued from the glacier's edge. When the glacier at last retreated through the melting back of its front all its contents of clay and boulders and what not were left spread out as a mantle of drift or glacial till covering the surface once occupied by the ice. This tended to fill up the val- leys and so make the surface more uniform, and added to the planing and cut- ting effected by the ice, succeeded in reducing what must have been a diversi- fied topography to a flat even plain.
Once more the rivers began to run in their courses to the sea and to cut their valleys into the beds of drift. Vegetation spread over prairie and valley. Forests grew where only vast stretches of ice had been, and Crawford county assumed an appearance very similar to that of today. This period of warm climate and pleasant conditions is known as the Aftonian interglacial age. We have evidence of the conditions which prevailed in the buried peat beds which have been found in various parts of the state, in soil bands and other vegetal remains and also in the remarkable fossil remains which have been discovered in Crawford and other counties of western Iowa, as well as elsewhere. It seems that for some reason the Aftonian was a period of great floods and these floods brought down immense quantities of sand and gravel. These were de- posited in the stream valleys, many of which they seem to have nearly or en- tirely filled. Subsequent stream work has cut away much of this material and carried it farther along toward the ocean, but much still remains to testify of former conditions. These remnants occur as terraces or banks along the valley walls and serve today as almost inexhaustible supplies of sand and gravel for various economic purposes. Such are the beds opposite Denison and those un- derlying Deloit as well as the large bank which has been opened just south of the village.
The animals of those days roamed over the prairies and through the forests of Crawford county. They died and their bones were scattered about or washed into the streams and buried in their silts and sands. Oftentimes when they came down to drink they became mired and perished, to be exhumed and become objects of wonder to their human successors generations later. Many of these early settlers would be much like our modern fauna. The wolf no doubt made life as miserable for his neighbors as he has within the memory of man. Whether the bison lived in this particular age may not be certain, al-
394
HISTORY OF CRAWFORD COUNTY
though it is certain that he lived in Iowa in abundance in later days. The bear and the deer were present as has been recently shown from the discovery of a bear's tooth near Missouri Valley and of a stag's antler in the gravels at Denison. A portion of the latter is shown in one of the accompanying illustra- tions and a comparison with the six-inch ruler will give some idea of the great size of the complete antler and of the lordly beast which carried it. Horses were abundant in Aftonian days and have left many traces of their presence in the shape of bones and teeth, numbers of which have been found in the gravel beds of western Iowa. It is a strange fact that while horses were abundant at the time we are discussing, they had entirely disappeared from the American continent at the time of its discovery. The herds of wild horses which inhab- ited our western prairies during the last century were descended from ances- tors brought over by the Spanish conquerors. Camels were here and their bones are found mingled with those of the other denizens of the prairies in these natural graveyards-the Aftonian gravels. Probably the strangest and most remarkable members of the animal kingdom of Iowa were the sloths, great slow-going, sleepy animals whose distant relatives today hang by their toes from the trees of the forests of the Amazon in South America. Not many of their remains have been found in Iowa, some claws and similar parts, but enough, certainly, to let us know that they lived here and probably paid Crawford county an occasional visit, at least.
But among all the strange inhabitants of our territory the largest and most imposing were the elephants and mastodons. What a spectacle would have pre- sented itself to the eyes of the beholder if he could have been set down let us say, in the Boyer valley at Denison. On one hand he might have seen a herd of majestic elephants, led perhaps by the giant whose sixth molar is here rep- resented in Plate III, from the Mill gravel pit at Denison. This is one of the largest teeth of this species which has ever been found. The grinding surface measures ten and one-half inches in length by four and one-half inches in width. This was the hairy elephant often called also the northern mammoth and it must have been relatively quite abundant as the teeth as well as other hard parts are rather common in the gravels.
Besides the northern mammoth our visitor to Crawford county might have discovered the southern mammoth and perhaps the monarch of them all, the imperial mammoth, would have been here also, since both of these species lived in our territory. The relative sizes of the teeth of these monsters are shown in Plate IV. The tooth shown in number one was also found at Denison. Frag- ments of the tusks of these elephants have also been found in the Denison pits and some are reproduced in Plate V.
Looking now across the valley, we may easily imagine that our imaginary visitor would see feeding on the luxuriant growth of grass a troop of horses, very similar to those of today, except that perhaps they were slightly smaller, with heads somewhat larger in proportion. Peeping from the timber fringing the stream might be the giant deer whose antler has been already mentioned, together with his gentle consorts and their graceful fawns; and stalking along the drier uplands he may have beheld an ungainly camel or two outlined against
STUDY NATURE NOI BXA>
Plate II -- Part of antler of great stag. Cervalces, from gravels at Denison
Plate III-View of the grinding surface of the sixth upper right molar of the mammoth or hairy elephant, Elephas primigenius, found in sandpit near Denison by James Mill. The grinding surface is ten and one-half inches long and four and one-half inches wide
Photos by S. Calvin
395
HISTORY OF CRAWFORD COUNTY
the sky. All this would seem strange to our eyes, but less so to those of the men who roamed over the world in the days when history had not yet begun to be written. But the commoner and smaller forms of life were by no means absent. Here the gopher sits on his earth mound and whistles in derision as a hawk swoops down to capture him. There, perchance, a rabbit scuds away before a pursuing wolf or fox. And so we might go on with the multitude of animals which make up our Crawford county fauna.
But we must not omit mention of another creature which, although no re- mains have as yet been identified in our area, there is no reason to question was at some time one of the early inhabitants. This is the mastodon, a gigantic elephant-like creature a lower jaw of which is shown in Plate VI. When it is noted that this jaw is thirty-two inches long, some conception of the size of the creature will be gained. A comparison of the teeth shown in Plates III and IV, with that in the jaw here figured, shows the difference in the dentition of the elephant and the mastodon. The elephant tooth has a flat grinding sur- face roughened by two series of transverse ridges, while that of the mastodon bears a number of blunt bosses or knobs for crushing food. Note also that both of these animals carry only one developed tooth in each half jaw, or four for the entire mouth, at any one time. As these are worn down they are re- placed by others which push outward and displace the old ones. When the series of six for each half jaw has grown out, the animal must perforce suffer the consequences of a toothless old age.
The cavities at the point of the lower jaw of the mastodon for the recep- tion of tusks are worth notice since they show that this animal was armed with two pairs of these formidable weapons, one in the upper jaw and one in the lower.
It was said above that there were two periods since the retreat of the cre- taceous sea when the territory of Crawford county was shut away from sun and wind. One of these two periods was the Nebraskan age, when unknown thicknesses of ice lay over the land as previously described. The second period is known to geology as the Kansan age, a similar period, when again Crawford and Iowa and the whole upper Mississippi valley were covered by ice. The Aftonian age lasted for a long time, just how long we have no means of know- ing. But by and by there came a recurrence of those climatic conditions which had led to the formation of the ice sheets of the Nebraskan and once more the climate grew colder, the summers shorter and the winters longer, until finally there was no cessation of the cold, the snow piled up from year to year, it con- gealed to form solid ice and again the ice sheets came down from the frozen north and covered our area with a great white mantle. The glacier did not cease its onward march until it had reached Missouri river, where it crosses the state of the same name. All animal life was driven southward or exterminated, the vegetation was overwhelmed and absolute desolation ruled where once there had been fullness of life.
But in course of time the long, dreary winter came gradually to a close and springtime dawned. The ice could not resist the warming sun rays and it was slowly melted away. Once more the earth resumed her wonted appearance.
396
HISTORY OF CRAWFORD COUNTY
While the old-time valleys had been filled up by the drift from the Kansan glacier and the surface of Crawford county was again level and smooth it was not long before the little rills began to cut their valleys and the larger streams set to work to carve out again the hills and hollows which give diversity to our beautiful Iowa landscapes.
Since the Kansan ice left Crawford county there have been three invasions of Iowa by continental glaciers, namely the Illinoian, the Iowan and the Wis- consin. Each of these periods of cold has been succeeded by a period of warmer climate, the Yarmouth following the Kansan, the Sangamon after the close of the Illinoian, the Peorian succeeding the Iowan and the Present age since the Wisconsin glacier was melted away. These are all shown on the chart in Plate I. But none of the glaciers was able to extend as far as our, county and hence while it was subjected to great periodic variations of climate, the agencies of erosion have held continual sway ever since the close of Kan- san times, subject of course to modifications attendant upon climatic changes.
North-central Iowa between Clear Lake, Des Moines and Storm Lake rep- resents that portion of our state once covered by the Wisconsin ice. If this area be compared with that to the southwest, of which Crawford county is typical, it will be seen how much farther advanced is erosion in this older, Kansan region. It has been estimated from studies of the different drift sheets that if the time since the retreat of the Wisconsin ice sheet be considered as unity, the length of time since the close of the Kansan invasion must be reck- oned at from fifteen to seventeen. It will be easy to see from this comparison how much longer the streams and atmospheric agencies of erosion have had to work on the region of the Kansan drift than on the Wisconsin area and to understand why the topography of the former area is so much more mature than is that of the latter region. A study of the map of Iowa will show the facts in the case and we have here the explanation of what may seem at first a very anomalous situation.
Overlying the Kansan drift of Crawford county is a fine yellow or bluish gray silt known by the German word loess. This belongs to several ages of Pleistocene time, the lower, blue-gray part to the time immediately following the Kansan age and the upper yellow loess to the interglacial ages following the later ice invasions as well as to the time following the Wisconsin, the last glacial age. In many cases these two varieties are found together. In other places only one may be seen. The origin of the loess may be explained by re- ferring to present day conditions along the Missouri bottoms. Here clouds of dust are raised from the sand-bars and silt banks and are carried inland to be deposited on the prairies and hilltops. In this way the Missouri bluffs have been built up and vast quantities of this dust-like loess have been spread over adjacent territory. It is only necessary to transfer these conditions to the va- rious interglacial ages to understand how these beds of loess have been formed. In some parts of Iowa the different varieties of loess are separated by drift sheets, but in Crawford county, since there are none of the later sheets, the loesses lie in contact. They are the representatives of the different interglacial ages and in a less direct way of the glacial ages also. One of the best ex-
2
3
Photo by S. Calvin
Plate IV-Side view of teeth of fossil elephants that once inhabited Iowa. A little more than one-fourth its natural size
1-Fouth molar of the hairy. or northern mammoth, Elephas primigenius, from Den- ison. lowa
2-Fourth molar of the southern mammoth. Elephas columbi, from Logan, Iowa
3-Fifth molar of the imperial mammoth, Elephas imperator, from Pisgah, Iowa There is no doubt that all three lived in what is now Crawford County
397
HISTORY OF CRAWFORD COUNTY
posures in the county is seen in the pit of the Denison Brick Works, where both loesses may be seen distinctly marked off from each other.
Naturally the loess is thicker in the western part of the county, where the post-Wisconsin phase has been piled up in billowy hills and ridges. The typical loess topography is best developed as the great river is approached and here the topography is constructional rather than erosional; that is, deposition of loess has been in excess of cutting by streams and other forces. Western Crawford is transitional between the two types.
Of all geologic time the Pleistocene epoch is to most Iowans of the greatest immediate interest, for it is because of the sheets of till and loess spread over the surface of the state that Iowa's farms have attained their supremacy. This heterogeneous mixture of rock flour, clay and other ingredients, the glacial till, as well as the more uniform loess, contain all the elements which are necessary for plant food and form a most fertile soil, especially after the re- mains of generations of vegetable growth have been added to them to aid in forming a black top soil. The manufacturer may go far afield in search of produce for his mills, the miner and quarryman must needs delve beneath the soil for coal and stone, but eventually they must all look to the soil of Iowa for strength and sustenance. It needs but a moment's reflection to realize with what care such a precious heritage should be guarded and to understand that every means should be taken to perpetuate the valuable properties of this basis of Iowa's prosperity. Intelligent methods of soil culture, foresight in pre- venting waste by erosion and every aid that can be brought to bear should be utilized toward this end.
While the sources of Crawford county's wealth must always lie preemi- nently in her soils, there are one or two others which are worthy of mention here. One of these is the beds of gravels mentioned as having been brought down by the Aftonian streams. These are of great value for all purposes in which such material can be used, such as concrete, mortar, road building and others. There is no better road metal to be found than these gravels and road- ways built of them are permanent and clean. It may be mentioned in passing that many of the wells of the county find their supplies of water in the sheet of gravel of similar age which underlies the loess and Kansan drift-the yel- low and blue clays of the well drillers.
Another natural resource of the county is its brick material. This is very largely the loess, which because of its freedom from pebbles, its fine texture and uniform composition is admirably adapted for making the commoner grades of ware.
The foregoing sketch must have shown the reader how long and complex has been the history of the geological periods through which Crawford county has passed. The hills and valleys, the rocks and clays, all have a wonderful story to tell and unfold a fascinating panorama to him who has but eyes to see and a mind to read. Crawford county scenery has not, to be sure, the grandeur of mountains and canyons, but her prairies and rivers, her rocks and her soils bespeak a past as marvelous and forces as imposing as those which have raised mountains and carved canyons.
398
HISTORY OF CRAWFORD COUNTY
THE GREAT RIDGE ROAD. (Reprinted from an article in The Denison Review, by F. W. Meyers, and included by request.)
There are many beautiful drives in Crawford county, but somehow none of them appeals to our imagination more vividly than does the old ridge road northwest of Denison. It is a bleak, lonely, wind-beaten old road. Way back in the days of our youth it led into a far-off unknown land called the "German settlement." It used to be a great mystery to us, coming over the houseless prairies so many miles.
The old ridge road differs from other roads in many ways. It speaks not so much of the present generation as of the past. It was the first pioneer who laid out the ridge road, or perhaps it was the Indian or the buffalo. At any rate it was laid out to follow the path of least resistance. It sweeps gracefully about the hilltops, clinging ever to the summits. It avoids the steep places, skirts the hollows, dodges the corners and looks down on all the country round with supreme arrogance.
The ridge road is the ridge road from the time it leaves Main street and debouches-that is the proper word for a ridge road-into the valley. Man may gravel it as he will and toy with it and grade it and otherwise abuse it, but the ridge road is the ridge road still.
Let it be distinctly understood that the ridge road does not follow the fences or the telephone poles. The poles and the fences follow the ridge road. The ridge road is no respecter of persons. It had much rather go through a field than around it, and it will run right up to your back yard as soon as to your front one if your house does not have sense enough to meet the situation and face itself about.
Then, too, the superciliousness with which the ridge road greets the poor, little straight-laced, orthodox section line roads. How it looks at them out of the tail of its eye and flings a flirtatious curve at them from out of its many windings.
It seems to say, "I am the great ridge road. See how I disdain all con- fines. See how I ride the prairies as the good ship rides the waves. Poor little section roads, I pity you, with your bridges, your culverts, your banks of snow, your washouts, your ups and downs. The rain runs off my back in summer and winds are my servants to sweep me clean in winter. I am the great ridge road."
As the ever winding river told the Lady of Shalot all the happenings, sad and gay, of the little world below, so the ridge road tells its tale of sorrow and joy.
It was along its windings that the first pioneers struck out across the prai- ries. It was along this trail that the German emigrant, tired with the con- fusion of a new land, choked with the dust of trains, drew his first full breath of prairie air and disappeared, swallowed up in that mysterious German set- tlement, to return so soon indeed a full-fledged American citizen.
It was on the old ridge road that the long train of wagons came out of the mist, long before the sun rose, each wagon a torture pen to sleek, fat
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