The History of Pettis County, Missouri, including an authentic history of Sedalia, other towns and townships, together with biographical sketches, Part 8

Author: Demuth, I. MacDonald
Publication date: 1882]
Publisher: [n.p.
Number of Pages: 1154

USA > Missouri > Pettis County > The History of Pettis County, Missouri, including an authentic history of Sedalia, other towns and townships, together with biographical sketches > Part 8

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QUATERNARY .- In this Prof. Swallow includes what is separated under

HISTORY OF THE STATE OF MISSOURI.

the name of "Recent" by Prof. Dana and others, as shown in the chart. The Quaternary of Missouri is subdivided by Prof. Swallow into-

Alluvium. 30 feet

Bottom Prairie. 35

200

Bluff (Loess of other authors)

Drift (altered drift, boulder beds, boulder clay) 155

Total Quaternary formations. 420

That brings the succession of geological formations consecutively from their beginning up to the present time; and now our own eyes behold every day the processes of nature going on very much the same as they have gone along through all the unthinkable lapse of time that has passed since Pilot Knob first pushed its brazen brow up above the strange deso- lation of waters when "darkness was upon the face of the deep." And now our next consideration must be, the present aspects of the land sur- face of our state, together with its streams, its woodlands and its wonder- ful mineral wealth and resources.

MINERAL RESOURCES.

In the extent, variety, and practical value of her stores of mineral wealth, Missouri is not excelled by any other state in the Union. In the fall of 1880 the New York Economist published an article on Missouri, in which it said:

"The state of Missouri is one of the most remarkable pieces of this earth's surface. Surface indeed! Missouri goes far enough under the surface to furnish mankind with one hundred million tons of coal a year for thir- teen hundred years. Think of 26,887 square miles of coal beds-nearly half the state-and some of the beds nearly fifteen feet thick. With regard to iron, it is not necessary to penetrate the surface for that. They have iron in Missouri by the mountain. Pilot Knob, 581 feet high, and containing 360 acres, is a mass of iron; and Iron Mountain, about six miles distant from it, is 228 feet high, covers 500 acres, and is estimated in the last surveys, to contain 230,000,000 tons of ore, without counting the inexhaustible supply that may reasonably be supposed to exist below the level. There is enough iron lying about loose in Missouri for a double track of railroad across the continent.

" The lead districts of Missouri include more than 6,000 square miles, and at least five hundred points where it can be profitably worked. In fifteen counties there is copper in rich abundance. There are large depos- its of zinc in the state. There is gold, also, which does not yet attract much attention, because of the dazzling stores of this precious metal farther west. In short, within one hundred miles of St. Louis the following met- als and minerals are found in quantities that will repay working: gold, iron, lead, zinc, copper, tin, silver, platina, nickel, emery, coal, limestone, granite, marble, pipe-clay, fire-clay, metallic paints, and salt."

It can hardly be said that gold, silver, tin, platina or emery have been

HISTORY OF THE STATE OF MISSOURI.

found in paying quantity as yet, although they are known to exist in some of our mining districts, in combinations with other minerals. Our state board of immigration has published many well prepared and judicious papers on the various advantages and resources of our state, which care- fully avoid making any extravagant or overdrawn statements. They give the real facts as accurately as they could be ascertained up to 1879- 80, and form the most reliable body of knowledge on many matters of state interest, that is now accessible; and from this source we gather the more essential points.

COAL .- The Missouri coal fields underlie an area of about 26,000 square miles. The southern outcrop of the coal measures has been traced from the mouth of the Des Moines through the counties of Clark, Lewis, Shelby, Monroe, Audrain, Boone, Cooper, Pettis, Henry, St. Clair, Bates, Vernon and Barton, into the Indian Territory, and every county north- west of this line is known to contain more or less coal. Outside of the coal fields given above, coal rocks also exist in Ralls, Montgomery, War- ren, St. Charles, Callaway and St. Louis counties, and local or outlying deposits of bituminous and cannel coal are found in Moniteau, Cole, Mor- gan, Crawford, Lincoln and Callaway counties.

The exposed coal in Missouri includes upper, middle and lower coal measures. The upper coal measures contain about four feet of coal, in two seams of about one foot each and other thin seams and streaks. The area of their exposure is about 8,400 square miles.

The middle coal measures contain about seven feet of coal, including two workable seams, twenty-one and twenty-four inches thick, respect- ively, and one of one foot, which is worked under favorable circumstan- ces, and six thin seams. The exposure of the middle measures covers an area of over 2,000 square miles.

The lower measures cover an area of about 15,000 square miles, and have five workable seams, varying in thickness from eighteen inches to four and a half feet, and thin seams of six to eleven inches.

IRON .- It has been said by experts that Missouri has iron enough "to run a hundred furnaces for a thousand years;" and the ores are of every variety known to metallurgical science. Iron Mountain is the largest body of specular iron and the purest mass of ore in the world. It was forced up through the crust of the earth in a molten state during the Azoic Age of geology. The different ores of the state are classed as red hematite, red oxide, specular or glittering ore, brown hematite or limo- nite, hydrous oxide, magnetic ore, and spathic or spar-like ore (carbonate of iron). Many other names are used to indicate different combinations of iron with other minerals. Some of the iron deposits, instead of coming up in a fused mass from the bowels of the earth, as Pilot Knob, Shep-

HISTORY OF THE STATE OF MISSOURI.

herd Mountain and Iron Mountain evidently did, were formed by the steam that attended those fiery upheavals, carrying its load of gaseous matter until it.condensed and settled down at different points, and gradu- ally cooled or crystalized. This would occur sometimes in water and sometimes in the air, thus producing the great variety of ferruginous or irony compositions which we now find and utilize. And this mineral steam method of depositing iron and other products from subterranean gases must have occurred in Missouri at different periods of geologic time, and not all during the Azoic. The red ores are found in 21 coun- ties; the brown hematite or limonite iron ores extend over 94 counties, and in 31 of them it occurs in vast quantity.

Shepherd Mountain is 660 feet high. The ore, which is magnetic and specular, contains a large percentage of pure iron. The hight of Pilot Knob above the Mississippi river is 1,118 feet. Its base, 581 fert from the summit, is 360 acres. The iron is known to extend 440 feet below the surface. The upper section of 141 feet is judged to contain 14,000,000 tons of ore. The elevation of Iron Mountain is 228 feet, and the area of its base 500 acres. The solid contents of the cone are 230,000,000 tons. It is thought that every foot beneath the surface will yield 3,000,000 tons of ore. At the depth of 180 feet, an artesian auger is still penetrating solid ore. Dr. Litton thinks that these mountains contain enough iron above the surface to afford for two hundred years an annual supply of 1,000,000 tons. The ore is almost exclusively specular. It yields 56 per cent. of pure iron. The iron is strong, tough and fibrous.

Profs. Schmidt and Pumpelly, in their very learned work on the iron ores of Michigan and Missouri, have classified the iron-bearing region of our state ås follows:

Eastern Ore-Region .- 1. Ore district along the Mississippi river. 2. Iron Mountain district. 3. Southeastern limonite district. 4. Franklin county district. 5. Scotia district.

Central Ore-Region .- 1. Steelville district. 2. Ore-district on the up- per Meramec and its tributaries. 3. Salem district. 4. Iron Ridge district. 5. St. James district. 6. Rolla district. 7. Middle Gasconade district. 8. Lower Gasconade district. 9. Callaway county district.

Western Ore-Region .- 1. Lower Osage district. 2. Middle Osage district. 3. Upper Osage district.

Southwestern Ore-Region .- 1. White River district. 2. Ozark county district.

The same authorities have classified the various kinds of iron ores found in Missouri, thus:

HISTORY OF THE STATE OF MISSOURI.

Deposits of specular ore in por- phyry.

Deposits of specular ore in sand- stone. Disturbed deposits of specular ore. Drifted deposits of specular ore.

Strata of red hematite.

Disturbed or drifted deposits of red hematite.

Deposits of limonite on limestone. Disturbed or drifted deposits of limonite.

LEAD .- The annual lead product of Missouri is said now to exceed that of any other state or country; and it is conceded that its lead deposits are the richest in the world. The lead region all lies south of the Mis- souri river; the mineral is found chiefly in the magnesian limestone rocks, which are the great lead-bearing rocks of the world; but it is also found in ferruginous clays, in slates, in gravel beds, and in cherty masses in the clays.

Mr. R. O. Thompson, mining engineer, of St. Louis, has written a sketch of the mode of origin of our lead and some other mineral deposits, which is plain, concise, and a clear statement of the teachings of science on this very interesting portion of Missouri's geological and mineralogical history. We quote:

"The Azoic rocks in this region, when the great Silurian system began to be formed, were so many islands, their heads only elevated above the vast sedimentary sea. The beds upon which the limestones and sand- stones were deposited consisted of the weatherings of the Azoic rocks, which naturally sought the valleys and became a base for the sedimentary rock. This boundless sea held in solution lime, magnesia, alumina, man- ganese, lead, copper, cobalt, nickel, iron, and other mineral substances. In this chemical condition gases were evolved and the work of formation commenced. The two gases forming the great creative power, and aiding solidification, were carbonic acid and sulphuretted hydrogen; the former seeking its affinity in lime and forming limestone; the sulphur in the latter naturally combining with the other metals, forming sulphates, or sulphur- ets. The work of deposition and solidification being in harmony, it is easy to understand how those minerals exist in a disseminated condition in these rocks. The slates that we find so rich in galena, presenting the myriad forms of lingula, must also have been formed in the Silurian Age. The distribution among the magnesian limestones of these decomposing slates can be most easily accounted for. The decomposed feldspar pro- duced by the weathering of the porphyry became in its change a silicate of alumina, and the sulphur, combining with the lead, disseminated the same in the slate as readily as in the limestone."

The Missouri lead region has been divided or classified into five sub- districts, as follows:

I. The Southeastern Lead District, embraces all or parts of Jefferson, Washington, Franklin, Crawford, Iron, St. Francois, St. Genevieve, Madison, Wayne, Reynolds, and Carter counties, with some mines in the western portion of Cape Girardeau county. Mining has been longest carried on in this district, and the aggregate of the production has been very great, although the work has been chiefly surface mining. Mine-

HISTORY OF THE STATE OF MISSOURI.

La-Motte, in this district, was discovered in 1720, by Francis Renault and M. LaMotte, and has been worked more or less ever since.

II. The Central Lead District, comprises, as far as known, the coun- ties of Cole, Cooper, Moniteau, Morgan, Miller, Benton, Maries, Camden, and Osage. Much of the mining done here, again, has been near the surface, the lead first being found in clays, in caves, and in masses in clay but a few inches below the surface. Shafts, however, sunk in the mag- nesian limestone, find rich deposits in lodes and pockets.

III. The Southern Lead District, comprises the counties of Pulaski, La Clede, Texas, Wright, Webster, Douglas, Ozark, and Christian.

IV. The Western Lead District embraces Hickory, Dallas, Polk, St. Clair, Cedar, and Dade counties. Some rich deposits have been found in this district, especially in Hickory county.

V. The Southwestern Lead District comprises Jasper, Newton, Law- rence, Stone, Barry, and McDonald. Here very extensive mining has been done, more especially in the two counties first named, which have, for the last few years, produced more than one-half of the pig-lead mined in the state.

For several years past more than one-half the lead production.of the United States has been from Missouri mines. Besides the numerous smelting works supported by them, the manufacture of white lead, lead pipe, sheet lead, etc., contributes materially to the industries and com- merce of the state.

COPPER .- Several varieties of copper ore exist in Missouri mines. Deposits of copper have been discovered in Dent, Crawford, Benton, Maries, Greene, Lawrence, Dade, Taney, Dallas, Phelps, Reynolds and Wright counties. Some of the mines in Shannon county are now profit- ably worked, and mines in Franklin county have yielded good results.

ZINC .- Sulphuret, carbonate and silicate of zinc are found in nearly all the lead mines of southwestern Missouri; and zinc ores are also found in most of the counties along the Ozark range. What the lead miners call " black-jack, " and throw away, is sulphuret of zinc. Newton and Jasper counties are rich in zinc ores; and Taney county has an extensive vein of calamine, or carbonate of zinc.

COBALT .- Valuable to produce the rich blue colors in glass and porce- lain, and for other purposes in the arts, is found in considerable quantities at Mine-La-Motte.

MANGANESE .- Used in glass manufacture and the arts; it is found in St. Genevieve and other counties.

NICKEL .- Found in workable quantities at Mine-La-Motte.

HISTORY OF THE STATE OF MISSOURI.

BUILDING STONE.

Missouri abounds in solid, durable materials for buildings; she has quarries of red and gray granites, and very fine limestones, sandstones and marbles. In Crawford, Washington and Franklin counties there are workable beds of " onyx marble," a stalagmite formation found in caves, and very rich and valuable for mantles, table-tops, vases, ornaments, etc. This marble is not found anywhere else in the United States, and has been imported from Algiers and Mexico, at great cost. As an illustration of the high repute abroad, and substantial home value of Missouri products in the stone line, we give a case in point.

The new state capitol at Des Moines, Iowa, which will cost $3,000,000, and is said to be the largest and finest public edifice in the United States outside of Washington city, is built mostly of materials from Missouri, except the rough masonry and brickwork. The Missouri stones and their cost is as follows:

St. Genevieve buff sandstone $ 147,289.83

Carroll county blue limestone 139,238.54

Fourteen red granite columns, 18 feet, 43 inches long, 2 ft. 3 in. diameter, turned and polished at St. Louis .... 8,144.50

Total paid by Iowa to Missouri on this one building. . $ 294,672.87

Other examples of Missouri building stone will be of interest. The Archimedes limestone is used for the U. S. custom house in St. Louis. The encrinital limestone is used for the State University building, and court house at Columbia. The Trenton limestone is used in the court house at St. Louis. A stratum called "cotton rock" in the magnesian limestone formation, is used for the state house and court house at Jeffer- son City. Encrinital marble is found in Marion county, and other varie- ties occur in Cooper, Cape Girardeau, St. Louis, Iron and Ozark coun- ties. In the bluffs on the Niangua, a marble crops out twenty feet thick, which is a fine-grained, crystaline, silico-magnesian limestone, of a light drab color, slightly tinged or clouded with peach blossom. Some of the beautiful Ozark marbles have been used in ornamenting the national capitol at Washington.

Lithographic limestone is found in Macon county.

EARTHS, CLAYS, OCHRES, ETC.

Kaolin, or decomposed feldspar, is a clay for making porcelain ware, and is found in and shipped from southeastern Missouri. Fine pottery clays are found in all the coal bearing region. North of the Missouri river many beds of best fire-clay are found, which is extensively manufac- tured at St. Louis into fire brick, gas retorts, metallurgists' crucibles, etc.

HISTORY OF THE STATE OF MISSOURI.

Yellow and red ochres, ferruginous clays, and sulphate of baryta, all val- uable in the mannfacture of mineral and fire-proof paints, are found in great abundance all through the iron districts. Near St. Genevieve there is a bank of saccharoidal sand which is twenty feet in height, and miles in extent. The mass is inexhaustible. Two analyses give the following results:

Silica 9S.81 99.02

Lime. 0.92 0.98

The sand is very friable, and nearly as white as snow. It is not oxy- dized or discolored by heat, and the glass made from it is clear and unstained. One firm in St. Louis has annually exported more than 3,500 tons of this sand to the glass manufactories of Wheeling, Steubenville and Pittsburg.

GEOGRAPHY OF MISSOURI.

LOCATION AND AREA.

The state of Missouri (with the exception of the Pan-Handle, in the southeast corner, which extends 34 miles further south), lies between the parallels 36 degrees 30 minutes and 40 degrees 30 minutes north latitude, and between longitudes 12 degrees 2 minutes, and 18 degrees and 51 min- utes west from Washington. Its southern boundary line, extended east- ward, would pass along the southern boundaries of Tennessee and Vir- ginia. The line of the northern boundary, extended in the same direction, would pass north of the centers of Illinois, Indiana and Ohio, and near the centers of Pennsylvania and New Jersey. Extending these lines west- ward, they would embrace the entire state of Kansas, and a considerable portion of Nebraska on the north and of the Indian Territory south.

The length of the state north and south is 282 miles; its extreme width, east and west, is 348 miles, and the average width, which is represented by a line drawn due west from St. Louis, is 235 miles.

The area of the state is 65,350 square miles, or 41,824,000 acres. In size it is the eighth state in the Union, and is larger than any state east of or bordering upon the Mississippi, except Minnesota. It occupies almost the exact center of that portion of the United States lying between the Rocky Mountains and the Atlantic, and is midway between the British possessions on the north and the Gulf of Mexico south.

The following list shows what other large cities of our own and foreign countries lie on the same latitude with the largest cities in our

HISTORY OF THE STATE OF MISSOURI.

state: The latitude of 38 to 39 degrees north, embraces Annapolis, Maryland; Washington and Georgetown, D. C .; Alexandria, Va .; Ports- mouth, Ohio; Lexington, Frankfort and Louisville, Ky .; Madison, New Albany and Evansville, Ind .; St. Louis and Jefferson City, Missouri; Sacramento and Vallejo, California; Yarkand, China; Tabreez, Persia; Smyrna, Turkey; Messina and Palermo, Sicily; Lisbon, Portugal.

The latitude of 39 to 40 embraces the cities of Philadelphia, Dover, Wil- · mington, Baltimore, York, Gettysburg, Columbus, Cincinnati, Indiana- polis, Terre Haute, Springfield, Quincy, Hannibal, Kansas City, St. Joseph, Leavenworth, Denver; Virginia City, Nevada; Marysville, Cali- fornia; Tientsin, Pekin and Kashgar, in China; Bokhara in Turkestan; Erzroom in Turkey; Valencia in Spain.

The meridian of 90 to 91 degrees west longitude, takes in Grand Portage, Minnesota; Mineral Point, Wisconsin; also Dubuque, Davenport, Rock Island, Galesburg, St. Louis, Memphis, Vicksburg and New Orleans.

Missouri is half as large again as New York, and more than eight times the size of Massachusetts. It would make a score of German prin- cipalities. Larger than England and Wales, or Scotland and Ireland, it is equal to one-third of the area of France.

SURFACE FEATURES.

As explained in the chapter on geology, there occurred away back in the earliest geological ages, some subterranean force which pushed up through the crust of the earth, a series of knobs and irregular ridges and hills in a region extending from St. Genevieve, in a southwest direction, to Shannon and Texas counties, taking in some portions of Madison, St. Francois, Washington, Iron and Reynolds counties. After this, these knobs and ridges were islands in the ocean, which covered the rest of Missouri and adjoining states. On the bottom of this ocean the solid strata of limestone, sandstone, and other rocks, were formed. In course of time the rest of the country was raised above the ocean, and the sur- face presented a broad, undulating plateau, from which projected the hills and ridges above named. The rains descended upon this plateau, and the waters collected into branches, creeks and rivers, and flowed away to the ocean, as now; and during the succeeding cycles, the channels and valleys of the streams were worn into the rocks as they now appear. These facts respecting the formation of our state, give some idea of its surface features. It may be described as a broad, undulating table-land or plateau, from which projects a series of hills and ridges extending from St. Genevieve to the southwest, and into which the branches, creeks and rivers have worn their deep broad channels and valleys. In that portion of the state north of the Missouri river, the northwest part is the highest,

HISTORY OF THE STATE OF MISSOURI.

and there is a general descent to the south and east, as shown by the course of the Missouri river and its north side tributaries. In the eastern part of this region there is a high dividing ridge which separates the small east-flowing tributaries of the Mississippi from those flowing south- ward into the Missouri; the St. Louis, Kansas City and Northern railroad follows this highland from Warren and Montgomery counties to Coats- ville on the north line of the state, in Schuyler county; and railroad sur- veys show that in a straight line across the state, the Missouri river at the city of Weston, in Platte county, is 320 feet higher than the Mississippi at Hannibal.

South of the Missouri the highest part is a main ridge extending from Jasper county through Lawrence, Webster, Wright, Texas, Dent, Iron, St. Francois and Perry counties, striking the Mississippi river at Grand Tower. This ridge constitutes what is called the Ozark range, which for three-fourths of its course across Missouri is not mountainous, or com- posed of peaks, but is an elevated plateau of broad, level, arable land, and divides the northward flowing tributaries of the Missouri from the waters which flow southward into the lower Mississippi. It is a part of that great chain of ridge elevations which begins with Long's Peak, about fifty miles northwest of Denver, in Colorado; crosses the state of Kansas between the Kansas and Arkansas rivers; crosses Missouri through the counties above mentioned; passes into Illinois at Grand Tower and thence into Kentucky opposite Golconda; and is finally merged into the Cumber- land Mountains. This ridge probably formed the southern shore of that vast inland sea into which the upper Missouri and Platte rivers emptied their muddy waters for a whole geological age, and deposited over the states of Iowa, Missouri, Kansas and Nebraska, their sediment from the Cretaceous and Tertiary beds of the mountain regions in Dakota, Montana, Wyoming, etc., and the "Bad Lands" of northwestern Nebraska. This great sea or lake had its chiefs outlet at Grand Tower,* where for thousands of years its waters plunged over the rocky limestone ledges and flowed off to the Gulf of Mexico, which then extended nearly or quite up to the mouth of the Ohio river at Cairo. But as it gradually wore down the rocks of this southern high ridge barrier, of course the channel through this narrow pass became gradually deeper and deeper, and as gradually drained off the mighty lake, leaving four great states covered chiefly with a kind of sediment which Prof. Swallow has termed " bluff

* Dr. Shumard in his report on a geological section from St. Louis to Commerce,-p. 151, says: "The Grand Tower rises from the bed of the Mississippi, an isolated mass of rock, of a truncated-conical shape, crowned at the top with stunted cedars, and situated about fifty yards from the Missouri shore. It is eighty-five feet high, and four hundred yards in circumference at the base. During high water, the current rushes around its base with great velocity. *

* About half a mile below the Tower, near the middle of the river, is a huge mass of chert. * In the next two miles the Missouri shore is bounded by hills from 75 to 200 feet in altitude." It is rocky and bluffy for six miles or more along here, some of the elevations reaching 330 feet.

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The History of Pettis County, Missouri, including an authentic history of Sedalia, other towns and townships, together with biographical sketches, Part 8

Author: Demuth, I. MacDonald Publication date: 1882] Publisher: [n.p. Number of Pages: 1154

Author: Demuth, I. MacDonald
Publication date: 1882]
Publisher: [n.p.
Number of Pages: 1154