USA > New York > Franklin County > A history of St. Lawrence and Franklin counties, New York : from the earliest period to the present time > Part 80
USA > New York > St Lawrence County > A history of St. Lawrence and Franklin counties, New York : from the earliest period to the present time > Part 80
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Part 1 | Part 2 | Part 3 | Part 4 | Part 5 | Part 6 | Part 7 | Part 8 | Part 9 | Part 10 | Part 11 | Part 12 | Part 13 | Part 14 | Part 15 | Part 16 | Part 17 | Part 18 | Part 19 | Part 20 | Part 21 | Part 22 | Part 23 | Part 24 | Part 25 | Part 26 | Part 27 | Part 28 | Part 29 | Part 30 | Part 31 | Part 32 | Part 33 | Part 34 | Part 35 | Part 36 | Part 37 | Part 38 | Part 39 | Part 40 | Part 41 | Part 42 | Part 43 | Part 44 | Part 45 | Part 46 | Part 47 | Part 48 | Part 49 | Part 50 | Part 51 | Part 52 | Part 53 | Part 54 | Part 55 | Part 56 | Part 57 | Part 58 | Part 59 | Part 60 | Part 61 | Part 62 | Part 63 | Part 64 | Part 65 | Part 66 | Part 67 | Part 68 | Part 69 | Part 70 | Part 71 | Part 72 | Part 73 | Part 74 | Part 75 | Part 76 | Part 77 | Part 78 | Part 79 | Part 80 | Part 81 | Part 82 | Part 83 | Part 84
This limestone has been used to some extent as a marble, and mills for sawing it have existed in Rossie and Fowler, but its coarse crystaline texture impairs its value, except for the more massive kinds of archi- tecture. For the manufacture of lime, however, there is probably no- where in the world a material that will surpass this. It is generally in this rock, or along the line of junction with the gneiss, that the more splendid varieties of minerals occur, that are so eagerly sought by col- lectors. Limestone is rare in the primary rock of Franklin county; it, however occurs in township No. 9. In agricultural capabilities, the soil underlaid by primary rock varies in quality, and seems to be in a mea- sure, dependent upon the prevalence of limestone, and the nature and amount of the loose drifted materials that overlie it. It has been gen- erally conceded by geologists, that these transported materials, which in many instances constitute the soil, and modify to a great degree its agri-
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cultural capabilities, are derived from localities north of the place they now occupy. The northern border of the state, and for a great distance into Canada, is underlaid by rocks of a more recent period, in which lime is an important ingredient, and these give character to the soil for a considerable distance south, which can scarcely be said to differ from that immediately above them. The surface of the primary, is generally more or less broken by ridges of rock, often rising but little above the surface. These ridges have a prevailing direction of N. E. and s. w., which gives to the rivers, tributary to the St. Lawrence, their general course, and occasions the remarkable flexures, so strikingly noticed.in the Os- wegatchie and Indian rivers, which flow in natural valleys for a con- siderable distance between ridges of gueiss. Towards the southern borders of St. Lawrence county, the upheavals become of greater alti- tude, and as we go into the eastern part of this, and southern part of Franklin county, they attain the altitude of mountains, which in Essex, become the highest east of the Mississippi river. These bald and sterile peaks, support but a scanty vegetation, and overlook innumerable ponds and lakes, with fertile intervales; but thousands of acres will be found wholly unfit for tillage) and of no value beyond the timber on the sur- face, or the iron ores beneath it. These lands form an elevated plateau, liable to late spring and early autumnal frosts, but adapted to grazing, the uplands affording pasturage, and the intervales meadows. Of min- erals interesting to the collector it has none, but it abounds in iron ores, which will hereafter employ the industry of great numbers, as it unites the three essentials of ore, water power, and fuel, to which, in a great degree, has been added in the Northern Rail road, an access to market. From an elevation of 1600 feet, the surface uniformly descends to the St. Lawrence, and in Franklin county, from the greater elevation, the descent is more perceptible, so that from almost any prominent point, the lower country north may be overlooked to a great extent, and the majestic St. Lawrence reduced to a silver line in the blue distance, with the Canadian villages dotted here and there, and the obscure outline of northern mountains, faintly appearing on the horizon, give a peculiar beauty to the landscape. Lying directly upon the gneiss, or in some instances upon the limestone, is a rock which presents a great variety of structure, called by geologists, Potsdam sandstone, from its great abun- dance above that village, and its remarkable adaptation for building purposes which it there exhibits.
Perhaps no material in the world will surpass in cheapness, elegance, and durability, the Potsdam sandstone, where it occurs in even-bedded strata, as in the towns of Potsdam, Canton, Stockholm, Malone, &c. The sharpness of outline which it preserves in localities where it has been exposed to the weather for centuries, indicate its durability, and being composed of nearly pure silex, occasionally tinged with iron, it affords none of the constituents which nourish parasitical mosses, Walls made of this stone never present the mouldy, decaying appear- ance, common to walls of limestone in damp situations. At the quar- ries of this stone in Potsdam and Malone, which at the latter place, has become a regular business for exportation, it cleaves into slabs, three or four inches thick, and several feet in length, and when first exposed to the air, it readily breaks when laid over a straight edge, with carefully
* On the flight of Sir John Johnson, mentioned on page 123, it is said. that as he passed down the Raquette, he noticed the Potsdam sandstone piled up in beautiful regularity by na- ture with all the symmetry of art, along its banks, and predicted that a city would be built come day in the vicinity of that stone. More than thirty years afterwards he enquired of one rom that place at Montreal, if any use had been made of that stone ledge.
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repeated blows of a stone hammer into pieces of any desirable length, or breadth with the greatest freedom. Exposure to the air hardens it in a little time, and it thenceforth is fitted for any purpose of paving, or the walls of buildings, for which uses it is unsurpassed. Walls laid with alternate courses of broad and narrow stone, present a very neat and substantial appearance.
The sandstone enters Rossie from Jefferson county, between the Os- wegatchie and the iron mines, and runs across that town about two miles into Gouverneur. The first continuous mass of sandstone enters from Jefferson county in a bold escarpment, and forms a terrace overlaid by a soil of much fertility, and is generally quite level, except where accumu- lations of drifted materials occur, or valleys have been worn along the courses of existing streams. The south margin of this rock conforms to the course we have traced as the boundary of the gneiss, and it under- lies some of the most valuable farming lands of Northern New York. A feature will be observed in the district underlaid by the sandstone, which is quite general, and is due to the little liability to disintegration , which it exhibits, namely: the absence of gentle swells and sloping de- clivities. Wherever valleys occur, their margins are usually bounded by abrupt precipices of naked rock, and where deep ravines have been wrought by running streams, as at the falls on the Chateaugay river, the banks present bold projecting and overhanging cliffs, with intervening spaces, where from frost or running streams portions have been thrown down or swept away, leaving detached and almost isolated masses stand- ing. In Hammond, instances occur in which outstanding masses of this rock, of the same height as the main body, but separated from it, often occurs. In texture, the sandstone differs greatly, being at times fine grained and uniformly stratified, as at all the quarries where it is wrought, and at times made up of angular or rounded inasses of various sizes, ce- mented together, with little symmetry or appearance of stratification. It is among the last of these that several curious instances of structure exist, which indicate in themselves some of the causes that must have operated when the deposits were going on. Ripple marks are of com- mon occurrence, proving that they formed the shores of ancient seas, by which the sands were thrown into slight undulating ridges, exactly as is seen on the borders of existing waters. In some places the rock is made up of balls, having a concentric structure like the coats of an onion, usually with a pebble as a nucleus, as if they had been formed by rolling over the surface, receiving an addition from the adhesion of sand, as we sometimes see snow balls rolled up by the wind on the surface of snow. In the vicinity of the iron mines of Rossie, this spheroidal structure is very common, and makes up the whole rock. They are of all sizes, from a pea to an orange. But perhaps there is no structure, either of this or of any rock, more worthy of study than the remarkable cylindrical strati- fication frequently observed in Rossie, Antwerp, Theresa, &c. These cylinders are vertical, and of all diameters, froin two inches up to twenty feet or more, and their section where exposed to the surface, shows them to be made of concentric strata of sand of different colors and degrees of fineness, firmly consolidated and capable of being detached, when they present to the casual observer the appearance of huge logs of wood, and has led to their being called " petrified logs." As the kind of rock in which they occur does not possess cleavage, it is seldom quarried, and opportunities have not been found to learn the depth to which they de- scend. From what the author has seen, he infers that they are some- what conical, and probably run out at no great depth. This sandstone
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contains but few evidences of organic existence, these being limited to obscure fucoids and one or two bivalve shells. At times the ripple marks have been seen much like sea weeds in their arrangement, and the fracture and cleavage of the stone near Potsdam, has at times shown a moss-like ramification, which may be due to manganese. The cylinders at times encroach upon each other, the last formed being perfect, while the older one has its stratification interrupted by the other. No rational theory has occurred to us by which this wonderful structure could be explained, than that they were formed by vortices or whirlpools playing upon the surface of water, and imparting their gyratory motions to the mobile sands of the bottom, which gave the circular arrangement noticed, and which has since become consolidated and remains.
The book of nature is ever open to give instruction, and may be read by all. In every department of the world around us, may be seen sufficient to call forth the admiration and fix the attention of the humble observer, who sees in the least and most casual occurrences, the operations of causes which may have operated at an exceedingly remote period, but which have written their history in characters more enduring than hu- man monuments. The fancy would become weary in traveling back through the long period that has elapsed, since the surface of the ancient ocean that once evidently overspread this country, may have ebbed and flowed, obedient then as now, to physical laws which change not. The winds played upon the surface, and sent their waves to ripple along the shores, and the tinny vortex, formed by conflicting currents, spun then as now, and recorded its history in the sands beneath!
The Potsdam sandstone is bordered along the St. Lawrence, and ex- tending back a few miles by the calciferous sandstone, which presents at many places near Ogdensburgh, definite fossil remains, which are how -. ever limited to a few species. Among these are many obscure masses, with a texture that indicates them to have been sponges, or the lower orders of zoophytes, which have never been studied with the view of scientific interest. In an economical point of view this rock is of import- ance, both as a building stone and as material for lime, for which, how- ever, it is far inferior to the white limestone of the primary region. At Massena and at Waddington, water lime has been manufactured from this rock, but this is not now done. The above enumerated form the princi- pal of our rock formations, but over them all, is more or less extensively and very unequally spread a mass of soil, sand, clay, and boulders of rock, much of which bears evidence of having been drifted by agencies that have long since ceased from more northern localities, and deposited in its present form. This has received the name of Drift, and its study forms one of the most instructive departments of practical geology. Evidences of its northern origin, may be found in our ability to often trace loose masses of rock to the parent source, and especially to the polished and scratched surface of rocks when exposed, which bear tes- timony to the fact that they have been ground and furrowed by moving inasses, which the direction of the scratches certify was from a northerly quarter. The evidence of the grinding of solid bodies moving in water, is often observed along streams at the present day. Near Cooper's falls, in De Kalb, is a cavity of several feet in depth which has been worn in this way, but it is at a level far above the present river; and in the gneiss rock, near the Ox Bow, in the edge of Jefferson county, is another example, which occurs on the face of a cliff some seventy feet in height, and is of so remarkable a nature as to have attracted general curiosity. The following cut is borrowed from Prof. Emmons's report on the geology
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HISTORY OF ST. LAWRENCE
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of the 2d district, and correctly represents the shape of the cavity, but not the imposing height and grandeur of the cliff.
Pulpit rock, near Ox Bow, Jefferson county.
The pot shaped cavity is about '18 feet deep and 10 wide, at the largest part. It derives its name from its having been used as a pulpit on sev- eral occasions when the settlements were new. In one instance a Method- ist quarterly meeting is said to have been held at the foot of this rock.
In De Kalb an instance is observed, in which the strata of sandstone have been pressed into waves, as is shown in fig. 3, facing page 704. This locality is mentioned by Prof. Emmons, from whose' report these drawings are derived, as 80 rods north of De Kalb village. At another locality the strata are broken up, as shown in fig. 1, opposite page 684, which proves that these masses have been subjected to motion since formed and consolidated. Tortuous strata in the gneiss are extremely common, but nowhere can this be studied with better advantage than on the summit of the hill towards Hammond, in the village of Rossie.
Accumulations of drift are of common occurrence in Rossie, near Sprague's Corners, in Hermon, Pierrepont, Parishville and Hopkinton, &c .; and across Franklin county, near the village of Malone, they are very conspicuous. These hills may be readily known by their smooth, rounded outline. In the above instances, no prevailing direction can be noticed, but nearer the St. Lawrence, especially in the lower part of St. Lawrence county, continuous ridges crossing the river obliquely, may be raced considerable distances. In some cases, the surface is thickly studded with boulders, which have been noticed in continuous trains for half a mile or more, and groups of these, usually of similar materials, are of constant occurrence.
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There is above the drift still another formation, consisting of sands and clays, and containing shells unchanged in texture, and of the species now living in the Arctic seas, which skirts the northern border of the two countries, from Ogdensburgh eastward, to which, from its extensive occurrence in the valley of the St. Lawrence, the term Laurentian de- posit has been proposed. It exists in Canada over a great extent, and also in the valley of lake Champlain. The rail road cutting east of Ogdensburgh, was through this, and multitudes of the fossil shells of species named by naturalists, Saricava rugosa, Tellina grænlandica, and perhaps a few others occur, and may be gathered in quantities. The clay beds at Raymondville, which have a peculiar columnar structure, very much like starch, and no signs of stratification whatever, contain shells of the same species, proving that they belong to a marine forma- tion of a comparatively very recent period. The clays at the latter place are overspread for miles by a light sandy loam, as is the case with the clay deposits near Albany and elsewhere. These recent fossils occur in ravines throughout a considerable part of the northern border of Franklin county. Of a still more recent period, are the bog ores still forming in swamps, the deposits of lime from a few springs, and the detritus brought down by rivers, and left at their mouths, of which the rush bed, at the mouth of the Oswegatchie, before the village of Ogdens- burgh, is an instance.
Among the remarkable features of the primary, are trap dykes, of which many very interesting instances occur in Rossie, especially near Wegatchie, and metallic veins. As it is designed to render this notice of practical utility, many subjects of a theoretical nature will be passed. Of metallic veins, those of lead, copper and zinc are the principal, and of the first that at Rossie is preeminent. Indefinite reports of lead, silver, &c., based upon Indian traditions, were common among the early proprietors, and much effort was made to discover the localities, among which one, said to exist near the sources of Grass river, was sought after At Rossie, lead ore occurs in several veins, which descend nearly vertical, and the ores are associated with iron pyrites, calcite, celestine, anglesite and many other minerals, which will be enumerated. At the mines on Black lake, at Mineral point, zinc blende occurs in con- siderable quantities, as it also does, to some extent, with the galena of the St. Lawrence company's mines in Macomb. We consider the fact settled beyond a doubt, that lead ore exists in quantities that will render its mining very lucrative in St. Lawrence county, and from the discover- ies that are being made, it is probable that many new and valuable local- ities will hereafter be opened. In all cases, so far as observed, this metal exists in true veins, with definite walls, and the geological features of the country are such as experience in other mining districts has shown favorable to the probabilities of ore in profitable quantities.
An association styling itself the St. Lawrence Copper Company, was formed under the exertions of H. H. Bigelow, of Boston, in 1846, for the purpose of working mines of copper in northern New York, and mining operations on a small scale were commenced in several places, but more extensively on the farmn of Hubbard Clark, near the south line of Canton, where several thousand dollars were expended in the erection of machinery, and in sinking a shaft about sixty feet deep, with short levels. The ore occurs here in white lime stone, containing occasional crystals of brown tourmaline, and was the yellow sulphuret of copper. It formed a regular vein of one foot in width in some places, and was associated with calcite, iron pyrites and occasional stains of the green
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HISTORY OF ST. LAWRENCE
and blue carbonates of copper. The calcite of this place was at times found in crystals of huge proportions, coated with minute crystals of pearl spar. It is said that some eighty tons of ore had been procured, when the workings were suspended, and a small mass of native copper was reported to have been found near the locality. A reverberatory furnace was erected at Russell village, for working these ores, and others from Wilna, Jefferson county, but never got in operation. Mr. Bigelow subsequently went to California, was elected mayor of Sacramento, soon after wounded in endeavoring to suppress a riot, and afterwards died of cholera in San Francisco. Since the above period, no effort has been made to mine for copper, although in several places specimens of ore occur in such circumstances as to excite the belief that it exists in valu- able quantities.
Next after the agricultural and manufacturing facilities of northern New York, her iron mines may be ranked among the elements of her wealth. These ores are of three distinct varieties, differing essentially in geological age, chemical characters, mineral associates, and the quali- ties of iron which they produce. These are the primitive or magnetic, the specular and the bog ores. The former, although of great abundance, mostly occur in sections yet unsettled, and difficult of access, in Pitcairn, Clifton, Chaumont, Sherwood, &c., and in the towns of Duane, Dickin- son and Franklin in Franklin county. It is this variety of ore that is so largely wrought in Clinton and Essex counties, and that forms the wealth of Sweden. It is known to mineralogists as Magnetite, from its being magnetic, and is, so far as we have observed, interstratified with gneiss. Its mineral associates are few, being quartz, pyrites and pyroxene, from its being magnetic, it is readily separated from stone, by being crushed and passed under revolving magnets, which pick up the particles of ore. It is sparingly distributed through most of our gneiss rock, and the par- ticles loosened by disintegration, form the black sand, so uniformly seen on the borders of lakes in the primary region. This sand often troubles the compass of the surveyor, and has led to the belief of mines of iron ore, in localities where nothing but iron sand existed. Specular and bog ores have no effect upon the magnetic needle. Primitive ore is difficult to melt, but makes good iron, and yields about 70 per cent. It may be worked in a forge or blast furnace, the former being most in use in Essex county. Some varieties make an iron that is exceedingly hard, as was the case with that wrought in Duane, which led to the belief that edge tools having the hardness and temper of steel, could be cast directly from the furnace. This, about the year 1840, led to much inquiry, and a resolution was passed by the assembly in the session of 1841, calling upon Professor Eminons, the geologist of the second district, embracing the northern part of the state, for information respecting this ore. In the report which this called forth, it was stated that the ore was a mix- ture of the protoride and deutoxide of iron, two varieties, chemically dif- tering in the amount of ogygen contained, but mechanically mixed in this instance, and that a part of the ore being first reduced, united with the carbon of the fuel, and became true steel, while the other part was melting. Although the edge tools stood the test of experiment, the opinion was expressed that they would not bear continued use, and this has been fully sustained by experience, which has shown that they will soon crumble and break. In his final report, the geologist expressed his belief, that the ores of Duane did not possess properties differing from those of Essex county. The iron from those ores is very hard, and well suited for those uses that require this property.
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The specular ores, so called from the splendid lustre of the crystals of Elba and other localities, occurs under two varieties, distinct in situation, and accompanying minerals. The least important of these, is the crys- taline variety, occurring in gneiss and white limestone, often beautifully crystalized in plates, and of variable and uncertain quantities, liable to thin out and again become wide, as is shown in figure 1, opposite page 685, which represents a locality in Gouverneur, where a is soil, b sandstone, c limestone, and d iron ore. It has not hitherto been wrought with pro- fit. A mine in Edwards has yielded about eighty tons, which made ex- cellent malleable iron. Quartz, apparently in twelve sided crystals, formed by joining the bases of two six sided pyramids, but really having a short prism between, is usually found with this ore, and cavities lined with crystaline groups of these minerals, form splendid cabinet speci- mens.
Between the gneiss and sandsone, and not elsewhere, occurs a red compact ore, chemically like the last, but so unlike to the eye as not to be classed with it, and this has hitherto been the ore most largely used in St. Lawrence, Jefferson and Lewis counties, for the manufacture of iron. The oldest of these mines is the Caledonia mine in Rossie, and has been more or less wrought since 1812. A few rods distant on the line of Gouverneur, is the Kearney iron mine, which was discovered by Lyman Adams, in 1825, and has produced about 50,000 tons of ore of excellent quality. 'It has been manufactured at the Carthage, Louisburgh, Fuller- ville, Freemansburgh, Alpina, Redwood, Wegatchie, Sterlingville, Ant- werp and Rossie furnaces. It has been worked as an open pit to the depth of 50 feet, and an area of about a quarter of an acre. At first it appeared as a hillock not covered by other rock. The Caledonia mine is capped by sandstone, and has been wrought into caverns with huge masses of ore left to support the roof. In Fig. 2 opposite page 684, is shown the relative situation of the ore and rock, in which a, is ore; b, adit; c, a mineral supposed once to be serpentine, but now called a new species, dysyntribite, d, gneiss; e, sandstone. The relation of these two mines is shown in Fig. 1, opposite page 704, in which a, lis sandstone; c, Cale- donia mine; d, ore. An apparent underlaying of the ore with respect to gneiss, is noticed by Prof. Emmons, in Fowler, as is shown in Fig. 8, op- posite page 684, in which a, is sandstone; b, ore; c, gneiss. In Fig. 2, opposite page 704, is shown still another relation from the same author- ity, in which a, is serpentine ; b, ore. Several very valuable mines of this ore occur along the junction of the primary and sandstone in Jefferson county, and it has been wrought to some extent near the village of Little York, in Fowler, since 1833. A part of this mine was purchased by the owners of Louisburgh furnace, several years since, and the remainder has been wrought at a tribute of from 2 to 4 shillings per ton to the owners. The ore here occurs in a hill of moderate elevation, and lies directly upon the gneiss, which has been uncovered to a considerable extent, although large quantities still exist. These red ores impart their color to whatever comes in contact with them, giving a characteristic tinge to every person and object about the premises. They are never crystalized, but occur in every variety of lamellar, slaty, botryoidal and pulverulent forms, and in some cases, cavities are found lined with beautiful and pe- culiar crystalizations of carbonate of lime, spathic iron, heavy spar, ar- ragonite, quartz, iron pyrites, and more rarely cacoxene or chalcodite, and Millerite, the latter being the rarest and most beautiful of its asso- ciates. It occurs in but one of our localities in brilliant needle shaped crystals, radiating from a centre like the fibres of a thistle down, and
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