A century of science in America : $b with special reference to the American Journal of Science, 1818-1918
History
A century of science in America : $b with special reference to the American Journal of Science, 1818-1918
American journal of science; Science -- United States -- History
_Older Glacial Climates._—Hardly had the Pleistocene glacial climate
been proved, when geologists began to point out the possibility of even
earlier ones. An enthusiastic Scotch writer, Sir Andrew Ramsay, in 1855
described certain late Paleozoic conglomerates of middle England, which
he said were of glacial origin, but his evidence, though never
completely gainsaid, has not been generally accepted. In the following
year, an Englishman, Doctor W. T. Blanford, said that the Talchir
conglomerates of central and southern India were of glacial origin, and
since then the evidence for a Permian glacial climate has been steadily
accumulating. Africa is the land of tillites, and here in 1870
Sutherland pointed out that the conglomerates of the Karroo formation
were of glacial origin. Australia also has Permian glacial deposits, and
they are known widely in eastern Brazil, the Falkland Islands, the
vicinity of Boston, and elsewhere. So convincing is this testimony that
all geologists are now ready to accept the conclusion that a glacial
climate was as wide-spread in early Permian time as was that of the
Pleistocene.[3]
In South Africa, beneath the marine Lower Devonian, occurs the Table
Mountain series, 5000 feet thick. The series is essentially one of
quartzites, with zones of shales or slates and with striated pebbles up
to 15 inches long. The latter occur in pockets and seem to be of glacial
origin. There are here no typical tillites, and no striated undergrounds
have so far been found. While the evidence of the deposits appears to
favor the conclusion that the Table Mountain strata were laid down in
cold waters with floating ice derived from glaciers, it is as yet
impossible to assign these sediments a definite geologic age. They are
certainly not younger than the Lower Devonian, but it has not yet been
established to what period of the early Paleozoic they belong.
In southeastern Australia occur tillites of wide distribution that lie
conformably beneath, but sharply separated from the fossiliferous marine
Lower Cambrian strata. David (1907), Howchin (1908), and other
Australian geologists think they are of Cambrian time, but to the writer
they seem more probably late Proterozoic in age. In arctic Norway Reusch
discovered unmistakable tillites in 1891, and this occurrence was
confirmed by Strahan in 1897. It is not yet certainly known what their
age is, but it appears to be late Proterozoic rather than early
Paleozoic. Other undated Proterozoic tillites occur in China (Willis and
Blackwelder 1907), Africa (Schwarz 1906), India (Vredenburg 1907),
Canada (Coleman 1908), and possibly in Scotland.
The oldest known tillites are described by Coleman in 1907, and occur at
the base of the Lower Huronian or in early Proterozoic time. They extend
across northern Ontario for 1000 miles, and from the north shore of Lake
Huron northward for 750 miles.
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