St. Paul daily globe. [volume] (Saint Paul, Minn.) 1884-1896, 1888-02-18
Some of the Causes Assigned
by the Scientists
for It.
Great Commissions Swallowed
UP Myriads of Animal and
Vegetable Life.
Why the Waters Run North,
and Not in the Usual
Direction.
Special Letter to the Globe.


BROWNS VALLEY. Feb. 16-Before
the valley of the Red River of the North
was scarcely settled by any white fami-
lies, governmental expeditions, with
scientific corps. were sent there at diff
ferent times to form treaties with the
Indians, inspect geological formations
and report chances for future homes.
Among the interesting items which
they put Oh record is their unanimous
statement that the Red and Minnesota
rivers were originally
ONE CONTINUOUS STREAM,
flowing southwark into the Mississippi,
then spanning the continent almost
from the Arctic circle to the Gulf of
Mexico.
The evidences Of this are plain:
Traverse lake, the head of Red river,
Is but eight feet above the Big Stone.
Each resembles the other, and is about
thirty miles long and one mile and a
half wide, occupying two deep gulches
in the prairie. They are separated by
a neck of alluyial land four miles wide,
entitled the great divide" Whereof is
picturesQuely located the city of
Browns Valley. Curying with the
bluffs on its Dakota side, is the original
channel Of the ancient river, nearly lev
eled up, but plainly visible, threaded
down the valley. By amply dredging
the Red and Minnesota rivers, locking
where necessary, and digging out the
aforementioned channel, the Gulf of
MeXica and fIudson's bay
WOULD BE CONNECTED,
opening to commerce one of the most
important water thorOughfareS on the
glO G.
1t seems anomalous that river should
flow directly opposite the general
course of other great rivers in the same
continental basin. But observe the
structural cOnfiguration of the Red
river valley. Between the Rocky
mountains and the Mississippi river are
two grand elevations, or watersheds,
stretching nearly north and south, the
eastern one feeding the tributaries of the
the''Father of Waters, "and the western
those of the Missouri and between them
lies the Red river valley, having it's
tributary feeders in the same water
sheds on their eastern and western
slopes. Here, then, is a vast dip in the
continent which would naturally de-
cline southwark with the others, were
it not for transverse elevation extend
ing east and west of the divide" con-
shutting the watershed Of the Red and
Minnesota rivers. Was this great
swell heaved up by some internal
force of the earth:' Tie remark is fire.
quently made by thoughtful tourists Wis
iting our lakes, that the elliptical eXca-
walton i'll the prairie crossed by the ''di-
vide" being about twelve miles in cir
conference. aud $50 ct below the
prairie level, resembles the
CRATER OF AN ANCIENT VOLCANO.
- In boring an arteSian well in Browns
Valley few years ago the men pene-
trated 400 feet through a continuous
mass of blue clay before reaching arte-
sian fiOw-the waste of the GRANTEES
washed into the mOnstrOus hole. This
fact seems to favor the volcanic theory.
The writer of this lnclineS to the opinion
that the SO-called ''crater" was caused
by powerful currents of water from the
upper Minnesota, striking at right an
giles with the then sluggish ancint river
flowing south, and driving the line of
action eastward, producing a great
whirlpool that bored out the hole like
an augpr, which gradually filled up with
debris after the fury of the waters was
spent. The scientific surveyors MAIN
tain that the entire Red river valley was
once a
FRESH WATER LAKE,
which they named AgaSsiZ, in honor of
that eminent naturalist. There are pos
tive evidences of this, and that the
transverse watershed across east and
west at the ''divide '-being the highest
elevation in the Mississippi and Red
river valleys-was its southern shore,
and the two grand watersheds between
the Rocky mountains and the "Father
of Waters" that now supply the trib-
utarieS of the Red river, were its west
ern and eastern boundary, and thence
stretching northward near the Arctic
circle. If these high landmarks, visibly
traceable, were the encircling shore of
Lake AgaSSiZ, it (the ShOre) would nat
urally heighten in size during those
transitional centuries, building up at
length the present grand watersheds.
1t is a well-known fact that where
frigid winds sweep over such waters i'm
the hyperbOrean regions the anchor
ice, broken UP towards spring, lifts adj
hesive rock and gravel, which are
hurled outward to the rim, piling tier
upon tier, hills of debris, that after
wards, smashing to and fro, gravitate
into basin-like form toward the center.
The watersheds being thus con.
structed in some such way, the query
arises
WHAT DRAINED THE LAKE
and subsequently filled it up with al
luvium, leaving but river with its trib-
utaries to report the geological story of
ancient times? Surveyors believe that
during the drift period the icebergs-
whose melting down helped form the
lake-when loosened from their moor
ings, sailing southwark, ploughed
through the embankment at the 'sdi-
tA.AH crfx. fhn i
Big Stone reservoirs, and that drift
line OF these bergs piled their loads a
few miles farther west, building up the
great wall on the prairie known as the
COteauX, ranging nearly north and
south about Seventy-five miles and ten
to twenty miles wide, constituting the
western tributary sources of the Mime
sofa river.
When the ice-belts and bergs were
entirely melted down, it must have re-
quired centuries more for so vast body
of water to cut its way through its out
let OH its terrible march to the south,
flooding almost continent; and other
centuries still for Lake AgassiZ, holding
up with land. When partially drained
of its surplus waters the millions of
| fountains flowing into streams began
! their descent from the watersheds, hurl-
ing down their huge drifts of debris of
rock and gravel, the attritiOn of which
formed soil that gave birth to water
plants. These, decaying and rising,
were whirled together by surface winds,
| forming miniature islands threading out
and knitting in, and mixing with allu-
vium from all directions, until in time the
entire lake was overlapped with flora.
| This. too, sunk and rotted, in whose
humus were rooted still higher order
| of plants, to be in turn there buried /;
and, after centuries of such attritiOn,
where was once an open lake so vast i'm
| proportions, is now solid, deep soil.
.inI, ,.io On, tho