The Republican journal. [volume] (Belfast, Me.) 1829-current, 1900-02-01
The "Ice Age" Locally.
NOTES on government Publication of In
tense Interest and Value to Biologists.

d. Walcott, Director of the United States
Geological Survey, under whose super
visions the Typographical maps are issued
which have been written up in these col
umns, for mammoth and very valuabl e
volume of Geological matter, of which we
nope to be able to make good use in sub
sequent issues. 1t treats of the hills and
lakes of our own section very learnedly
and solves problems as to local surface
geology hitherto enshrouded in mystery,
especially to the unscientitic. Only an
expert In geological science can appreciate
the great value of the work, who e author,
the eminent Prof. Geo. II. Stone, has
devoted years of patient research to MS
herculean task This report is applied
exclusively to Maine and is in no sense
history of progress of glacial science.
1t seems we'll nigh Incredible that once
''Greenland's icy mountains were fact
for the State of Maine. We complain in
the latter days of severe winters, and the
oldest inhabitant has his legends of the
awful cold of the winters of long ago.
But the biologists tell us that Maine Is
now a warm climate compared to that
which delighted its Inhabitants OF ten
thousand Or more years ago, IT indeed
there were any such dwellers upon this
part of the earth. The legends of the
| oldest inhabitant are stories OF troplc
weather compared to the winters of which
the geologist treats. 1t seems to be demon.
| strated to scientific certainty that all
New England was once covered with an
immense e-sheet in the so called glacial
period of earths history. Just how
many years ago it is difficult to determine,
but few thousands OF so in the past.
| No one has the power to make so called
: ancient history seem relatively modern
affair as the modern geologist. The
| archaeologist whose "pokings' about in
ancient ruins and mounds, with pick and
| spade, reveal records of an age five to
ten thousand years before our time, is
completely distanced by his brother geol-
| Ogist in the race for far distant past.
Now this geological investigator tells us,
| by the wrinkles oh the brow of this old
earth, that this world is "a very ancient
affair. If we think conditions of climate
are severe now, in those good old times,
! the climate was the delightsome one of
/ Greenland. Indeed, it seems probable
that the aspect of the fair State of Maine
was the aspect of the ice-covered land OF
Greenland. Every valley was filled with
ice and packed snow. Every mountain
| top was covered. This geological inves-
tigator, as a bit Of relief to the monoto-
| nous and dreary Wilderness of the scene,
barely admits the possibility that Mounts
| Washington and Katahdin were not com
| pletely covered by this enormous ice
sheet! Above the dreary expanse of des-
olation these peaks, reduced to little hill
locks above the icy plain, were the only
spots of bare earth in all the great eXpanse
of the New England ice sheet. 1t is even
doubtful, the investigators tell us, if these
peaks We're not also covered with the
great ice cake.
But the work has interest for others
! than the expert in this science. The
poor fool of a wayfarer in the road of
knowledge can find much of interest and
profit to himself in the book. 1t is full
of matter of local interest 1.-The int Iii
gent citizen. In our region are interest
ing facts observed. We find that the valley
through which the Brdgton and Saco Val
ley railroad is built was prepared by a
glacial river of some kind or other. The
we'll known ''mill- brow'' on the right
bank of Stevens Brook is the deposit of
stream which ran underneath the ice sheet
and continued its way along the course
sand and gravel for the use of the genera
of years afterward. This glacial stream
is traced from its apparent origin in
Sweden to its junction with the great
sheet of water which formerly occupied
the region OF. Sebago Lake.
One Of the interesting and almost start
ling bits of information the ordinary
reader gets from this work is that so large
a portion of modern Maine was under the
sea. In these cold, old times, Bridgton
was almost on the sea coast. Prof. Stone
finds evidence that the shore line was
some 230 feet higher than at present. All
of the coast of Maine below go feet ele-
walton was under the waves of the ocean.
This submergence of the coast brought
the sea nearly to the shore of the present
Lake Sebago. Probably here the ice met
the sea. By the map of marine clays in
this book we see that the coast of Maine
was more irregular than at present. Deep
indentations, far reaching fiords, extended
inland along the course of the present
rivers. In some cases they reached 100
miles or more inland.
Much more Of interest locally might be
quoted. According to Prof. Stone this is
very interesting region of Maine to the
geologist. He says: "The number and
heights of the hills, which the gravels of
this region cross are remarkable No
where else in Maine is there anything
equal to them. In Brownfield, Porter
and Hiram, the glacial rivers flowed up
and over these hills 200 or more feet higher
than the valleys to the north of them,
and in Parsonfeld and Cornish they
crossed several more. In Limington,
near the Cornish line, gravel series goes
up and over a pass in a narrow valley
called The Notch at the western base of
Strout's Mountain. The top of the pass
is fully 300 feet above the northern base
of the hill and about 400 feet above the
gravel series at the Saco River, 2 or 3
miles north of the Notch
The book is a revelation to the ordinary
reader. 1t is difficult for the Imagination
to grasp clearly the situation of the State
covered with ice from the elevation of A.
500 feet at Katahdin TO 1900 feet at
Green Mountain at Mount Desert! The
sea breaking against an ice front far in
land from the present coast! Great gla-
ciers pushing and grinding their stubborn
way down the valleys and over the hills
and breaking at sea into ice berg and foe!
Glacial streams plunging into abysmal
crevasses or threading their way through
deep ice canyons or subterranean courses
through crystalline tunnels of ice, streams
that confined within walls of ice; pushed