The Saint Paul globe. (St. Paul, Minn.) 1896-1905, 1900-06-27
WIS COOLER YEARS AGO
SO WARREN UPHAM TELLS THE
BIOLOGISTS ABOUT MINNIE
sofa WEATHER
WHEN THE GLACIER WAS HERE
Operations of the Ice Sheet on Min
nesOta Geology Are of In
terest During the Hot
Spell.

1t was cooler 1000 years ago than it was
yesterday. People of ST. Paul were chief
~ occupied yesterday vainly endeavoring
TO keep cool, and 1t is, perhaps, some
source of consolation to know that it
was not ever thus. At least Secretary
Warren Upham, of the State Historical
society, is authority for the statement,
and in a paper read yesterday before the
Geological Society of America, at it's an
nual meeting in Philadelphia, Secretary
Upham tells Interestingly of some of the
remarkable geological formations of the
Northwest, left after the ice period.
Just 1000 years ago the great sheet Of
Ice which extended over the northern part
of America disappeared, and left many
peculiar formations to tell of it's exist
enCe. The ice sheet was at least a mile
thick, and covered an area embracing
the entire northwestern part of North
America, and the northern part of the
United States, including Minnesota and
other Northwestern states.
The subject of Mr.. Upham's paper read
before the national society of biologists
is Giants Kettles Eroded by Moulin Tor
rents,'' freely translated, tells of the ket-
ties or wells visible in the interstate park
at Taylor's Falls, in one part of Pennsyl-
Vania, and at Lucerne, Switzerland. But
Mr.. Upham says that the giants kettles
located in Minnesota are, for their size
and formation, the most wonderful in the
world. More commonly these kettles are
called pot holes, and are about 100 in num-
Der at the interstate park, varying from
SIX to twenty-five feet wide, and from
one foot to seventy-tive feet deep. The
process of formation IS explained by Mr..
Upham and thus accepted by biologists
to have started with the melting of the
great ice sheet which covered North
America AS the ice melted, the water
trickled downwards hundreds of feet,
gradually wearing a small channel, which
eventually became a small river. The cur
rent washed stones and ore downward,
and wore holes in the ground. These are
the pot holes that are of such curious III
terest to those who visit the interstate
park.
Secretary Upham, previous to his cleo
ton as secretary of the historical society,
was engaged in both the state and gov
eminent geological survey, and contrib
uted very largely to the geological sur
vey of Minnesota, and his statement that
the weather 1000 years ago was little
more endurable than yesterdays carries
additional weight. However, he states
that the ice period started, as near as
can be cOrrecly computed, $4,000 years
prior to the time that the great ice sheet
left the earth. In other words, the glacier
which covered North America started to
grow 100000 years ago, and any people
who were around during that period at
no time suffered with the heat. 1t is OBJ
vious, therefore, if the people who lived
during that SO 900 years lived in frigid
zone all that time, st. Paulites should at
least be willing to stand a few days OF
hot weather, when it is considered that
their very remote ancestors only had one
kind of weather call the tiIae." Mr. Up
ham does not doubt that the earth was
inhabited during all that time. he does
not desire, he says, to become engaged
in a theological argument as to the age
of the earth and the number of years
that man has inhabited it, according 10
the computations of the Bible He be-
lieves that the earth was inha bitable many
many thousands of years ago, and states
that we have unmiStakable evidences to
prove this assertion South of the ice
ice sheet, the Southern states were entire
Iy inhabitable, and as the ice fields of
Greenland are inhabited, not by a race of
very advanced civilization. but real, live
people, and he believes of necessity that
North America was good place for imml-
grants even in the ice age. At any rate,
biologists have only what evidences they
can collect, and as the oldest inhabitant
does not remember the ice sheet, people
are hoping that an iceberg or cold wave
will come down from Hudson's bay.