The sun., 1908-01-26
IN THE LIMESTONE DRY LOTS
REGION WHERE GEN. SPINNER
HUNTED TRILOBITES.


meeting OF HnreS WhtfFAneus-DObs
tOmless Ponds and Deep CANerns.
There is an interesting patch of country
up among the hills OF central New York
Of which the most curious features have
never been known outside OF a circle OF
twenty miles in diameter.
Fifty years ago "a stranger, middle aged
man. was seen now and then picking at the
stone fences OF the farms on the hillsides
with a small cold chisel and hammer. To
the few who knew him by sight he was
Francis T.. Spinner. then Of the village OF
Mohawk. ". Y. His signature became
pretty we'll known to the people of this
country in civil war times and for some
time afterward. for il was on all the green
backs and shinplasters issued by the Gov
ernment.
He was the Unit ed States Treasurer and
was known as Papa Spinner, title aifec-
tionately bestowed upon him by girls in
the Treasury Department for his fatherly
gentleness in dealing with them. IL was
said of his remarkable signature--which
he wrote r. h. Spinner that it was written
not from left to right nor from right to left.
but perpendicularly from it's beginning.
Gen. Spinner was a geologist by avooation,
and he found the region in which he used
thus to be seen very fruitful Of trilobites
and other fossils abounding in regions of
the limestone formation.
Standing but a few miles from this par
tiCular patch Of country Horatio Seymour,
the Sage OF Deerfield and once Governor
Of the Empire State, made an address in
which he spoke of the region as being
the most interesting suunmit east Of the
Mississippi River. Almost within sound Of
a cannon shot from where he stood there
we're brooks. he said. whose waters found
their way to the harbOT OF New York. to
Chesapeake Bay, to the Gulf Of Mexico and
to the Gulf of st. Lawrence.
The region especially referred to here is
a limestone ridge lying between two small
streams that find their way northward
into the Mohawk River, thence into the
Hudson and into New York harbor.
About midway between these little
streams is a small natural pond about one
third of a mile in diameter and nearly
round. Its water is as clear as crystal,
for it is fed by springs.
IL is very deep. and il used TO he said
that no one had ever found bottom in its
deepest Part with the appliances at hand
for sounding. which we're cloehes lines and
bed cords knotted together and weighted
with an anvil For years it was called
smiths Poad; afterward its name was
changed to Cedar Lake, and as such it is
now indicated by dot on the larger maps
of New York State.
Out of this little lake small brook flows
swiftly over the pebbles in a nOrthery
direction. as if to reach the Mohawk River
twelve miles away, at some point between
the two northwar1 flowing brooks pre-
vioIsly mentioned Within half a mile
it's course is detected in almost the oppo-
site direction by higher ground. and this
rivulet, starting between two others that
make their way into New York harbor
! flows southwark. II becomes the middle
branch of the Unadilla River flows into the
Susquehanna River. empties into Chesa.
peake Bay and joins the Atlantic Ocean al
the Virginia Capes.
The peculiarly interesting features Of
this narrow summit are mostly under.
ground The higher grounds on each side
/ of the small southwark flowing stream
are known as the east dry lots and the west
dry lots
They are limestone ridges covered with
fertile soil laid out in farms of cultivated
fields and woodlands. beneath which are
many caverns of unknown extent. None
of them is large enough to he considered
among the great natural caverns, but THEN
number gives the underground part of the
region a weird interest.
/ There was and may be still in this region
a tamarack swamp in the centre of which
was a lake of perhaps fifteen or twenty
| acres covered by sod. In dry weather a