Amadeus Grabau's Paleontology of Niagara Falls Book

 

On September 12, 2022 I posted about acquiring Amadeus Grabau's (1870-1946) book Geology and Palaeontology of Eighteen Mile Creek and the Lake Shore Sections of Erie County, New York from 1899. While looking at my bookshelf for a book to read, I came across another book I had acquired in 2023. It is the 1901 Amadeus Grabau's Guide to the Geology and Paleontology of Niagara Falls and Vicinity. Normally I would not get a book about fossils from New York or a place I have not collected from before but I have a special interest in this author.

I bought the book for a number of reasons: it is signed by Dr. Grabau, it includes a chapter from Elizabeth J. Letson (1874-1919) [who I profiled in a blog posting June 1, 2021], it contains a number images by paleontologist Elvira Wood (1865-1928), and it has fossil images I can scan and post (particularly Silurian Period fossils). The book is an ex-Cap May City Public Library (New Jersey) copy and was bought from Princeton Antiques Bookfinders (Atlantic City).

It is inscribed: "To my good Friend Rev. August Steinle with the warm regards of the author Amadeus W Grabau May 8, 1906". Below is a scan of what he wrote, note the insect holes where they have eaten part of the page. I am not sure I have the spelling of the reverend's last name correct.

Chapter 5 in the book is written by Ms. Letson (title listed as Director of museum, Buffalo society of natural sciences) and it is entitled "Post-Pliocene Fossils of Niagara". On page 241, she included the figure and description for Amnicola letsoni (Walker, 1901) which is a gastropod species named after her. At the beginning of the chapter she lists a footnote "I wish to acknowledge here my obligations to Prof. Henry A. Pilsbry, Mr Bryant Walker and Dr. V. Sterki, for valuable assistance and advice given in the preparation of this chapter."

Index Fossils of North America

At the beginning of the year, I read the first posting of 2012 on the well-crafted and thought provoking blog, Fossils and Other Living Things about the book Index Fossils of North America. This book is one of my favorite references in my small collection of paper paleontology books. My copy is a 5th printing from 1955 and what makes it so special is the personal touches added by the last owner. Inside the cover, written in black ink is the inscription "W.D. Struby 1955".

The owner carefully marked the book in colored pencils using a system: phylum names underlined in blue-green, class in red, order in purple, subphylum in light green, subclass in red dashed lines, and all others in darker blue. So that tells us the person was organized and methodical. What intrigues me is the type of fossils Mr. Struby was highlighting in the plates.  As he took an interest in a genus or species, he would draw a green border around those figures and write the genus name (see picture later in posting).

As I began to use the book for help with identifications, it became apparent that we both looked at the same types of fossils.  Did he live in my area to be looking at similar brachiopods, trilobites, and crinoids? Of course, not all the fossils appear to be from the Kentucky, Indiana, Ohio, and Tennessee area.

Illustrations he marked covered a wide variety of fossils as the Triticites fusulinidae, sponges Astrospongia and Recepticulites, Conularia, coral Hexagonaria, blastoid Pentremites, brachiopods Hebertella, Platystrophia, Pentameroides, Dictyonella, to name a few, Cyclonema gastropod, and trilobites Cryptolithus and Dalmanites. Many more fossils are highlighted and not all are ones I collected or even heard of but in general our fossil interest overlapped.

As with the fossils I find, there are many unanswered questions about previous owner who over 56 years penned his name to this book. Similar to the fossils I encounter, there are many questions that arise that will never find answers as the past has scattered that information like dust in the wind.

UPDATE: (9/1/2019) This book appears to have belonged to William Deming Struby (1921-1983).  A geologist who had an Oklahoma oil company, Boradi Petroleum Corporation. Further research needed.
https://www.linkedin.com/in/william-struby-38292618
https://www.findagrave.com/memorial/164855223/william-deming-struby

Uranium Book Review

Just finished reading Uranium: War, Energy, and the Rock that Shaped the World by Tom Zoellner (Viking,2009). The book illuminates various places across the Earth touched by national quests to harness the power of uranium. The second heaviest of the naturally occurring elements, uranium influenced governments behavior though last three-quarters of the 20th century. The book covers the element's discovery in Germany in 1789 leading to uncovering its radioactivity by Henri Becquerel in 1896 and all the way to nuclear proliferation issues of today.

The author covers a broad range of facets of uranium and its applications.  Coverage tends to be light on science and statistics though. A lot of stories relate to people involved in the creation of the first American atomic bombs and the competition between the United States and the Soviet Union to collect uranium and produce nuclear weapons. Portions of the book reveal aspects of the jobs involved, technologies, huge costs in human health/money and the environmental cleanups in mining and processing. It also covers nuclear weapon development in Israel, Iran, and Pakistan. The dilemmas Australia faced with uranium mining both culturally and environmentally as they possess 40% of the world's reserves.

My interest involved researching type mining localities from the 1800s for a possible future museum exhibit. The stories I found the most interesting was the history of uranium/radium discovery and early mining at St. Joachimsthal (Czechoslovakia). The exploration and mining conditions in Shinkolobwe (Congo), Utah (USA), St. Joachimsthal (Czech Republic), and Wismut mines (Germany) was educational.

One point in the book that has me somewhat confused is uranium's type location. The book highlights that Martin Klaproth, a Berlin pharmacist/chemist, discovered uranium in 1789 from material from St. Joachimsthal. Though Wikipedia lists a mine called Georg Wagsforth in Johanngeorgenstadt provided the material. I have also read Klaproth used materials from both localities to make his discovery.

Tales of uranium prospector Charlie Steen in his rags to riches to dementia were fascinating. One of the best stories was that of him accepting the outstanding-alumnus award from the Texas College of Mines in El Paso. The school had been renamed to Texas Western College as it expanding the circulum to vocational training and liberal arts. During his "acceptance" speech he railed against classes like Coaching Basketball, Real Estate Brokerage and Baton Twirling. He went further to state he would not accept the award unless it listed the school by its old name reflecting its mining history.

So how does this book relates to paleontology? On page 148, while talking about the 1950s Uranium Rush (akin to American Gold Rushes of 1800s), there is mention of uranium soaked fossil trees being found. Prospectors look for ancient stream beds that could contain fossilized trees. "These could usually be found in the Shinarump layer of sandstone, which was like a wedge of crunchy pink mortar between the Chinle and the Moenkopi formations."

The author includes the quote of a driller named Oren Zuflet who claims to have found an uranium dinosaur. Reviewing the source notes for the chapter found on page 307, his quote was from oral history archive at California State University, Fullerton which was created by Professor Gary Shumway. To back up that story, this YouTube video shows a dinosaur vertebrae fossil that reads up to 200 CPM.  [NOTE: I can see this video using Firefox browser but just see a window with an icon using Internet Explorer and Chrome browsers so here is the direct YouTube link: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uXIn481XJFM&feature=player_embedded]




The book was sold with  two different covers. The one shown above is a picture of the one I read. Just a thought, what if the cover pictured uranium bearing green torbernite instead or an eye-catching fluorescent autunite. Maybe the designer wanted to show how plain such a powerful element can appear in its natural form. The other cover, which can be seen on Amazon.com, is probably more relevant to the content of the book dealing with nuclear weapons and the people involved in uranium mining/acquisition.

If you read the book, it might help to watch this next video showing some of the east German mining sites. The book covers the Czechoslovakia and German sites quite a bit because of the long history of the regions mines. They may have provided 80% of the uranium supply to former Soviet Union. The YouTube video shows Hartenstein (shaft 371) and Bergen in eastern Germany as part of an modern day uranium exploration adventure.  [NOTE: I can see this video using Firefox browser but just see a window with an icon using Internet Explorer and Chrome browsers so here is the direct YouTube link: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pci02sEHGho&feature=player_embedded]



All and all the book is a good read and one can learn all kinds of interesting stories about this element. The author seemed more interested in the weapon aspects of uranium than exploring expanded power uses. The end notes for the books can be found here. Learn more at Tom Zoellner's web site.

Paleontology and Dinosaur Hunting Radio Show

Louisville, Kentucky's news and talk public radio station WFPL (89.3 FM) local affairs program State of Affairs with host Julie Kredens will explore the topic of dinosaur fossil hunting on Thursday, January 6, 2011.

The radio show airs between 1-2 PM EST.  Thursday's show is entitled "Paleontology & Dinosaur Hunting" with guests Homer Hickam author of the novel The Dinosaur Hunter and Rocket Boys (book that inspired the movie October Sky) and paleontologist Jack Horner co-author of How to Build a Dinosaur: Extinction Doesn't Have to Be Forever and technical advisor on some of the Jurassic Park films.  Mr. Horner was recently interviewed for the CBS news show 60 Minutes, visit this web link.

If you are interested in dinosaurs, consider attending the free lecture on February 10, 2011 at 7:30 PM on the campus of the University of Kentucky in Lexington at the Singletary Center for the Arts building.  Jack Horner will be talking about his book on re-creating dinosaurs.  Learn more at this web link or view the PDF poster here.

UPDATE (7/8/2018): State of Affairs is no longer a program on WFPL. It ended its 14 year run in 2011. A recording of the show can be found on the WFPL News Archive Site at a link entitled Adventures in Paleontology by Laura Ellis.

Visit the WFPL web page for State of Affairs for a link to listen live if outside the Louisville, Kentucky broadcast area or the podcast once the show has aired.  E-mail questions to soa@wfpl.org or call in questions during the show at (502) 814-8255 or 877-814-8255.

The two life like dinosaur pictures were taken in 2010 at the Louisville Zoo's Dinosaurs Alive! exhibit and the dinosaur fossil casts picture was taken at the Museum of Natural History in Paris, France in 2009.

The Disappearing Spoon... A review sort of

Everyone that has taken a chemistry class has some exposure to the periodic table.  Probably every science classroom has it hanging on the wall.  The book The Disappearing Spoon by Sam Kean tells stories of how elements on the periodic table were discovered and people that helped provide the information in those elemental squares.

The title of the book refers a practical joke that chemists sometimes play.  While serving hot tea to guests, the spoons used for stirring would be composed of gallium.  Gallium is a solid while at room temperature that looks like aluminum.  Once the material heats to over 80 degrees Fahrenheit it turns to a liquid.  Watch this great video showing this trick.



Even though this book pertains more to chemistry, science history, and physics there is a tie in to paleontology.  In the section of the book talking about pathological sciences.  The author describes these sciences as "a marginal and unlikely phenomenon" which scientific principles and practices are used to prove its existence (e.g. spiritualism in the 1800s, cold fusion)

On pages 260-263 the author writes of the branch of paleontology that tries to reconstruct extinct creatures.  The chemical relationship is the ship HMS Challenger in 1873 doing marine research recovered conical and spherical manganese pieces from the deep sea floor.  When some of these nodules were cracked open, they revealed megalodon shark teeth.  The pathological part of the science emerges when people started to study the manganese plaque on the teeth.  The build up should show 1.5 million years of accumulation but some teeth only had 11,000 years worth.  Ideas circulated that like the coelacanth, the megalodons escaped extinction.  It appears though the teeth with thin manganese layers were probably covered for long periods of time and then exposed recently.

One of stories I found eye opening was that of aluminum refinement (international spelling: aluminium).  The metal in pure form was once as valuable as gold.  As the book informs, the United States in 1884 as a show of its rising world power, capped the Washington Monument with a 6 pound pyramid of aluminum.  Today along American roads, one can find discarded aluminum beer and soft drink cans.  Amazing that once such a valuable metal is now trash on the side of the road!  What changed, scientists figured out that electricity would separate the element into its pure form. With aluminum the most abundant metal on the earth's surface... the price became very cheap. It makes one wonder if space agencies would concentrate on asteroid mining, our planet would be awash in cheaper rare and common metals.


Another fact learned in the book was the contribution to the periodic table the locality of Ytterby, Sweden has made.  The mines there accounted for the discovery of seven new elements (ytterbium, yttrium, terbium, erbium, holmium, thulium, gadolinium).  Also from reading the book is the migration of chemical research from France and Germany to the United States which now might be migrating to Asian countries.

Dmitry Ivanovich Mendeleev circa 1885

"father of modern periodic table"

 The State Tretyakov Gallery, Moscow

Public Domain on Wikipedia 

There are sad stories as well about the toll research took on some of the scientists. Marie Curie and her daughter Irene Joliot-Curie dying of leukemia from their work with radioactivity.  Enrico Fermi suffered from exposure to beryllium.  How harmful some elements can be to the population and environment.   The author's revelations about the harmful effects of cadmium at the Japanese Kamioka mines.  Also how this incident tied to the Godzilla movies later produced in the country.  Another tale of doom on how nitrogen gas can kill as NASA found out with the shuttle program.

Another fascinating story is that of the remains of an ancient natural fission reactor found in Oklo, Africa.  Too many insightful and interesting tales to cover in this 391 page book to review here.  Go to Sam Kean's web site to learn more about it and how you can obtain a copy to read!

I enjoyed reading the book.  The Louisville Public Library has a number of copies, even so I was put on a waiting list back in August 2010 which put 27 people in front of me to read it.  Finally a copy became available right before Christmas.  So I read it pretty quickly so it could get back in circulation because there were 28 people still waiting to read the book.

One recommendation is going to Theodore Gray's Periodic Table website while reading The Disappearing Spoon.  Mr. Gray's pictures of all the elements and their practical uses makes great reading and helped me visualize the material with the element names as they were mentioned in the book.

 Periodic Table

Source: Wikipedia

Public Domain Image

Mills Geological of Creston, California

Mostly I like to buy used reference books about paleontology published after 1927 that relate to fossils I am studying.  So when I saw a list of used library books for sale on the Paleolist, a number of books on the list peaked my interest.  The seller was Jim Mills of Mills Geological of Creston, California.  One should be cautious about ordering items on the Internet but after some research showing other transactions had taken place with this company and the organization had been in existence since 1992, I felt comfortable.  The two books ordered were: a collection of bound Tennessee Geological Bulletins from the 1930s (my interest was Bulletin 41 - A Preliminary Report on the Foraminifera of Tennessee by Joseph A. Cushman) and the other book Texas Cretaceous Echinoids by Rosemary E. and Thomas J. Akers of Houston Gem and Minerals Society 1987.

Both books arrived very securely packed via the United States Postal Service (USPS) and in good shape.  The speed that the USPS moves letters and packages at the prices charged is impressive.  After this transaction, I found Mills Geological a good place to deal with.  They have a website that seems focused on polished petrified wood but also "The Bookshelf" section with more used books one can buy: www.MillsGeological.homestead.com

After briefly looking at the bulletin on Tennessee Foraminera, the study was based on two counties in the southwestern part of the state near the Mississippi border in 1929.  The researchers were looking for formaninifera of the Eocene and Cretaceous Periods.  They did not find very many fossils in the Eocene but were surprised by the number found in the Cretaceous and how similar they were to ones found in Texas and Europe.  The fossils were found in the Selma Chalk similar to the Texas Navarro formation (European equivalent: Maestricetian).

Mention of Texas fossils, leads to the other publication on Texas Cretaceous Echinoids.  It is a 143 page guide.  It starts out with an introduction to the fossils and Texas map showing the area where they are found.  A stratigraphic unit chart is provided which by the way shows the Upper Cretaceous Navarro Group in the Gulf Series.  The book has additional sections on echinoid distribution, fossil preservation, classification, morphology, illustrations, identification guide, descriptions and drawings of Texas enchinoids, localities, references, and indexes.

Both are nice additions to my library.

Stories in Stone: Travels Through Urban Geology

Author David B. Williams carves and shapes words into a thought provoking book on stone and its role in history, science and art. The book, Stories in Stone: Travels Through Urban Geology was published in 2009. It contains a wide variety of stories that revolve around the theme of building materials and our human history.

Paradoxides Trilobite 

Photo by © Sam Gon III

From Wikipedia.org 

My perspective reading it was more from a paleontological view and I was not disappointed by Mr. Williams discussions of fossils and their ties to building materials.  The first chapter on brownstone relates to a story of finding dinosaur tracks which in 1800s America were interpreted as ancient bird prints.  When writing of the Boston granite, a discussion of the Paradoxides harlani trilobite appears and tying together the North American continent with Africa.

His discussion of fossils continues in a chapter on coquina clam (Donax variabilis) of Florida and its role in helping maintain a Spanish presence in North America.  Another chapter discusses the petrified wood in Colorado and its unique use in building a gas station.  The chapter entitled America's Building Stone - Indiana Limestone highlighted a stone whose fossils I most familiar.  The Salem/Bedford/Indiana Limestone contains the remains of many, many fossils.  The author gives a great description of Mississippian Period sea environment.  Here is an excerpt from page 117:

The microscope would have revealed a world population of protozoans inhabiting one-twentieth-of-an-inch-wide-shells, each made of a half dozen chambers coiled like a poorly made cinnamon roll.

Known as foraminiferas, they lived for a few months, died in the lagoon, and settled amid the billions of shells of their cohorts. Forams are an abundant fossil in some parts of the Salem, but because of their wee size they are rarely visible in the stone. When you see a Salem wall you are looking at a cemetery of epic proportions.

Endothyra baileyi Foraminifera

Salem Limestone

Washington County, Indiana 
 

Of course the author is referring to the Endothyra (aka Globoendothyra) baileyi foraminifera which can be found at Spergen Hill, Washington County, Indiana.  The chapter also reveals that Spergen limestone is found in eastern Colorado but that same layer is known as Salem in Kansas and Illinois.  So I guess that might be why that hill was given that name.

Progressive Carvings of a Block of Indiana Limestone

Indiana State Museum

Indianapolis, Indiana

David Williams mixes poetry into his text and its relation to stone whether citing a Oliver Windell Holmes poem or a chapter describing the poet Robinson Jeffers ties to Carmel granite.  Mr. Jeffers built a house and tower in Carmel, California from the granite he harvested there.  The process produced works of poetry and some impressive hand-built structures.

Tribute to Indiana Limestone Quarries

Indiana State Museum

Indianapolis, Indiana

Quarries play a big role in the book and there are many descriptions of them.  The fascinating story of the building of the Bunker Hill Monument from Quincy, Massachusetts granite is unveiled.  The author ties in the use of the "plug and feather method" of stone cutting and early railroad building to move slabs to launch the Boston granite quarries.

The chapter about Michelangelo's marble and all the problems Standard Oil had after using it for their Chicago office building was a lesson in using the right materials.  It was informative about where in Italy Carrara marble is quarried and how much of it is used today.

At the end of the book there is a glossary of geological terms, research notes/sources sectioned by chapter, and an index.  Inside the back of the jacket lists the book Web site www.storiesinstone.info plus color photos and back stories on the author blog at stories-in-stone.blogspot.com.

Once finished reading, one will have a new perspective on the stone structures seen in everyday life. It inspired me to seek out buildings around Louisville, Kentucky whether it be the modern Humana building with its polished pink granite or Bedford Limestone trim on TARC's Union Station or the Gene Synder U.S. Courthouse.

Highly recommended and available at amazon.com or the check worldcat.org for copy in a library near you.

Kentucky Trilobite Book

Tracking Trilobites: Adventures in Paleontology by Judy Lundquist is a great primer on learning about ancient creatures known as trilobites. A trilobite is an extinct animal that belonged to the phylum of arthropods. According to the book, trilobites share traits with today's spiders, scorpions, and horseshoe crabs.

The book is easy to read and rates itself at the beginning of the book on a 3 point technical scale (general, intermediate, technical) as general level book. There are lots of pictures, drawings, and maps for the reader to study. This book is from a point of view from a person in Kentucky since it was published by the Kentucky Geological Survey. A number of experts from Kentucky and around the world are cited throughout the text. A section of the book covers trilobites found in Kentucky from five geological time periods: Ordovician, Silurian, Devonian, Mississippian, and Pennsylvanian. Once the book is read, a person can learn more by consulting the references and web site addresses at the end of the book. Though, a number of the web site addresses do not work anymore.

The state of Kentucky has a wide variety of trilobites to study. Whether it be the large Isotelus trilobite from the Ordovician Period, the spiked tail of the Dalmanites existing in the Silurian Period, the large eyed multiple lenses of the Phacops living in the Devonian Period, or the blind, deep ocean Ordovician Period Cryptolithus trilobite. Their diversity and detail rich fossil remains make for great study.

All in all this is a good book to learn about Kentucky trilobite fossils.

Find out how to obtain Judy Lundquist's book at this website.

Paleontology Books

My excursions around the Louisville Kentucky area and across the Ohio River into southern Indiana has brought many fossils for me to study. Unfortunately, I had few references for helping to identify what I was finding. My project to expand the KYANA Geological Society website to show fossils from some of the larger personal Louisville area fossils collections ran into some issues last December. So I proceeded in a new direction with this blog trying to show things I or people I know have been finding and then try to identify it.

My only reference besides the Internet was a book called Fossils of Ohio, Bulletin 70 from State of Ohio, Department of Natural Resources, Division of Geological Survey. While covering the state of Ohio, their geology is similar to that of Indiana and Kentucky so the information applicable. It does have its limits since it has to cover so much information for such a large state. I bought this book from the Falls of the Ohio State Park gift shop (when they still had one) years ago.




I just acquired this week and last, two more books that should help me with creating better entries on the fossils I try to identify.

The next book is Index Fossils of North America by Hervey W. Shimer and Robert R. Shrock from MIT Press. This book is nice though dated (1944). It has a lot of images to study and compare to specimens.
The last book is one I became familiar with in the Indiana University Southeast library while I was a student there. It is Memoir 93 Silurian and Devonian Corals of the Falls of the Ohio by Erwin C. Stumm, The Geological Society of America. Most of the fossils I find in Jefferson County near the Ohio River and over in southern Indiana tend to be corals. This book is a great asset to help with the study of those corals. The book I recently purchased was in excellent condition as if it was never used since it was published in 1964.



Other resources are Dry Dredgers website for Ordovician fossils, Kentucky Paleontological Society (KPS) website for Kentucky fossils and older books whose copyrights have expired. Another good reference to consult is the JSTOR database at the library for journal papers. It is a great research tool for showing how papers reference other research and how they are in turn referenced by later works.