The History of Cayuga County 1789-1879 page 253
Chapter XXXI / Town of Sterling / Geological Formation

The underlying rocks are the Medina sandstone, which covers the northern half of the town, and the Oneida conglomerate and the series of the Clinton group, in the south part. An interesting locality showing the super-position of these rocks is at Bentley's quarry, on the road from Martville to Hannibalville, where the red sandstone and the Clinton group are within a few feet of each other, having a gray sandstone intervening, intermixed with the green shale of that group. The junction between the red and gray sandstone is concealed by drift, &c. The two former have been quarried for building stone.*

The red sandstone is well exposed in the bottom of the creek at Sterling Center, and in its sides, extending along the creek a mile south, the mass exposed being twenty-five feet thick. It appears again in the road near the place formerly owned by Robert Hume, about two and one-half miles from Sterling Center, and four from Martville; also at the quarry between Martville and Hannibalville, where it is of two kinds, the hard and variegated, which shows the diagonal structure, and the more coarse and friable, of a darker color. The red sandstone is geologically the lowest rock of New York which contains brine springs of sufficient purity and quantity to be manufactured into salt. From this fact and its red color it was for a long time confounded with the red shale of the Onondaga salt group. At Sterling Center a brine spring rises by the side of the creek, through a fissure in the sandstone; another exists a mile further south, and a third near Little Sodus Bay. The salt from all these springs was said to have had a sharper taste than common salt, owing probably to a more soluble muriate with an earthy base.

Conglomerate appears at Bentley's quarry and at the farm formerly owned by Robert Hume, both previously referred to. In the former locality it is a light greenish-gray, fine-grained sandstone, in places mottled with green shale, and in a few places with reddish purple spots of ferruginous shale. It was quarried for the mill at Martville, the thickness excavated being four or five feet. The latter locality was opened for Wolcott furnace.

The Chicago group, so well characterized by its iron ore beds and its marine plants, rests upon the conglomerate. At Bentley's quarry it appears on the top of the sandstone, which corresponds with the Oneida conglomerate, showing a series of their grayish-green sandstone and shale, the former containing numerous fucoids and other forms, with the Clinton lingula, besides some other fossils, the mass exposed being about ten feet thick. It appears again on the creek, extending from the village of Martville to the mill about a half mile below. At the village are seen alternations of shale and calcareous shale, the latter somewhat solid. The whole is fossiliferous, the Clinton retepora being abundant. Here was found a specimen of the Niagara delthyris, and, in the green shale of the higher part of the group, a nearly complete specimen of the Calymene Clintonii. At the mill, in the bed of the creek, rising for about eight feet in the bank, is a yellow-green shale. It contains some fossils among which is the Broad agnotis, and an Avicula yet unnamed; above which are thin layers of limestone composed entirely of Shining Orthis, (Orthis nitens.) This mass is covered with about fifteen feet of alluvion, at the bottom of which were fragments of light-colored hard limestone with ore adhering to it, showing that a deposit exists in the vicinity.

Lenticular clay iron ore, also called argillaceous exists on the land of Peter Van Petten, a little south of Hume's quarry, and a little west of Sterling Station, from which latter place considerable quantities of ore have been taken.

This ore consists of lenticular or flattened grains of various sizes, which apparently have been made to cohere by the pressure applied to the mass. It frequently contains joints or disks of the encrinite, and fragments of other organic remains. Its usual color is brownish-red, its powder being more red. It is very friable, soils the fingers, has but little lustre, and is often studded with minute grains of iron pyrites. All the samples examined effervesce freely in acids, which is probably due to the admixture of carbonate of lime. By some its formation is ascribed to the decomposition of carbonate of iron; and by others to that of iron pyrites. The infiltration of water, acting in a slow and imperceptible manner, is supposed to be the cause which has produced this decomposed form of the ore. It yields

*The Medina sandstone is much used for under-pinnings of houses and farm buildings. It has been observed that hogs are very fond of licking it whenever they have access to it, that it causes them to foam at the mouth, and renders it difficult to fatten them.

Franklin B. Hough, A. M., M. D., Gazetteer of the State of New York, 1872.

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