USGS Science⌕ Search

Geology topics

Nelson Horatio Darton

Publications and source records attributed to Nelson Horatio Darton.

At least 19 recordsLinked to original sources
USGS1933

Guidebook of the western United States: Part F - The Southern Pacific lines, New Orleans to Los Angeles

The Southern Pacific Railroad from New Orleans to Los Angeles, a distance of about 2,000 miles, passes through a region exhibiting a great variety of geographic and industrial conditions. The climate, especially the amount of precipitation, is the most influential factor in causing this variety. The low Coastal Plain of southern Louisiana and eastern Texas, with ample rainfall and thick rich soils, is a province distinct in configuration, human occupations, and products. There are extensive swamps, prairies, and wooded areas, but a large part of the land is under cultivation, with sugarcane, cotton, and rice as the principal crops. The streams are wide and slow, the winter climate is mild, and the summer heat is tempered by breezes from the Gulf of Mexico. Flourishing towns occur at short intervals, and some of them are growing rapidly. The entire region is underlain by a great thickness of sand and clay of alluvial origin. In central-eastern Texas the Coastal Plain is higher, the soil conditions are materially different, the streams run more swiftly, swamps become rare, and although much land is under cultivation, many areas are either in pasture or not cleared. The vegetation changes with change of soil and increase of altitude, and the crops are more diversified than in the lower parts of the Coastal Plain. The region is underlain by sandstone, shale, and other formations, which rise toward the west, cropping out in regular succession as they are crossed from east to west. Some of these formations are hard enough to make ridges and knobs, and there is general terracing at various levels. Parts of the highest lands are remnants of an old plain of former wide extent. Beyond San Antonio the traveler observes several changes in the general aspect of the country, for although the Coastal Plain extends west to Del Rio, there is both a gradual increase in elevation to about 1,000 feet and a marked diminution of rainfall to the west, which greatly affect landscape and industries. Cacti become larger and more abundant, and many special trees and plants are prevalent, notably the mesquite; forests diminish in density, and far to the west trees occur only in the bottom lands. Agriculture here depends largely on irrigation, and the raising of cattle, sheep, and goats is the dominant industry. The principal underlying rocks are shale, soft sandstone, and chalk, which do not make strong relief but produce hills and ridges of moderate height separated by wide valleys, which along the larger streams are bordered by bottom lands. Northwest of San Antonio the Coastal Plain gives place rather abruptly to the Edwards Plateau, owing to the rapid rise of hard limestones; from San Antonio to Del Rio this feature lies north of the railroad but is visible at many places. For many miles west from Del Rio the railroad is on the plateau, which is floored by hard limestone and deeply trenched by the drainageways, notably by the canyons of the Devils River, the Rio Grande, and the Pecos River. In this district, where semiarid conditions prevail, vegetation is sparse and trees are mostly confined to valley bottoms except where the limestone supports a growth of juniper or live oak. The soil is thin, but it sustains grass and shrubs which afford good pasturage for many goats, sheep, and cattle. Owing to the gradual general rise of the strata to the west the land increases in elevation, and much of the plateau in south-central Texas is 2,000 feet above sea level in its eastern part and 3,000 feet in its western part. Near Sanderson this rise develops into the great dome of the Marathon uplift. The central part of this uplift is truncated, revealing a large area of closely folded Paleozoic rocks, making sharp ridges of the Appalachian type. The Edwards Plateau ends on the east side of this uplift. To the west is the Davis Mountain region, a wide province of volcanic rocks, characterized by rugged peaks and irregularly disposed ridges in great va

Bulletin↗
USGS1920

Geothermal data of the United States, including many original determinations of underground temperature

The purpose of this report is to present all available published data bearing on the rate of increase of underground temperature with increasing depth in the United States, together with several hundred original observations by myself and my associates. A canvass of the governmental, State, and serial publications has yielded many records of temperature of flowing wells and also a few observations made with thermometers in borings and deep mines. Additional data on temperature of flows have been given by correspondents. Some of the data, especially those relating to flows from wells, may not be reliable, and as a rule these could not be discriminated. Many records are omitted because no facts are available as to the source of flow.

Bulletin↗
USGS1916

Guidebook of the western United States: Part C - The Santa Fe route, with a side trip to Grand Canyon of the Colorado

The United States of America comprise an area so vast in extent and so diverse in natural features as well as in characters due to human agency that the American citizen who knows thoroughly his own country must have traveled widely and observed wisely. To 'know America first' is a patriotic obligation, but to meet this obligation the railroad traveler needs to have his eyes directed toward the more important or essential things within his field of vision and then to have much that he sees explained by what is unseen in the swift passage of the train. Indeed, many things that attract his attention are inexplicable except as the story of the past is available to enable him to interpret the present. Herein lie the value and the charm of history, whether human or geologic. The present stimulus given to travel in the home country will encourage many thousands of Americans to study geography at first hand. To make this study most profitable the traveler needs a handbook that will answer the questions that come to his mind so readily along the way. Furthermore, the aim of such a guide should be to stimulate the eye in the selection of the essentials in the scene that so rapidly unfolds itself in the crossing of the continent. In recognition of the opportunity afforded in 1915 to render service of this kind to an unusually large number of American citizens, as well as to visitors from other countries, the United States Geological Survey has prepared a series of guidebooks covering four of the older railroad routes west of the Mississippi. These books are educational in purpose, but the method adopted is to entertain the traveler by making more interesting what he sees from the car window. The plan of the series is to present authoritative information that may enable the reader to realize adequately the scenic and material resources of the region he is traversing, to comprehend correctly the basis of its development, and above all to appreciate keenly the real value of the country he looks out upon, not as so many square miles of territory represented on the map in a railroad folder by meaningless spaces, but rather as land - real estate, if you please - varying widely in present appearance because differing largely in its history and characterized by even greater variation in values because possessing diversified natural resources. One region may be such as to afford a livelihood for only a pastoral people; another may present opportunity for intensive agriculture; still another may contain hidden stores of mineral wealth that may attract large industrial development; and taken together these varied resources afford the promise of long-continued prosperity for this or that State. Items of interest in civic development or references to significant epochs in the record of discovery and settlement may be interspersed with explanations of mountain and valley or statements of geologic history. In a broad way, the story of the West is a unit, and every chapter should be told in order to meet fully the needs of the tourist who aims to understand all that he sees. To such a traveler-reader this series of guidebooks is addressed. To this interpretation of our own country the United States Geological Survey brings the accumulated data of decades of pioneering investigation, and the present contribution is only one type of return to the public which has supported this scientific work under the Federal Government. In preparing the description of the country traversed by the Santa Fe Route the geographic and geologic information already published as well as unpublished material in the possession of the Geological Survey has been utilized, but to supplement this material Mr. Darton made a field examination of the entire route in 1914. Information has been furnished by Erasmus Haworth, J. E. Todd, and R. T. Hill, as well as by others whose writings are listed in the bibliography at the end of the text. Cooperation has been rendered by the United States Reclamation Service and by bureaus of the Department of Agriculture. Railroad officials and other citizens have also generously given their aid, and other members of the Survey have freely cooperated in the work. For the purpose of furnishing the traveler with a graphic presentation of each part of his route, the accompanying maps, 25 sheets in all, have been prepared, with a degree of accuracy probably never bsfore attained in a guidebook, aiid their arrangement has been planned to meet the convenience of the reader. The special topographic surveys necessary to complete these maps of the route were made by W. O. Tufts.

Bulletin↗