Geology topics

Oscar E. Meinzer

Publications and source records attributed to Oscar E. Meinzer.

2 recordsLinked to original sources

USGS2014

The channel‐storage method of determining effluent seepage

Some years ago the senior author, in collaboration with Norah Dowell Stearns, undertook to make a monthly inventory of the water‐supply of the Pomperaug River Basin, in Connecticut, from a study of data obtained by A. J. Ellis from 1913 to 1916. For this purpose approximate determinations or estimates were made of the ground‐water runoff, that is, of the part of the daily discharge of the river that consisted of water derived from the zone of saturation by effluent seepage. The determinations or estimates were essentially based on the assumption that after a week of fair weather the storm‐water was all discharged and that until the next rain the runoff was essentially all ground‐water (U.S. Geol, Surv. Water‐Supply Paper 597, pp. 107–116 and pi. 19, 1929). In the discussion of the methods and results of this investigation, the following statement was made (Water‐Supply Paper 597, pp. 145–146): “In this investigation the estimates of ground‐water runoff were based on the discharge of the Pomperaug at Bennetts Bridge—that is, on the discharge during the periods between rains, when there was virtually no direct runoff left in the stream‐system. Much better results could be obtained by basing the estimates on periods beginning as soon after rains as all of the direct runoff has reached the streams. With this method the ground‐water runoff during any particular day would be the total runoff minus the decrease in stream‐storage. The decrease in stream‐storage could be estimated by maintaining gages at several points on the trunk‐stream and on selected tributaries and making surveys of the stream‐system showing the approximate water‐areas of different parts of the system at different gage‐heights.”

Eos, Transactions, American Geophysical Union↗

USGS1925

The artesian water supply of the Dakota sandstone in North Dakota, with special reference to the Edgeley quadrangle

The Dakota sandstone and the overlying dense plastic shales form the most remarkable artesian basin in the United States with respect to its great extent, the long distances through which its water has percolated from the outcrops of the sandstone in the western mountains to the areas of artesian flow, and especially the tremendous pressure under which the water in the sandstone was originally by thick and continuous cover of impermeable shales. In 1882 a well was drilled to the Dakota sandstone at Aberdeen, S. Dak., by the Chicago, Milwaukee & St. Paul Railway Co. This well was reported by Nettleton 1 to have been "the first bore put down which reached the artesian basin of the Dakotas." In 1896 Darton 2 estimated that about 400 artesian wells had been drilled to the Dakota sandstone, presumably in South Dakota and adjacent parts of the artesian basin in North Dakota which he investigated. 3 The strongest of these wells had pressures ranging from 100 to more than 200 pounds to the square inch and flows ranging from 1,000 to more than 4,000 gallons a minute. The present brief paper is based chiefly on the data that have been obtained in the successive surveys in regard to about 230 artesian wells in or near the Edgeley quadrangle. A table of these well data is on file in the United States Geological Survey and is to be published in the detailed report on the geology and hydrology of the Edgeley and La Moure quadrangles that has been prepared by Mr. Hard. The well data obtained by Mr. Hard have already been published in a report prepared by him in his capacity as State flood-control engineer.

North Dakota↗