Warsaw Limestone - Pisgah Rock Quarry, LBL EarthCache
Warsaw Limestone - Pisgah Rock Quarry, LBL
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The Rock Quarry is located in Land Between the Lakes on the east shore of Kentucky Lake at Mile Marker 30. It is approximately 8 miles south of Kentucky Dam and less than 5 miles south of the canal that connects to Lake Barkley. You will need to access the quarry via the Hillman Ferry Heritage Trail or by water from Pisgah Bay or Kentucky Lake.
TASKS
IN ORDER TO LOG THIS FIND YOU MUST:
A. Click on my profile and e-mail the answers for the following questions to me. Do not post your answers when you log in your find. Logs which do not meet the requirements to claim the find will be deleted.
1. Thickness of Quarternary Deposit: using your GPSr, determine the elevation difference between the Overlook (36° 55.960'N 88° 10.732'W) and the Upper Ledge (36° 55.951'N 88° 10.712'W).
2. Thickness of Warsaw Ledge:
a) Using your GPSr, determine the elevation diffence between the Upper Ledge and the Lower Ledge (36° 55.951'N 88° 10.712'W).
b) Estimate the Lower Ledge's height above the water.
c) Thickness = a) + b) + 118 feet
3. What evidence, if any, is there that the two ledges were being quarried. If so, which ledge was this most prevalent?
B. Optional, though greatly appreciated. Take and log a picture of you(and your group) standing atop the exposed ledge.
HISTORY
These bluffs were the source of lime produced by the Star Lime Works started by L.A. Vogel sometime prior to the Civil War. Their high quality lime was an important resource for the iron industry at "Land Between the Rivers" as well as other iron furnaces in the surrounding area. The lime and limestone was shipped along the Tennessee, Ohio, and Mississippi Rivers to support a large variety of industries elsewhere. The quarry later became a primary source for the limestone during the construction of Kentucky Dam when the Kentucky Lake Reservior was created. TVA constructed railroad tracks from the dam site to the Vogel land and quarried, by all estimates, several million dollars worth of stone to construct Kentucky Dam. With the impoundment, the quarry, the Star Lime Works, and its community came to an end shortly after 1945. The rock quarry is approximately 118 feet deep and has a rock ledge that is a popular cliff diving spot as well as graffiti art.
GEOLOGY
The most common rock in this area is Warsaw Limestone of Mississippian age, which was deposited 350 million years ago in the bottom of a warm, shallow sea. The Warsaw Limestone was named by Hall (1857) from outcrops near Warsaw, Illinois.
During the latter part of the Cretaceous Period, 130 million years ago, the Gulf of Mexico inundated much of the southern United States and covered all of the Jackson Purchase Region and some of the Mississippian Plateaus with sands, clays, and gravels. The Warsaw Limestone of western Kentucky was deposited on a shallow-marine shelf and in troughs within this shelf. It contains thick deposits of high-calcium limestone and is a medium gray, fine- to coarse-grained limestone containing fossil material in a chalk-like matrix. The Warsaw Limestone is about 150-300 ft thick, and. like most of the Upper Mississippian limestones of western Kentucky, is poorly exposed, cropping out mainly along the Cumberland and Tennessee Rivers.. It is identified principally by a thick, reddish-brown, cherty soil.
This hilly borderland between the Mississippian Plateau to the east and the Jackson Purchase to the west has been known as "the Breaks." Much of this region has been flooded by damming of the Kentucky and Cumberland Rivers, forming the area known as the Land Between the Lakes. The ‘breaks’ and the western part of LBL was the shoreline of the great interior seaway that bisected North America during a period of geologic time from 145 to 60 million years ago.
1. Geocache is placed on LBL managed property with permission. 2. It is the visitors responsibility or orient themselves with policies and rules pertaining to this Department managed site. 3. Though others may climb the walls at the quarry and/or dive into the waters below, not everyone should. Please gauge your own abilities carefully.
Additional Hints
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Treasures
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