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Origin of Ochre (Part 2.)

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 Last post, we saw how the Adirondacks are far older than mountains in Vermont and New Hampshire, and how the farther east you go, the younger the mountains. Even in their prime, the Taconics, Greens, and Whites never reached even half the height of the original Adirondacks. However, water and wind conspired over millions of years to break rock back down to grains of sand. Sediment from the mighty Adirondack mountains can be found today as far away as central Pennsylvania.  And iron oxide clays made of sediment from the Adirondacks settled in isolated pockets from Bennington to Monkton on the eastern slope of the mountains facing the ocean left in the wake of the retreating and so far anonymous continent.   Ochre production in Brandon may have started as a byproduct of iron mining.  One of the earliest industries in Brandon was founded by John Conant and Sons.  Although not all the details are known, this company probably had an interest in iron mining, fur...
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The Origin of Ochre (Part One)

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  In our last installment, we learned how an ochre mine in Forestdale may have been home to a giant frog discovered in 1865.  So what is ochre anyway? And why was it being dug up?  Basically, ochre is a clay-based rock that contains iron oxide, aka rust. It produces colors from red to yellow when pulverized, which is easily done because it softens  quickly with water.  Native Americans used ochre for body paint, to decorate pottery, and in burial ceremonies.  Early European residents of Brandon also used ochre for paint, which was made on, you guessed it, Paint Works Road. So why is there ochre in Forestdale?  Clay is made when certain types of rocks break up into very fine particles, are washed away by moving water, and settle in layers when the water slows down or stops moving.  The story of Forestdale’s ochre takes us back 1.3 billion years ago on the part of the globe where South Africa sits today, with a continental collision.  As we’ll ...
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More on the Giant Frog

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In the last post, I shared a New York Herald article on a Giant Frog discovered in Forestdale, VT.  Mind you, this account was published in a newspaper but hardly fit the category of news.  The Lazarus-like frog was unearthed 55 years before the article appeared in the Herald.  The source of the article was Frank Rogers, then of Forestdale.  Frank informed the Herald reporter that he was 15 years old as he personally watched miners uncover the frog, which soon revived. Why did the story itself hibernate for over five decades from 1865 to 1920 before Mr. Rogers and the New York Herald dug it up and revived it? It was widely known, then as now, that glaciers once covered all of New England.  Ice covered the land in places to a depth of almost 2 miles.  People speculated; could this frog have gone to sleep in a pre-ice age swamp only to be buried, frozen, and roused from sleep in a post-glacial meadow surrounded by the miners who dug him up?  (I assume “h...
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Let's Start with the Giant Frog

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https://brandonvt.blogspot.com/   Some time ago, a friend suggested that I might consider writing a series of articles on the natural history of Brandon, Vermont.   She suggested a 1.3 billion year synopsis of how Brandon got to be the way that it is, how geology, meteorology, and biology all conspired with human history to make this unique and special place we know today. I wasn’t convinced anyone would be interested.  “The problem with history,” I said, “is that it gets old after a while.” “You could put in lots of interesting examples,” she countered, “like how Smalley Swamp was formed by a block of ice, what created the “hogback” off of Pearl Street, what put the Paint in “Paintworks” road, and riveting story of Forestdale’s giant frog.”  I thought perhaps she was on to something, but would anyone else think so? ” And so, dear Reader, this is a very tentative first installment of a 1.3 billion year natural history of Brandon, Vermont. In an attempt to keep you r...
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