The Coal Bed of Minnesota.
Hon. Thomas Clark, editor of the Lake Superior Gazette, and a gentleman who possesses a vast amount of geological knowledge relating to this State, makes the following remarks on the recent discovery of coal on the Cottonwood river:
It is with no surprise that we learn that coal is discovered in Minnesota. The geological exposures of the western half of that State, together with what we had learned long since, convinced us that labor in shafting in proper localities, would not be fruitless. In the winter of 1859-60, the Hon. Messrs. Evans, of Blue Earth, and Hodges, of Olmsted, Senators of the Minnesota legislature, gave information which convinced all enquiring minds of the necessity of a geological survey of the Blue Earth and Minnesota river valleys. The same Carboniferous exposures, more or less covered by drift, have been found by explorers extending from Iowa to the Lake of the Woods.
Professor Owen, ever cautious in all his statements gives evidence of coal associations, in his report on the Red River and St. Louis valleys and northern lakes, and from critical examinations made in railway surveys, we are more than satisfied that the shales and carboniferous drifts in the valleys of the Upper Mississippi, Snake and Kettle rivers, warrant the conclusion that Minnesota contains the coals necessary for domestic use, and in abundance for the reduction of her unbounded mineral resources on the borders of this lake.