by Kimberly SchneiderOn March 9 Prof. Francis Graham took his Earth Dynamics class on a fieldtrip to a Washingtonville Shale deposit outside of Wellsville at Yellow Creek. The purpose of the fieldtrip was to explore the possibilities of finding fossils within the rocks. While many of the students did find a few fossils, Graham found a masterpiece: petrified wood sandwiched between two pieces of sandstone.
Graham told his class the stone is a piece of Pennsylvanian Allegheny Formations, which is approximately 300 million years old. Where Washingtonville Shale sits now was once a natural forest that was covered by glaciers. Time has changed the formation into what it is now. Washingtonville Shale once had a layer of Ames limestone, but that layer of rock has eroded away due to weathering.
Graham pointed out that the Ames limestone is part of what makes up Kent State East Liverpool’s Mary Patterson Building. After his fieldtrip was over Graham had taken a few of the students over to show them what he was talking about with the building. He also pointed out a few of fossils that lie within the limestone at the Mary Pat.
Professor Graham is an encyclopedia of knowledge on many topics; he has many talents and several interests outside of Kent State. One of his interests is in fossils, many of his fossils he carries with him in a case. These are his select few: “something to keep my interest when I retire,” he said.
