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My folks have a nice lake behind their house. It is relaxing to spend a warm evening watching a heron spear fish or geese fight each other. Or watch silt slowly fill the lake bed. Across the street, a housing developer stripped off a bunch of soil down to the bedrock, but ran out of money before building on the land. This has resulted in some significant erosion and sedimentation in the lake, but this cloud does have a silver lining. I soon noticed a thick bed of shale exposed on the hill. So it was only a matter of time until I make the short trip to the top. The hill, with exposed shale, can be seen on the right. No, I did not hunt that day. A few weeks ago, I drove up there and poked around the Pennsylvanian strata. The Island Creek Shale is the first bed encountered: There are thin beds of calcareous sandstone within. Oh look, ripple marks: And trace fossils: I've found fusulinids and brachiopods where the shale thins several miles to the south.

Lead pollution from Native Americans attributed to crushing galena for glitter paint. Indiana University- Purdue University Indianapolis School of Science https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2019/10/191021144740.htm Bird, B.W., Wilson, J.J., Escobar, J., Kamenov, G.D., Pollard, H.J. and Monaghn, G.W., 2019. Pre-Columbian lead pollution from Native American galena processing and land use in the midcontinental United States. Geology. https://pubs.geoscienceworld.org/gsa/geology/article/574378/PreColumbian-lead-pollution-from-Native-American https://www.researchgate.net/publication/336567955_Pre-Columbian_lead_pollution_from_Native_American_galena_processing_and_land_use_in_the_midcontinental_United_States https://www.researchgate.net/profile/Broxton_Bird Yorus, Paul H.