Reading, Writing, and Rocks

Natural History, July, 1999

The second annual American Museum of Natural History Young Naturalists Awards, administered by the Alliance for Young Artists and Writers, this year invited students in grades seven through twelve to investigate and write about local geological phenomena. The winning entries, excerpted below, are available in a print catalog and on-line at www.amnh.org/youngnaturalistawards.

My Fish-Shaped Homed

I live on a 118-mile-long island sticking out from New York. Its name is Long Island, and it is shaped like a fish. It has been my home for almost twelve years, but I hardly ever think about how the landforms affect my life.... Most landforms were created by the most recent glacier, Wisconsin, because it changed most of the effects from previous glaciers. It also formed Long Island Sound, a great place for sailing, swimming, and even kayaking. Before that, it had only been a valley filled with water. There was land at both ends. The big ice cubes that broke off fell and melted, creating bays, mostly those on the northern shore. The same falling, melting ice cubes split the eastern end into the North and South Forks.... Long Island has come a long way, "like a lump of clay forever being reshaped," says Dan Fagin, who writes about Long Island for Newsday. Only 0.5 billion years ago, the land that is now Long Island was actually part of a chain of volcanic islands. Millions of years ago, the eastern side of North America was facing south. The future Long Island was in the tropics. It collided with North America 450 million years ago. The volcanic rocks were pushed deep underground and hardened by heat and pressure to form a layer of bedrock. Later it rose to the surface and became our bedrock.... The fertile plains caused by the glacier made part of Long Island grassland. Most of Long Island was grass when Europeans first explored it. The plains were used for farming, especially for potatoes.

Tashina Graves, Grade 7 Woodland Middle School East Meadow, New York

Rocks of Roane County

Hidden between two hilltops in Roane County, West Virginia, lies a beautiful natural bridge carved by the hands of Nature. Nearby runs a meandering stream, which created this work of art. It was in this area around the natural bridge that I based my collection of rocks. The rocks that I collected ranged from Saltsburg sandstone, which is in the Glenshaw Formation of the Pennsylvanian System, to Lower Connelsville sandstone, which is in the Casselman Formation of the Pennsylvanian System. Saltsburg sandstone, found in the oldest rock layer, indicates that a beach was on this site for a relatively long time while these rocks were forming. The Pittsburgh Red Beds, which is the next layer up, is shale.... These rocks indicate where there once was a delta because of an inland sea increasing in size.... Over hundreds of millions of years after the Pennsylvanian Period, the sediments turned to rock, and the whole area of western West Virginia became a plateau because of North America and Africa colliding. The mountains and valleys in the area from which I collected my rock samples were formed by the erosion from rivers and streams.... The Saltsburg sandstone that formed the bridge was stronger and more resistant to erosion than the shaley sandstone that was beneath it. The bridge was found at approximately one thousand feet above sea level, and the gully that was formed by the water that formed the bridge eventually ran to a meandering stream.

Alison Moore, Grade 9 Herbert Hoover High School Clendenin, West Virginia

Cornwall Iron

Cornwall Iron Furnace is a well-known historical site in Pennsylvania, one that harks back to the century of coal and iron barons. Built in 1742, the Cornwall iron mine closed in 1972, after approximately 220 years of continuous operation. About 106 million natural net tons of iron were mined during its operation. Cornwall's rich supply of iron ore provided cannon and shot for the Continental Congress during the Revolutionary War. This historic ore deposit lasted until only a couple of decades ago, but even then the importance of this site did not end. Besides being made into a national landmark, the extensive dumps of waste rock from the mines are open to collectors.... Limestone is one of the two major rock masses that formed the Cornwall site, and where there's limestone, dolomite is present as well. Most dolomite is mixed into the rocks at Cornwall, but some can be found in crystal form.... The other major constituent of the Cornwall area is a dark-colored igneous rock called diabase, which is a variety of gabbro.... At Cornwall, the feldspar in the diabase is a light pink color. That characteristic made it very hard to identify. I had to go through all my rock and mineral books until, luckily, I found a matching picture.

Brandon Aldinger, Grade 10 Palmyra Area High School Palmyra, Pennsylvania

Reading the Rocks

I slipped into my ski jacket and stuffed some gloves deep into my pockets. My mother honked the horn of the car, and I ran out, locking the door behind me. The ride was only about five minutes. As we approached, I could smell the salt air even from inside the warm car. Mom parked the car, and I ran toward the beach. It was cold; the wind was hitting my face and making my cheeks tingle. I walked along the picturesque beach as the sun was setting to the west of me. The waves crashed upon the beach, and there were whitecaps as far as the eye could see. With my head down and my back hunched over, I looked at the rocky sand. I saw a couple of rocks I knew and put them into the bag I had brought along. By the time I knew it, I had so many rocks that I filled up the entire bag! I laid out all the rocks on the kitchen table as the fire from the fireplace blazed next to me. I looked at each one carefully, examining each one's unique features. I discovered that you don't need to read a long, tedious book to learn about the history of Earth. Rocks and fossils provide much of Earth's history. Each rock had its own story to tell.... In the region where I collected my samples, there is a great variety of sedimentary and metamorphic rocks, although there are some igneous rocks, too. Depositing sediment forms a sedimentary rock; sediment is earth that has been sculpted, broken up, and transported by wind, water, or ice. Conglomerate rock found in my sample area is a perfect example or a sedimentary rock.... Long Island is a museum and a laboratory. Studying the rocks is like watching a dramatic documentary of the physical history of Long Island.