Crushed Stone Resources of the Devonian and Silurian Carbonate Rocks of Indiana

Abstract

Devonian and Silurian carbonate rocks exposed on the crest and flanks of the Cincinnati Arch provide most of the raw material for the crushed stone industry of Indiana. The present northwest-southeast structure has controlled the erosion of these strata, but earlier northeast-southwest structural trends apparently influenced deposition and erosion during much of Silurian time. Structural trends with similar northeast-southwest orientation have been noted in older rocks and are well expressed in Jasper and Cass Counties. Precise stratigraphic-correlation s in northern Indiana are hampered both by thick glacial overburden and by lack of diagnostic lithologic markers in some intervals. This is especially true of the economically important Niagaran reef facies which are now believed to be present in the Salamonie Dolomite and Louisville Limestone in addition to the well-documented Wabash Formation (Huntington Lithofacies) and possibly the Salina Formation.

The crushed stone industry of Indiana produced 21, 635, 639 tons of material valued at $28, 219, 683 in 1964. More than 60 percent of this material was obtained from nine major rock units in the Devonian and Silurian Systems of northern and eastern Indiana. These strata have a wide range of chemical and physical properties which determine the uses of the crushed stone. Production statistics from 1959 through 1964 show that 72. 4 percent of the crushed stone is used in concrete and highway construction.