History of the Indiana Geological Survey

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A Hiatus

Certainly the geologic activities of David Dale Owen and a number of his professional colleagues, including his brother Richard, did not cease, but most of them did not concern Indiana geology. The new federal appointment was as principal agent to explore the mineral lands of the United States beginning July 31, 1839. Since 1807 it had been the policy of the Congress not to sell, but to lease, public lands that contained mineral resources, and to make either disposition of federal lands in the lead-bearing region of Galena, Ill., Dubuque, Iowa, and Mineral Point, Wis., it was necessary to have a geologic appraisal. The House of Representatives called on the President of the United States to communicate to the Congress all information in the possession of the Treasury Department relative to the "location, value, productive-ness, and occupancy of public mineral lands," and to cause such further information to be collected and surveys to be made as might be necessary. President Martin Van Buren sent the resolution to the Secretary of the Treasury, who referred it to the Commissioner of the General Land Office. This was James Whitcomb of Indiana, who turned to a fellow Hoosier, David Dale Owen, to carry out the work.

Figure 3. Harmonist granary (the "Old Fort"), David Dale Owen's third laboratory and now the property of Kenneth Dale Owen.

Maclure died in Mexico in 1840, and at the request of Maclure's heirs Owen spent some time classifying the huge Maclure collection, to which he added many items from his own fieldwork. He made a lengthy collecting trip along the Ohio River in 1841, and the resulting two tons of material exceeded the capacity of the building that he was then using as a laboratory, the second in a series. Maclure's sister then gave him a large building (fig. 3), which had been constructed of sandstone and brick by the Harmonists for use as a granary, and which has been called the Old Fort. He remodeled it extensively, and it came to be known as "The Laboratory." It contained storerooms, work-rooms, a large lecture hall, and exhibit space. In 1846 the noted British geologist Sir Charles Lyell, with Lady Lyell, was the guest of the Owens, and Sir Charles "spent much time in Owen's laboratory and carefully inspected the fossil and mineral cabinets. In company with Owen he visited various points of geological importance in the neighborhood" (Hendrickson, 1943, p.69). Soon afterward Owen and Joseph Norwood, who later became State Geologist of Illinois, explored central Kentucky, apparently on their own and without other financial backing.

In March 1847 the Congress created two new land districts and provided for their survey and offer for sale. Owen was appointed in April to survey the Chippewa Land District northeast of the Mississippi River and south of Lake Superior. It was an area the size of the State of New York and mostly without settlements or established transportation routes.

In 1854 the Kentucky Assembly approved a geological survey of that state, and the governor selected Owen to head it. In 1857 the governor of Arkansas offered Owen appointment as State Geologist for a first survey of that state, and Owen accepted the appointment after arranging with the governor of Kentucky to continue direction of the Kentucky survey without salary. The first report of the Arkansas survey, covering the years 1857 and 1858, was published (Owen, 1858) at a time when the fourth and last of Owen's Kentucky reports was still in preparation.

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