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Show Mfch Range Has Peculiar Structure , far As "Oil Traps" Are Concerned ' -Zt I Kx'lulvo: Tlio Sprinirvilln llnr- KxcIiinIvo: Tlio Sprlnpvillo Hcr-iilil, Hcr-iilil, by Kay K. Cwlton, IVtrolciun ideologist. Insofar ns the present physical features of the local Wasatch Mountains which you see rising1 majestically behind the "Art City" ns Springville Is well named, are concerned, these features are' due in the main to another period of distrophisim which was of post-Kocene post-Kocene age and is therefore entirely en-tirely different from the range created during earlier periods of geologic time such as the Paleozoic Pal-eozoic and Mesozoic eras, when much of the old now sought was being deposited from the life which is known to have inhabited seas here centuries before the advent ad-vent of the waters of Lake Bonneville. Bon-neville. The structure of the local range here is extremely complex and searches for commercial amounts of petroleum and natural gas have to be made with a view of what possibly happened here before the post-Eocene creations which you see today as the finished fin-ished product of the Wasatch Mountains. In other words is the strata which now produces oil in commercial com-mercial amounts in northeastern Utah from the Weber and Shin-arump Shin-arump sandstone zones higher or lower here in the Wasatch range , and does the Oquirrh sandstone rnmp under the same fpnlnpnr de- position as does the earlier Weber We-ber in northeastern Utah. Therefor, owing to the discrepancy discrep-ancy in geologic history in comparing com-paring the geologic history of Utah county and the Springville-Provo Springville-Provo general area and that of the Vernal-Ashley area far to the east, geologists must take into consideration certain fundamentals fundamen-tals which governed the deposition of strata comparable in geologic age with that which although sim-iliar sim-iliar produces oil in northeastern Utah. The rocks comprising the major portion of the Wasatch Mountains here in Utah county, are of Paleozoic, Pale-ozoic, Mesozoic and Cenozoic geologic geo-logic antiquity. In other words, they represent not only hundreds of millions of years in geologic antiquity, but three (3) major eras of geologic time, as well. There are large mas-1 ses of granite present here locally and one has only to go on a trip up to Stinking Springs and other local areas to see this evidence. Two (2) notable unconformities have been noted during local peo-I peo-I logic studies made by the writer, Mesozoic era which followed the ''Paleozoic in geologic sequence. , It appears further that the deposition de-position of rocks of the Jurassic system was followed by a distro-phic distro-phic revolution. The mountains at this time were faulted and folded, ervins' them the present day grot- and also by company geologists of the Sun Oil Company, now drilling a test well on the Diamond Dia-mond Fork anticline in section 17, township 8-south, range 5 east, SLBM., Utah county. These unconformities un-conformities appear among the sedimentary deposits (laid down during periods of sea inundation) but as far as can be determined, the deposition of the strata here locally in the Springville-Spanish Fork areas appears to have been continuous from the Carbbonifer-ous Carbbonifer-ous period of Paleozoic geologic times through successive geologic periods to the Jurassic, this representing rep-resenting the middle period of the esque shapes which they possess today as major physical properties. proper-ties. This work on' the part of Old Mother Nature was on a large scale and among the faults thus created was the local Thistle Overthrust. The mountains and valleys created by these dislocations disloca-tions were apparently not co-incident with the present mountains and the Utah Valley which one sees here today locally in the Springville area. The topography thus created by the dislocation was so far removed remov-ed by erosion during the Cretaceous Cretac-eous or closing period of Mesozoic Meso-zoic geologic time, that a transgression trans-gression of the sea, long before Lake Bonneville's time, spread sandstones of the Dakota series over worn edges of previously deposited de-posited rocks. - After the retreat of this sea, as a study of the Diamond Fork area shows, there appeared other crustal changes and then a long period of relative quiet in which the general movement move-ment of the debris was from west to east and a broad area to the east of Springville received terrestrial ter-restrial and lacustrine deposits. NOTE: New geologic eliminating eliminat-ing process was used in selection of Sun Oil Company's present test well drilling site. This will be discussed in another issue of the Springville Herald as an exclusive ex-clusive feature: RAY E. COLTON. |