WISCONSIN.
(Map [23].)
1. Wauwatosa, Milwaukee County.—In the Public Museum of Milwaukee are parts of both antlers of an elk found at Miller’s brewery, in Wauwatosa, at a depth of 4 feet.
Wauwatosa is a suburb west of Milwaukee, on the Menomonie River, situated principally on one of the moraines laid down just before the Wisconsin ice-sheet retired into Lake Michigan. The elk must have lived there since that withdrawal of the ice. It is possible that the antlers were found in marsh deposits of Recent age along the Menomonie River.
2. Pewaukee, Waukesha County.—This town is situated about 20 miles north of west of Milwaukee. In the Public Museum at Milwaukee is an antler which was plowed up somewhere about Pewaukee by Stanley G. Haskins and presented by him to the museum. Probably the antler belongs to the Recent epoch.
3. Whitehall, Trempealeau County.—From Dr. S. Weidman, State geologist of Wisconsin, the writer received a tibia found near Whitehall and which he identifies as belonging to Cervus canadensis. The following account of the discovery has been furnished by Dr. Weidman:
“The gully (fig. 2) in which the tibia was found is eroded out of stratified sand, containing fragments of local sandstone and cherts. The stratified sand, with local small fragments of sandstone, is, of course, pre-loessial in origin, but the erosion of the lower terrace is post-loessial, and the gully is very recent. The tibia was taken 2 feet below the lower terrace, along the side of the gully about 5 or 6 feet deep at the lower end and 3 or 4 feet deep at the upper end; length of gully 300 or 400 feet. The bone may possibly have been inserted after the development of the lower terrace, but I could see no indication of disturbance or change in the upper 2 feet of the lower terrace further exposed by the gully at this point, the upper 2 feet being essentially the same at this point as elsewhere along the side of the gully. If the bone was deposited along with the small fragments of sandstone in the stratified formation, the fragments being usually flat, about 0.5 inch thick by 1 to 2 inches wide, then the bone is evidently pre-loessial in age. I am inclined to think the bone was deposited with the sandstone fragments during the process of the filling up of the valley with the stratified surface, long before the loess was deposited in the region, rather than after the loess and the lower terrace was formed.”
Fig. 2.—Diagrammatic section of gully near Whitehall, Wisconsin, showing place of burial of elk bone.
According to this account the specimen belonged to the Peorian stage or an earlier one.