Identifier: historyofdelawar00smit (find matches)
Title: History of Delaware County, Pennsylvania : from the discovery of the territory included within its limit to the present time, with a notice of the geology of the county, and catalogues of its minerals, plants, quadrupeds, and birds, written under the direction and appointment of the Delaware County Institute of Science
Year: 1862 (1860s)
Authors: Smith, George, 1804-1882 Delaware County Institute of Science (Delaware County, Pa.)
Subjects: Natural history
Publisher: Philadelphia : Printed by Henry B. Ashmead
Contributing Library: University of Pittsburgh Library System
Digitizing Sponsor: Lyrasis Members and Sloan Foundation

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red onthis institution; and the managers thereof agreeing to receiveas students others than the members of their Society, the sphereof its usefulness has been greatly increased. Haverford Collegenow enjoys a high reputation as a literary and scientific institu-tion, while in respect to the moral training to which the studentis subjected, it is unsurpassed by any college in the country. At the commencement of the construction of the DelawareBreakwater, a large proportion of the stone used for that pur-pose was taken from the quarries in this County. The superin-tendent of the work, in the autumn of 1836, arrived at theconclusion that the Pennsylvania stone was inferior to that fromthe quarries in Delaware State, on account of the large propor-tion of mica it contained. He thought the presence of the micarendered the Pennsylvania stone peculiarly liable to chemicaldecomposition, and also to a further decay from the attrition ofthe waves. He even stated in his report, that the experience
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1843.) HISTORY OF DELAWARE COUNTY. 359 of tlie work, within the few years it has been in construction,has shown that the stones have decayed from both the.^o causes. Lar<^e quantities of stone had been quarried, particularly onCrura and Ridley Creeks, when the Government, on the stren;^thof the report of its agent, rejected the stone from DelawareCounty. Tiiose engaged in the business, who would be subjectedto great loss by the rejection of their stone, brought the matterto the notice of the County Institute, which promi)tly appointeda committee to investigate the subject. The autlior was chair-man of that committee, and upon him devolved the task ofmaking the necessary investigations, and of drawing up thereport. That report was decidedly favorable to the durabilityof the Delaware County stone. Its material conclusions weresubsequently confirmed by a board of military engineers, and thePennsylvania stone again accepted by the Government. The year 1838 was remarkable on account of

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