Themes of the Day:

• A Brief History of the Geologic Assembly of North America

A Brief History of the Geologic Assembly of North America

• Oldest rocks in NA - Slave Craton, 4.0 Ga (4000 Ma)
• Superior Province (Craton) - granite-greenstone belts 3.5 Ga to 2.5 Ga - Archean Greenstone near Wawa, ON
• Huronian and Marquette Range Supergroups - sedimentary rocks (including BIF) on the southern margin of the Superior Province - 2.3 Ga to 2.1 Ga
• Penokean Orogeny - 1.9 Ga to 1.75 Ga - accretion and deformation at southern edge of Superior Province
• Yavapai and Mazatal Orogenies - 1.8 Ga to 1.6 Ga - more accretion to southern NA - Kansas' basement rocks - metamorphic rocks in the Colorado Rockies
• Pikes Peak granite batholith - 1.4 Ga - anorogenic magmatism
• Mid-Continent Rift - Keweenawan volcanics and sediments in Lake Superior Basin - 1.1 Ga, Jacobsville Sandstone - extends to eastern Kansas
• Grenville Orogeny - Continent-continent collision - Eastern NA - 1.0 Ga (1000 Ma) - Rodinia Supercontinent
• Rodinia breakup, shallow sea covers much of NA - Late Cambrian, 500 Ma - sandstones at Tahquamenon Falls, Pictured Rocks
• Ordovician-Silurian-Devonian coral reefs cover much of Michigan (1, 2, 3), equatorial latitude - oil bearing formations of Kansas deposited in tropical marine environments - Appalachian Orogenies begin in Eastern NA
• Mississippian-Pennsylvanian-Permian - coal swamps in PA, WV, KY, Mississippi basin, Appalachian Orogenies culminate in closing of Iapetus Ocean, formation of Pangea Supercontinent - Ancestral Rockies uplifted
• Mesozoic Era - Triassic-Jurassic-Cretaceous - dinosaurs in northern Great Plains, Cretaceous Seaway in Kansas, Sierran volcanic arc along West coast, Atlantic ocean begins opening in East
• Cenozoic Era - Tertiary-Quaternary - Atlantic and Gulf Coastal plains, Rocky Mountains - Ogalalla Formation deposited, Basin & Range, and San Andreas Fault form in West, Uplift and Erosion in Great Plains (see below), Ice Ages, Humans Arrive, FHSU formed, class dismissed.

This concludes the material that will be covered on Exam #1.