Monoliths

This slab of stone brings to mind some ancient monolith, but it's actually part of the Geological Rock Park tucked beside the Thomas O'Brien Academy of Arts and Sciences inside Lincoln Park.

The Park consists of rows of boulders lining a path running roughly southeast of the school and just a stone's throw (pun unintended) from the shale-lined Beaverkill gully. Close to the school there is a sign identifying the specimen boulders which include various types of limestone, dolostone, garnet, and slate.

The Park's location is appropriate since this was once part of the estate of Professor James Hall, a man remembered as one of the country's leading 19th-century geologists and paleontologists, and the boulders are overlooked by the building that once housed Hall's work.

Another monolith of sorts, the soaring Corning Tower, looms in the background, along with the New York State Museum (which now holds Hall's collections) and the twin spires of the Cathedral of the Immaculate Conception.

Lost In The Wilderness - Part Five

This is the fifth in a series of posts on the Beaver Kill Ravine.

Part One
Part Two
Part Three
Part Four

Aside from the presence of the old brick and stone culvert giving a glimpse of a rushing river beneath the Lincoln Park gully, my other favorite feature of the Beaverkill ravine is the stone. The north and south walls of the gully are lined with heavy gray-black outcroppings of truly ancient bedrock.

According to a geology report in a 1930 bulletin from the New York State Museum, the stone is "Snake Hill shale" which it describes as a "dark, argillaceous, intricately folded and crumpled, as much as 3,000 feet deep."

According to the same 1930 report, there are very few places around Albany where this ancient bedrock lies exposed. I've seen similar stone along the Normskill near Delaware Avenue at the City's southern boundary. The other location given in the bulletin is a spot called Black Rock Cut, somewhere along the old NY Central Tracks near Tivoli Lake.

To be continued...

Beaver Park

Perched on a steep hill, quite close to the Thomas O'Brien Academy of Science and Technology and the Lincoln Park playground, this pale yellow brick building was once the workplace of the noted 19th-century geologist, James Hall.

The laboratory overlooks the Lincoln Park pool to the east and, just to the north, the remnants of the Beaver Kill Ravine (see my previous two posts here and here). From the latter came the estate's name, Beaver Park. While Hall and his family actually resided in another house which stood on the present site of the Lincoln Park tennis courts at the corner of Delaware and Morton Avenues, he spent much of his time at and was most at home in this laboratory and often slept there in a simple, small bedroom.

A plaque on the south facade sums up the building's history.

This building was erected by JAMES HALL State Geologist of New York 1836-1898
For fifty years it served as his office and laboratory and from it graduated many geologists of merit and distinction. During most of that period it was an influential and active centre of geological science in this country. Erected by The Association of American State Geologists 1916

Designed by Andrew Jackson Downing and Calvert Vaux (two leading architects and landscape designers of their day, Vaux worked with Frederick Law Olmstead on the design of New York's Central Park), the building housed Hall's drawings and extensive collections of fossils and other specimens which are now a part of the NYS Museum just north across the park.

The laboratory, now renamed the Sunshine Building and painted a buttery yellow, is now part of the Albany City School District.

Click here for a short profile of Professor Hall.