| Summary: | hottest, coldest, and driest year on record. The mercury plunged to 49 degrees below zero in January and for two weeks never rose above the 20 below mark. It rocketed to 111 degrees in July and did not fall below 80 degrees even at night for a week and a half. Summer nights are normally cool in Bottineau County even though daytime temperatures may be quite high. GEOLOGICAL HISTORY In brief, the geologic history until the time of glaciation consisted of repeatedly transgressing and regressing seas depositing sediments within a progressively subsiding basin. About 300 million years ago tiny organisms in the seas were included in the deposits and are now the source of the oil in Bottineau County. The Turtle Mountains are considered to be an erosional remnant left when the elevated land was eroded away. Beneath the glacial debris are sandstones and shales that have been eroded away between the Mountains and the Missouri Plateau. The glacial part of Bottineau County geological history is probably the most interesting because it is recent and signs of glaciation can readily be seen. Evidence indicates that ice as much as a mile thick at one time lay over Bottineau County, and in fact stretched several hundred miles to the south. Furthermore, the ice advanced and retreated across the area not once but several times. The first glaciers of the pleistocene epoch invaded the area in comparatively recent geologic time, not more than one million years ago. The last of the great ice sheets began its recession only about 20,000 years ago, and although at least four glacial sheets are assumed to have advanced and retreated over the area, the last one, the Wisconsin, effectively concealed evidence of its predecessors. The Turtle Mountains must have tended strongly to lobate the ice front but were not of sufficient height to project above the ice. The glacial drift on the mountains has a strongly mor- ainic surface in which knobs and lakes abound. With the melting of the large Wisconsin ice sheet, Glacial Lake Souris was formed from the meltwater. Glacial Lake Souris is said to have discharged its waters to the James River and later to the Sheyenne as the ice front receded. Most of Bottineau County, the part between elevations 1600 and 1100 feet, is situated on the lacustrine plain of Glacial Lake Souris. Prolific sand and gravel deposits can be found in most parts of the county. THE INDIANS IN BOTTINEAU COUNTY Mounds found in Bottineau County indicate that groups of Indians passed through the area two or three thousand years ago. Those people were called "Mound Builders." One group was the progenitor of the Algonquin people, of which the Chippewa and Scanned with a Zeutschel Zeta book scanner at 300 dpi. Edited with Multi-Page TIFF Editor.
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