GEOLOGICAL ASSOCIATION OF NEW JERSEY 2010 Annual Conference and Field Trip GANJ XXVII: The Geology of the Trenton Area - its Impact on the History of Development and the Need for Geologic Investigation in the Future Friday October 8 and Saturday October 9, 2010 New Jersey State Museum, Trenton, NJ

GANJ in the Pennington Trap Rock quarry

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FALL NEWSLETTER  Click here for the PDF version of the Newsletter

As announced in the spring, the 27th Annual Geological Association of New Jersey (GANJ) conference and field trip will focus on the geology of the Trenton, New Jersey area and its influence on local history.  A wide range of topics in geology will be covered, but there will also be some discussion of local archeology and history.  New this year as the initial field trip stop will be a short walking tour to see archeological research and geologic materials as used in local building construction.  In addition, there will be opportunities to see the exhibits in the New Jersey State Museum.         

The museum displays, with an emphasis on New Jersey, will be open all day Friday, including before the conference.  There will also be tours of some of the inner workings of the museum that are not typically on view to the public, including archived rock, mineral, fossil, and archeological collections.  Due to space limitations, these tours will be limited to a small number of people.  The teacher’s workshop, a show and additional discussion in the museum’s planetarium, will take place in the morning.    

For the Friday afternoon conference, there will be presentations on the Precambrian to Ordovician metamorphic rocks of the Trenton Prong, Triassic sedimentary rocks, Jurassic igneous rocks, and Cretaceous Coastal Plain unconsolidated deposits and Pleistocene glacial outwash.  Also to be discussed are recent archeological research on industrial development in Trenton, the use of geological deposits as building materials, and the influence of the local geology and geologic materials on the construction and use of the Delaware and Raritan Canal.  Our invited keynote speaker is Dr. Karl Muessig of the New Jersey Geological Survey and New Jersey State Geologist; Dr. Muessig will discuss the 175 year history of the Survey.  Following the presentations will be the annual dinner and business meeting with the election of GANJ officers for 2010-2011.  This will be at a local favorite in the historic Mill Hill Section of Trenton, Joe’s Mill Hill Saloon.  See Page 4 for a complete list and schedule.

The Saturday field trip will start with a walking tour of the Petty’s Run archeological research site, a location utilized for manufacturing from the early 1700s to the late 1800s, and Trenton’s Old Barracks Museum and surrounding area to view the use of local geological materials in Trenton buildings.  We will then board the buses to see outcrops of metamorphic rocks of the Trenton Prong, including Chickies Quartzite, amphibolites, schist, and gneiss; outcrops of the Lockatong Formation; an active diabase quarry; and a former clay pit in the Woodbury and Merchantville Formations.  Each of these units was an active source of material for the development of Trenton and continue to impact development of the region.   

Meeting Schedule

Friday October 8th - NJSM
9:00-5:00       Registration
9:00-12:00     Self-guided tours of museum exhibits, including: Hi-Def Planetarium, Fossil Mysteries, Pretty Big Things:  Stories of New Jersey History
                      Self-guided tours of  the Old Trenton Barracks Museum, including an exhibit on French and Indian War
10:00-11:00   Teacher Workshop – Planetarium presentation of Extreme Planets, live talk on New Jersey’s October sky; and discussion of upcoming lunar eclipse of Dec. 21, 2010 – Jay Schwartz, Planetarium Director        
11:00-12:00   Museum Tours - Tours of the inner workings of the museum, including archived rock, mineral, fossil, and archeological collections.  2 to 3 tours of about 20 minutes each.  Limited to 15 people per tour - David Parris, Curator, Natural History and Planetarium
12:00-1:00     Lunch     
1:00-1:20      Welcoming Remarks/Conference Overview – Pierre Lacombe, US Geological Survey / GANJ President
1:20-1:40      Metamorphic Geology of the Trenton Prong – Richard Volkert, NJ Geological Survey
1:40-2:00      Archeological Excavation of Plate Metal, Steel Mill, and Pottery Kilns of Trenton – Ian C. Burrow, Ph.D., Hunter Research, Inc. 
2:00-2:20      The Brownstone Quarrying Industry in New Jersey with notes on its Relation to Canals – J. Mark Zdepski, JMZ Geology
2:20-2:40      Geology of Trenton and Brownfield Development – J.R. Capasso, City of Trenton
2:40-3:00      Break
3:00-3:20      Raritan Canal and Geology – Richard W. Hunter, Ph.D., Hunter Research, Inc.
3:20-3:40      Lockatong Formation – Pierre Lacombe, US Geological Survey
3:40-4:00      Arsenic in the Passaic Formation – Zoltan Szabo, US Geological Survey
4:00-4:20      Pennington Trap Rock Quarry and Early Jurassic Diabase in New Jersey – Greg Herman, Ph.D., NJ Geological Survey

5:00-6:00      Keynote Speaker – Karl Muessig, Ph.D., State Geologist, NJ Geological Survey – 175 Years of History and Achievements of the New Jersey Geological Survey  

6:30             Dinner and Business Meeting – Joe’s Mill Hill Saloon, Trenton, New Jersey

Saturday, October 9th   - Meet at the Old Barracks Museum (Barrack and Lafayette Sts.), Trenton, NJ
Field Trip:  8:00 am - 5:00 pm. 
The field trip will start with a walking tour of the Petty’s Run archeological site, the location of a steel furnace and plating, cotton, and paper mills between the early 1700s to late 1800s.  We will also visit nearby buildings to see the use of local stone in construction, including the Old Barracks, part of the First Battle of Trenton in the Revolutionary War.  We will then board buses to see outcrops of the metamorphic rocks of the Trenton Prong, including Chickies Quartzite at historic Graystones (the starting point for the land survey that defined the first of William Penn’s land purchases from the native Americans in 1682) in Morrisville, PA; an outcrop of the Lockatong Formation by the historic Delaware and Raritan Canal and the Delaware River; an active diabase quarry near Pennington, NJ; and a former brick industry clay pit in the Woodbury and Merchantville Formations near Bordentown, NJ.   

Meeting Sponsorship and Advertisements

GANJ invites support of the annual meeting through sponsorship ($250.00).  Sponsors receive recognition in the proceedings volume and on the GANJ web site for a year.  More important is the opportunity to support geologic education in New Jersey.  If interested, please contact a board member.  Thank you again to our 2009-10 sponsors: 
   Louis Berger Group       
   Environmental Waste Management Associates      
   Langan Engineering & Environmental Services    
   New Jersey City University     
   Sadat Associates. Inc.    

In order to help defray meeting and printing costs, GANJ is also accepting advertisements from geologically- oriented entities (e.g., universities, environmental consulting firms, environmental laboratories, well drilling firms, etc.).  For $15.00, a copy of your business card will be included in the annual meeting proceedings volume.  If interested, please contact a board member.

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