30 - HISTORY OF LORAIN COUNTY, OHIO.

CHAPTER V.

FOSSIL FISHES AND WHERE THEY ARE FOUND:*

Until a few years since it was supposed that the rocks of Lorain county were barren of fossils, except small fragments of wood found in quarrying the sandstone at Amherst, Elyria and some other places. These, of themselves, are quite unimportant, except it be to show that in the epoch of the deposition of these sand rocks there existed coniferous trees.

In the year 1866 I came to the lake shore and purchased the place now known as "Lake Breeze." In walking along the beach I found water-worn fragments of a new, and to .me unknown fossil, of which Prof. Newberry, in the " Report of the Geological Survey of Ohio," says:

"About the time of Mr. Hertzer's discovery of fresh remains at Delaware, Mr. Jay Terrell, of Elyria, found several large, water-worn fragments of black, mineralized bone on the beach of the lake west of Avon Point. These had evidently fallen out of the cliff of Huron shale which here forms the lake shore. On examining these bones when brought to

* By Jay Terrell.

Cleveland by Mr. Terrell, I discovered that they were portions of the as medium, dorsi' of Dinichthys. This is a plate which covers the arch of the back immediately behind the head; and was, in some cases, two feet in length and breadth, and more than two inches thick at its central anterior portion. Since his discovery of the first of these interesting relics, Mr. Terrell has pursued the search for them with much enthusiasm and success."

These water-worn specimens did not give me any clue as to where they might be found in place; still I made a careful, and thorough search for them whenever the lake was still and clear enough to admit of it, supposing them to be under the water, but near the shore, or they would not thus be broken up and thrown upon the beach.

I continued this search for more than a year, and had nearly given up the hope of ever finding them in place, and as we often found pieces upon the beach, I had began to think that possibly they might have been brought here in the ice period.

HISTORY OF LORAIN COUNTY, OHIO - 31

About this time Park, one of my little boys, (who was then ten years old. and who had been with me considerable in my researches, and had become much interested in hunting for "our fish-bed" as we had already begun to call it) went out alone one day and in hunting along the banks of shale found a specimen embedded in the solid shale. He immediately came to me to tell me of his success, and to show me where it was that I might get it out. This was the starting point," our leader." From this we certainly could find others. It was not then a bed of bones massed together as I had supposed, but in detached pieces, scattered here and there through the shale. Enough was now known to tell us where to look for them; and a vigorous search was at one commenced. It was, however, three weeks before another single trace was found; and I had almost given up in despair, when one day, about a mile below our starting point, I found another specimen clearly defined in the rocky shale. My field of labor was now fully located, and a systematized search commenced in earnest. From that time to the present I have excavated more than a thousand bones.

Sometimes I have had to work for days, and blast the rocks in order to reach them; others have been readily accessible by the pick and chisel. In one instance I worked five days, with several men, in blasting and clearing away the debris, before we reached the rocky floor in which these bones were embedded; but it was a grand find. Prof. Newberry, in speaking of it says:

"Since the publication of the first volume of this report, a large amount of interesting material, illustrating the structure of this genus, has been brought to light. 1n this material is to be found nearly the .entire bony system of one large individual, which gives us a more complete representation of Dinichthys than has yet been obtained of any of the larger fossil fishes of the Old world. These specimens we owe to the enthusiasm and intelligence of Mr. Jay Terrell, who found them near his home in Sheffield, Lorain county. Here the upper portion of the Huron shale forms, along the Lake shore, cliffs which are being constantly worn away by the waves. These cliffs have been Mr. Terrell's favorite hunting-ground, and as the erosion of the surface reaches here and there the projecting point of a bone, each indication has been followed up with care, and the bone taken out, perhaps in many fragments, but yet complete in atl its parts. Mr. Terrell has carefully preserved and united these fragments, and thus has been able to contribute to science some of the most interesting and valuable Paloeontological material ever discovered."

"Some months sinee, while scanning the cliff near his house, his attention was attracted to a bone of which only a small portion was visible, the remainder being concealed in the rock. On taking this out, others immediately associated with it were revealed, which were, however, so deeply buried, as to be inaccessible by ordinary means. 1n these circumstances Mr. Terrell began operations on the cliff above, and excavated a space about twelve feet square down to the locality of the bones. Here he found the ventral shield, before unknown, quite complete: one mandible, a "premaxillary" and two "maxillary;" a perfect dorsal shield, two feet in diameter; two scapulo-coracoids, with a large number of additional bones, including the ossified rays of a large fin. From the same locality Mr. Terrell had before obtained a cranium almost complete, and two supra-scapulas: thus giving, as has been said, nearly the entire bony structure."

"Since this important discovery Mr. Terrell has found a complete mandible and maxillary of larger size than any before met with; the mandible (under jaw) being twenty-two inches in length."

The class of fishes to which these bones belonged, are now called Dinichthys-Terrelli (Terrell's terrible fish.)

Dentition of Dinichthys Terrell

They were armor-clad monsters of the old Huron sea, which rolled over nearly all of the North American continent, long ages before the formation of the coal measures. A thick, massive, bony coat of mail covered all the vital parts of their upper surface, while the plates that protected the under side of the body were large but relatively thin. No scales have as yet been found with their remains; hence it is inferred that the posterior portion of the body must have been covered with a thick, tough skin. It is evident that they were cartillagenous, from the fact that no bones- of their internal structure have been found. Hence it is more difficult to calculate their size and shape, which has not yet been fully determined.; but probably they were from fifteen to twenty feet in length, with very massive bodies. The head is composed of thick, bony plates, strengthened with massive internal arches, all firmly anchylosed together, forming a bony box which is two feet in length and thirty inches in breadth and in some places more than three inches in thickness.

Prof. Newberry says of the Os articulare capitis of the head plate:

"The joint itself is formed by a deep cyiindrical socket, into which fits the condyle of the supra-scapular, in such a way as to form one of the strongest and most complete articulations in the whole animal kingdom."

Of the jaws, he says:

"The dental apparatus of Dinichthys is its most remarkable feature. The massive jaws are themselves transformed into teeth more singular in their structure, and more formidable than any living fish. These powerful jaws terminate in four dense teeth, which are five inches long and three broad. They have shining black enamel on their wearing edge. Back of these front teeth, the under jaw is formed into a sharp cutting edge of jet black enamel, one-third their entire length. An upper tooth with a thin, long, beveled edge (six inches long), tits and corresponds to the under jaw in such a manner that the two play upon each other precisely like the blades of a pair of shears."

With such a pair of jaws as these, set in a head more than three feet and a half broad, it is easy to see that these great monsters were able to crush a much larger body than that of a man. I have one bone (middle plate of the back) which is twenty-four inches long and twenty-seven broad; is three inches in its thickest part, and weighs thirty pounds.

I need not here give a detailed description of the many bones which belong to this wonderful fish. The

32 - HISTORY OF LORAIN COUNTY, OHIO.

three above mentioned, are sufficient for our present purpose. It is impossible in language, to give any correct idea of these specimens. Suffice it, therefore, to say, that they are the remains of the largest fossil fishes now known to the scientific world.

Such a fish as this must have had formidable enemies, or he would not have been clad with such a bony coat of mail; and then his teeth clearly indicate that he was carniverous, and therefore fed on other large animals of the deep. Hence, in all my researches for his remains, I have ever been on the lookout for something else; and my labors have been rewarded as follows:

In the rocks up Black River, which Prof. Newberry designates " Cleveland Shale," and as belonging to the Waverly series, I discovered the remains of very large placoderm fishes, nearly if not quite as large as those belonging to the Huron epoch, some of the bones weighing many pounds each. I am not quite satisfied that the location of these rocks is correct; at present, however, we leave them as they are placed by the geological survey.

I also found in the same locality the spine of a large ctenacanthus shark; cladodus, and other small sharks' teeth ; jugular and other plates, of different parts, of these little carboniferous sharks; together with the scales of other fishes.

In the Bedford shales below Elyria I have obtained shells of a small Lingula, not yet described and named; also a shell, new, but probably allied to the Spirifers, and quantities of mollusks, (Macrodon-Hantiltonioe); also a species of small shark, and some other fossils. These were all found in a band of limestone, of about one foot in thickness, lying in the upper stratum of this shale and extending two or three miles along its exposure on Black river.

I have obtained from the Huron shale at the lake shore, in addition to those already mentioned, several bones and teeth of small, and as yet undescribed fossil fishes, some cones, apparently belonging to Lepidodendron, fruit pods and seeds, of sea weeds, and an undescribed species of Goniatites, (chambered shells). Broad, flag-like impressions of sea-weeds are very common all through this shale.

We now come to three classes of large fishes, that have recently been described and named by Professor Newberry. I give extracts from his descriptions, published in the Annals of the New York Academy of Sciences, 1878:

DIPLOGNATHUS MIRABILIS* (N. SP.) N.

" Dentary bone of mandible (under jaw), about eighteen inches long, by two inches in width, anterior half thickens as in Dinichthys, rising into a prominent point anteriorly, which diverges from its fellow of the opposite dentary bone, to form a forked extremity to the under jaw. Upper margin of the anterior half of dentary bone set with strong, conical, smooth, acute, incurved teeth, which dimish in size as they ascend the elevated point. Four larger, conical, recurved teeth, are set on the inner side of the triangular extremity of the mandible, filling the space between the point and the symphysis. A broad, roughened depression or pit at the symphysis marks the place of attachment of a

* Wonderful double-acting jaw.

strong ligament, which unites the mandibles, and prevents the splitting of the forked extremity of the jaw.

"The remarkable structure of the jaw on which the foregoing description is based, is without parallel, so far as known in the animal kingdom The dentary bones are produced forward into triangular divergent points, which are set with teeth on either margin; thus the extremity of the lower jaw forms a fork set with strong recurved tceth. This would form a very effective instrument for catching slender slippery fishes like eels, and was doubtless used for that purpose."

"From the Huron Shale, Sheffield, Lorain county, Ohio. Discovered by Jay Terrell."

DINICHTHYS CORRUGATUS (N. SP.) N.

"Dorsal plate four to five inches long, shield-shaped, terminating anteriorly in an obtuse, posteriorly in an acute point; the sides, irregularly rounded, form a feather-edge, probably buried in the it: tegument. Upper surface gently arched, marked by several obscure longitudinal strife, and by a peculiar transverse crape-like wrinkling. The under surface is uniformly excavated, and arched transversely on either side of the low and sharp central crest. This crest is prolonged into a narrow neck-like process, which projects forward and downward from the margin of the shield, and is excavated in It broad furrow on its upper surface.

"The supra-occipital bone is wedge-shaped and truncated forward, rounded behind, with a low point at the center of its margin. The upper surface is marked with characteristic transverse crape-tike wrinkling; the under surface stopes backward from the middle, with a prominent ridge, which forms the terminal point; anterior to the slope is a semi-elliptical excavation, divided at the bottom in two by a longitudinal ridge."

"An imperfect jaw found with the dorsal plate, and correspond ng in size, is about four inches in length, posterior extremely spatulate and thin; the anterior portion polished without, and terminating above in a sharp edge; the anterior extremity broken away."

"From the Huron Shale, Sheffield, Lorain county, Ohio. Discovered by Jay Terrell."

CTENACANTHUS COMPRESSUS ( N. SP.) N.

"Spine of medium size, perhaps six inches long, much compressed, by one inch and a half wide, strongly arched above; anterior margin smooth, posterior tlattened with a well-marked rounded ridge along the central line. Upper half of posterior face thickly set with conical recurved teeth. Exposed portion wholly covered with fine longitudinal ribs, which are highly ornamented by closely approximated transverse lines."

" Pectination finest on middle and lower portion of sides."

" From the Huron Shale, Sheffield, Lorain county, Ohio. Discovered by Jay Terrell."

I have now mentioned and described all the fossils, so far as I know, that have been discovered within the limits of our county. The Cuyahoga shale which is exposed along the streams in the southern portion of our county, has yielded in Medina and some other places crinoids, mollusks and other small shells, and no doubt these might be found here upon proper search made for them; and possibly new genera and new species.