Stephen C. Minkin Paleozoic Footprint Site
Stephen C. Minkin Paleozoic Footprint Site, formerly the Union Chapel Mine, is a former coal mine that became an important fossil site in Alabama after an Oneonta High School science teacher discovered tracks in the rocks at the site while preparing for a school field trip. The mine belonged to a family member of one of the children in his class. It is east of Jasper, Alabama in Walker County, Alabama.
According to a research paper, the site was once part of a "swampy tropical forest adjacent to a tidal flat during the Coal Age or
The site is paleozoic. Tetrapod fossils have been found at it.[2] The site is one of the most abundant sources of trackways of its age.[3]
Treptichnus and Arenicolites have been found at the site.[4]
The 2016 book Footprints in Stone by Ronald J. Buta and David C. Kopaska-Merkel is about the site and its discovery.[1] In 2012 they wrote a guidebook for the site.[5]
Digs open to the public have been held at the site.
Alabama Public Television aired a Discovering Alabama episode on fossiling and fossil sites in Alabama including this one.[8]
References
- ^ OCLC 942826537. Retrieved 2023-02-21.
- ^ Ehret, Dana J.; Kopaska-Merkel, David C.; Buta, Ronald J. (February 19, 2016). "Footprints in Stone: Fossil Traces of Coal-Age Tetrapods". The University of Alabama Press – via Project MUSE.
- ^ "Stephen C. Minkin Paleozoic Footprint Site". Encyclopedia of Alabama.
- ^ Rindsberg, Andrew K.; Kopaska-Merkel, David C. (2005). "Treptichnus and Arenicolites From the Steven C. Minkin Paleozoic Footprint Site (Langsettian, Alabama, USA)" (PDF). Alabama Paleontological Society Monograph. 1.
- ^ "Field-Trip Guidebook to the Steven C. Minkin Footprint Site, Walker County, Alabama". Alabama Paleontological Society. Retrieved 2023-02-21.
- ^ Underwood, Madison (2014-04-09). "This weekend, your family can dig for fossils in one of the world's premier fossil sites near Sumiton". Advance Local. Retrieved 2023-02-21.
- ISSN 1042-0940.
- ^ "Alabama Fossils". Alabama Public Television. 2021-05-06. Retrieved 2023-02-21.