Clayton Formation
Lithostratigraphy: Embayment Megagroup >>Clayton Formation
Chronostratigraphy: Cenozoic Erathem >>Tertiary System >>Paleocene Series
Primary source
Willman, H. B., Elwood Atherton, T. C. Buschbach, Charles Collinson, John C. Frye, M. E. Hopkins, Jerry A. Lineback, and Jack A. Simon, 1975, Handbook of Illinois Stratigraphy: Illinois State Geological Survey Bulletin 95, 261 p.
Contributing author(s)
H. B. Willman and John C. Frye
Name
Original description
Clayton Formation (Landon, 1891, p. 594).
Derivation
Named for exposures near Clayton, Barbour County, Alabama.
Other names
History/background
Type section
Type location
Type author(s)
Type status
Reference section
Reference location
Reference author(s)
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Stratigraphic relationships
Extent and thickness
The Clayton Formation is persistently present at the base of the Paleocene Series in southern Illinois (Pryor and Ross, 1962). It is well exposed in a small ravine northwest of U.S. Dam 53 in Pulaski County (SE NW NE 13, 15S-1E). It is commonly 15-20 feet thick.
Lithology
The Clayton consists of glauconitic, micaceous, green to buff silty clay that is sandy and pebbly at the base. The Clayton is generally less sandy and more glauconitic than the Owl Creek Formation below, and the contact, which is unconformable, is marked by pebbles of white and black chert and iron oxide in the base of the Clayton.
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Contacts
Well log characteristics
Fossils
Foraminifera are the main fossils in the Clayton Formation, but the remains of radiolarians and other plankton also are present.
Age and correlation
Environments of deposition
Economic importance
Remarks
References
LANDON, D. W., 1891, Variations in the Cretaceous and Tertiary strata of Alabama: Geological Society of America Bulletin, v. 2, p. 587-605.
PRYOR, W. A., and C. A. ROSS, 1962, Geology of the Illinois parts of the Cairo, La Center, and Thebes Quadrangles: Illinois State Geological Survey Circular 332, 39 p.
ISGS Codes
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