Prof. Charles B. Creager
Kansas Rock Garden

The Emporia State University Kansas Rock Garden is located outside Cram Science Hall as an extension of the geology museum. The idea for a rock garden was conceived in the mid-1980s by Prof. James S. Aber and came to fruition in the early 1990s. The rock garden honors Prof. Charles B. Creager, who was chair of the Division of Physical Sciences (1971-1984). The garden features rocks from the State of Kansas, including glacial erratic boulders, petrified wood, and fence-post limestone. Click on the small images below for full-sized pictures; all images © J.S. Aber.

Construction and general overviews

Delivery of glacial boulders from Marshall County, Kansas. Dick Weatherholt supervises unloading a large boulder. Photo date 7/88.
Building the limestone wall that forms the back of the rock garden. Photo date 3/91.
Pouring concrete for sidewalks of the rock garden. Photo date 9/92.
Overview of the completed rock garden from the northeast. The stone fence posts were quarried in west-central Kansas from the Greenhorn Limestone (upper Cretaceous) by early settlers. Digital-camera image; photo date 4/01.
Students and faculty prepare to view a partial solar eclipse from the rock garden. Photo date 5/94.

Individual rocks and fossils

Granite boulder with lichen cover (green spots). This glacial boulder was collected in Marshall County, northeastern Kansas. It was carried by an ice sheet from northern Minnesota or Canada. Digital-camera image; photo date 4/01.
Quartzite conglomerate boulder collected from Wabaunsee County, northeastern Kansas. It was carried by an ice sheet from the Sioux Quartzite bedrock of southwestern Minnesota or southeastern South Dakota. Digital-camera image; photo date 4/01.
Boulder of "greenstone" from the Canadian Shield of northern Minnesota or Canada. The red pocket knife rests on a flat, glacially planed surface. This specimen was collected in Marshall County, northeastern Kansas. Digital-camera image; photo date 4/01.
Glacial pavement on quartzite from Red Rock Ridge, southern Minnesota. Note the distinctive scratches and grooves. Digital-camera image; photo date 4/01.
The largest single glacial boulder consists of green matrix with large quartz crystals, a type of volcanic rock, such as dacite or latite--see igneous rocks. This specimen was collected in Marshall County, northeastern Kansas. It was carried by an ice sheet from northern Minnesota or Canada. Digital-camera image; photo date 4/01.
Large nodules of chert (flint) from the lower Permian strata of the Flint Hills, Butler County, south-central Kansas. Digital-camera image; photo date 4/01.
Petrified wood--tree stump and portion of trunk from the Flint Hills of Greenwood County, east-central Kansas. Digital-camera image; photo date 4/01.
View of the top of the petrified tree stump. This remarkable fossilized tree is early Permian in age. Digital-camera image; photo date 4/01.
Fossil coral from the Clay Creek Member, upper Pennsylvanian strata, Woodson County, southeastern Kansas. Digital-camera image; photo date 4/01.

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Last update 2 May 2001.