John Bulkley Perry and the "Taconic Question"

The Taconic controversy involved the most able minds and the most powerful egos of post-Wernerian geological science. Although John Bulkley Perry was as familiar with the "Taconic" rocks as his more famous contemporaries, his contributions have been overlooked by scholars of American geological history. During the years 1855-1870, Perry studied the Taconic strata, particularly in northwestern Vermont, and through the discovery of fossils, through fieldwork and correspondence with the principal Taconic proponent, Jules Marcou, and later via his few publications, Perry made original and significant contributions to the development of thought regarding the Taconic system of Ebenezer Emmons. The nature and timing of his publications, his extreme humility, his ultimate concern for theological questions, and his death at an early age were all factors in obscuring Perry's role in the history of the Taconic question.