Potton beds in Bedfordshire, the Shotover iron sands of Oxfordshire, the sands and fuller’s earth of Woburn, the Leighton Buzzard sands, the brick clays of Snettisham, and perhaps the Sandringham sands of Norfolk, and the carstone of that county and Lincolnshire. The upper ironstone, limestone and clay of the Lincolnshire Tealby beds appear to belong to this horizon along with the upper part of the Speeton beds of Yorkshire. The sands of the Lower Greensand are largely employed for the manufacture of glass, for which purpose they are dug at Aylesford, Godstone, near Reigate, Hartshill, near Aylesbury and other places; the ferruginous sand is worked as an iron ore at Seend.
This formation is continuous across the channel into France, where it is well developed in Boulonnais. According to the continental classification the Atherfield Clay is equivalent to the Urgonian or Barremian; the Sandgate and Hythe beds belong to the Aptian (q.v.); while the upper part of the Folkestone beds would fall within the lower Albian (q.v.).
See the Memoirs of the Geological Survey, “Geology of the Weald” (1875), “Geology of the Isle of Wight” (2nd ed., 1889), “Geology of the Isle of Purbeck” (1898); and the Record of Excursions, Geologists’ Association (London, 1891). (J. A. H.)
GREENSBORO, a city and the county-seat of Guilford county,
North Carolina, U.S.A., about 80 m. N.W. of Raleigh. Pop.
(1890) 3317, (1900) 10,035, of whom 4086 were negroes;
(1910 census), 15,895. Greensboro is served by several lines
of the Southern railway. It is situated in the Piedmont region
of the state and has an excellent climate. The city is the seat of
the State Normal and Industrial College (1892) for girls; of the
Greensboro Female College (Methodist Episcopal, South;
chartered in 1838 and opened in 1846), of which the Rev. Charles
F. Deems was president in 1850–1854, and which, owing to the
burning of its buildings, was suspended from 1863 to 1874; and of
two institutions for negroes—a State Agricultural and Mechanical
College, and Bennett College (Methodist Episcopal, co-educational,
1873). Another school for negroes, Immanuel Lutheran College
(Evangelical Lutheran, co-educational), was opened at Concord,
N.C., in 1903, was removed to Greensboro in 1905, and in 1907
was established at Lutherville, E. of Greensboro. About 6 m. W.
of Greensboro is Guilford College (co-educational; Friends),
founded as “New Garden Boarding School” in 1837 and rechartered
under its present name in 1888. Greensboro has a
Carnegie library, St Leo hospital and a large auditorium. It is
the shipping-point for an agricultural, lumbering and trucking
region, among whose products Indian corn, tobacco and cotton
are especially important; is an important insurance centre; has
a large wholesale trade; and has various manufactures, including
cotton goods[1] (especially blue denim), tobacco and cigars,
lumber, furniture, sash, doors and blinds, machinery, foundry
products and terra-cotta. The value of the factory products
increased from $925,411 in 1900 to $1,828,837 in 1905, or 97.6%.
The municipality owns and operates the water-works. Greensboro
was named in honour of General Nathanael Greene, who on the
15th of March 1781 fought with Cornwallis the battle of Guilford
Court House, about 6 m. N.W. of the city, where there is now a
Battle-Ground Park of 100 acres (including Lake Wilfong); this
park contains a Revolutionary museum, and twenty-nine monuments,
including a Colonial Column, an arch (1906) in memory
of Brig.-General Francis Nash (1720–1777), of North Carolina,
who died in October 1777 of wounds received at Germantown, and
Davidson Arch (1905), in honour of William Lee Davidson (1746–1781),
a brigadier-general of North Carolina troops, who was killed
at Catawba and in whose honour Davidson College, at Davidson,
N.C., was named. Greensboro was founded and became the
county-seat in 1808, was organized as a town in 1829, and was
first chartered as a city in 1870.
GREENSBURG, a borough and the county-seat of Westmoreland
county, Pennsylvania, U.S.A., 31 m. E.S.E. of Pittsburg.
Pop. (1890) 4202; (1900) 6508 (484 foreign-born); (1910) 5420.
It is served by two lines of the Pennsylvania railway. It is an
important coal centre, and manufactures engines, iron and brass
goods, flour, lumber and bricks. In addition to its public school
system, it has several private schools, including St Mary’s
Academy and St Joseph’s Academy, both Roman Catholic. About
3 m. N.E. of what is now Greensburg stood the village of Hanna’s
Town, settled about 1770 and almost completely destroyed
by the Indians on the 13th of July 1782; here what is said to
have been the first court held west of the Alleghanies opened on
the 6th of April 1773, and the county courts continued to be held
here until 1787. Greensburg was settled in 1784–1785, immediately
after the opening of the state road, not far from the trail
followed by General John Forbes on his march to Fort Duquesne
in 1758; it was made the county-seat in 1787, and was incorporated
in 1799. In 1905 the boroughs of Ludwick (pop. in 1900,
901), East Greensburg (1050), and South-east Greensburg (620)
were merged with Greensburg.
See John N. Boucher’s History of Westmoreland County, Pa. (3 vols., New York, 1906).
GREENSHANK, one of the largest of the birds commonly
known as sandpipers, the Totanus glottis of most ornithological
writers. Some exercise of the imagination is however needed to
see in the dingy olive-coloured legs of this species a justification
of the English name by which it goes, and the application of that
name, which seems to be due to Pennant, was probably by way
of distinguishing it from two allied but perfectly distinct species
of Totanus (T. calidris and T. fuscus) having red legs and usually
called redshanks. The greenshank is a native of the northern
parts of the Old World, but in winter it wanders far to the south,
and occurs regularly at the Cape of Good Hope, in India and
thence throughout the Indo-Malay Archipelago to Australia.
It has also been recorded from North America, but its appearance
there must be considered accidental. Almost as bulky as a
woodcock, it is of a much more slender build, and its long legs
and neck give it a graceful appearance, which is enhanced by
the activity of its actions. Disturbed from the moor or marsh,
where it has its nest, it rises swiftly into the air, conspicuous
by its white back and rump, and uttering shrill cries flies round
the intruder. It will perch on the topmost bough of a tree,
if a tree be near, to watch his proceedings, and the cock exhibits
all the astounding gesticulations in which the males of so many
other Limicolae indulge during the breeding-season—with
certain variations, however, that are peculiarly its own. It
breeds in no small numbers in the Hebrides, and parts of the
Scottish Highlands from Argyllshire to Sutherland, as well as
in the more elevated or more northern districts of Norway,
Sweden and Finland, and probably also thence to Kamchatka.
In North America it is represented by two species,
Totanus semipalmatus and T. melanoleucus, there called willets,
telltales or tattlers, which in general habits resemble the greenshank
of the Old World. (A. N.)
GREENVILLE, a city and the county-seat of Washington county, Mississippi, U.S.A., on the E. bank of the Mississippi river, about 75 m. N. of Vicksburg. Pop. (1890) 6658; (1900) 7642 (4987 negroes); (1910) 9610. Greenville is served by the Southern and the Yazoo & Mississippi Valley railways, and by various passenger and freight steamboat lines on the Mississippi river. It is situated in the centre of the Yazoo Delta, a rich cotton-producing region, and its industries are almost exclusively connected with that staple. There are large warehouses, compresses and gins, extensive cotton-seed oil works and sawmills. Old Greenville, about 1 m. S. of the present site, was the county seat of Jefferson county until 1825 (when Fayette succeeded it), and later became the county-seat of Washington county. Much of the old town caved into the river, and during the Civil War it was burned by the Federal forces soon after the capture of Memphis. The present site was then adopted. The town of Greenville was incorporated in 1870; in 1886 it was chartered as a city.
- ↑ One of the first cotton mills in the South and probably the first in this state was established at Greensboro in 1832. It closed about 20 years afterwards, and in 1889 new mills were built. Three very large mills were built in the decade after 1895, and three mill villages, Proximity, Revolution and White Oak, named from these three mills, lie immediately N. of the city; in 1908 their population was estimated at 8000. The owners of these mills maintain schools for the children of operatives and carry on “welfare work” in these villages.
