Upper Mercer flint or Upper Mercer chert is a type of flint, or a pure form of chert, found in Coshocton,

Hocking Hocking may refer to: Places * Hocking County, Ohio, United States * Hocking Township, Fairfield County, Ohio * Hocking Hills, Ohio * Hocking River, Ohio * Hocking Canal, a former canal that ran parallel to the Hocking River * Hocking, Western Aus ...

, and Perry counties of Ohio. Made of forms of silica and quartz, the hard and brittle stone was used by

prehistoric Prehistory, also known as pre-literary history, is the period of human history between the use of the first stone tools by hominins 3.3 million years ago and the beginning of recorded history with the invention of writing systems. The use of ...

people to make tools and weapons. To create

stone tool A stone tool is, in the most general sense, any tool made either partially or entirely out of stone. Although stone tool-dependent societies and cultures still exist today, most stone tools are associated with prehistoric (particularly Stone Ag ...

s, flint was heated to make chipping away at the stone easier, and then the flint was chipped to form razor-sharp edges. Resulting tools included

spearheads An armoured spearhead (American English: armored spearhead) is a formation of armoured fighting vehicles, mostly tanks, that form the front of an offensive thrust during a battle. The idea is to concentrate as much firepower into a small front as ...

, scrapers, knives, and arrows. Ohio flint is found between layers of Cambridge Limestone and Brassfield Limestone. It was deposited during the Paleozoic Era in the seas that covered what is now Ohio. Other deposits can be found in soil moved by glaciers, in glacial till or as erratics. The Welling site, an Upper Mercer flint quarry, is located on the eastern boundary of the town of Nellie in the Walhonding River Valley. It is 14 miles below the

glacial boundary This a partial list of glacial moraines. They are arranged by continents and divided by related hydrologic basins. This list is incomplete. Please improve the listing. North America Moraines of the Great Lakes Region Lake Ontario Basin * Oa ...

in the unglaciated Allegheny Plateau. The hills on either side of the valley are composed of bedrock of the Upper Mercer and Pottsville series. The use of Upper Mercer flint by prehistoric people was first reported in 1945. The quality of the material used to make tools was important in the ability of prehistory and Native American people to thrive and they would travel hundreds of miles to quarry flint to create or replace tools. Tools made from Upper Mercer flint during the Paleo-Indian period were found in what is now Michigan and West Virginia. Tools made from Upper Mercer flint during the Archaic period has been found over multiple states including eastern Indiana, southern Michigan, southern Ontario, western Pennsylvania, and Ohio. It was used most extensively in north-central Ohio. Early European settlers used to grind grain and used for flintlock guns, fire starters, and buhrstones. The state's official gemstone, it is used now for jewelry. Other quarries used by prehistoric people to gather flint in the state include

Flint Ridge Flint Ridge () is a north-south trending ridge with a summit elevation of in the Asgard Range of Victoria Land, Antarctica. On the west side of the ridge is Sagittate Hill, tall and mostly composed of exposed rock. At the south end of the ridge si ...

, a six mile deposit of

Pennsylvanian Pennsylvanian may refer to: * A person or thing from Pennsylvania * Pennsylvanian (geology) The Pennsylvanian ( , also known as Upper Carboniferous or Late Carboniferous) is, in the International Commission on Stratigraphy, ICS geologic timesca ...

-age

Vanport flint Flint Ridge Ancient Quarries and Nature Preserve is a Native American flint quarry located in Hopewell Township, Licking County, Ohio, about three miles north of Brownsville at the intersection of Brownsville Road and Flint Ridge Road. Old qu ...

that spanned western Muskingum and eastern Licking Counties, and Zaleski flint in Vinton and Jackson Counties.

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Further reading