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Salisbury Embayment

Bays of DelawareBays of MarylandBays of VirginiaCenozoic
Basins and arches of the Atlantic Coastal Plain
Basins and arches of the Atlantic Coastal Plain

The Salisbury Embayment was an arm of the Atlantic Ocean which covered what is now Delaware, southern and eastern Maryland, the Virginia Peninsula and parts of southern New Jersey during Paleogene and Neogene times, from about 65 million to 5 million years ago. Sea level throughout most of this period stood several hundred feet higher than at present, and deposition of sediments draining off the continent possibly caused the underlying rocks to sink down, creating the embayment. The shore of the embayment lay inland at the present-day Fall Line in the region. Throughout the Paleogene and Neogene times, sediment accumulated on the floor of the Salisbury Embayment during pulses of high sea level, forming the Paleocene Aquia and Brightseat Formations, the Eocene Pamunkey Group, and the Miocene Chesapeake Group. There are no deposits from the Oligocene epoch due to a drop in sea level, however, a 2- to 3- mile diameter meteorite or asteroid is thought to have left a 50-mile diameter crater upon impact in the southern Chesapeake Bay.When sea levels fell as the Pleistocene ice ages took hold, the thousands of feet of sediment layers in the Salisbury Embayment were exposed as the Coastal Plain terrains of Delaware, Maryland and eastern Virginia.

Excerpt from the Wikipedia article Salisbury Embayment (License: CC BY-SA 3.0, Authors, Images).

Salisbury Embayment
Neals School Road,

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N 38.68 ° E -75.7 °
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Neals School Road

Neals School Road
19973
Delaware, United States
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Basins and arches of the Atlantic Coastal Plain
Basins and arches of the Atlantic Coastal Plain
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Gov. William H. Ross House
Gov. William H. Ross House

Gov. William H. Ross House, also known as The Ross Mansion, is a historic home located near Seaford, Sussex County, Delaware. It was built in 1859, and is a two-story, brick mansion in three main connected blocks in an "H"-shape. It is in the Italianate style and features a three-story tower in the central space. The interior retains its original plaster mouldings, its Victorian trim, doors, and original inside shutters. It was the home of Delaware Governor William H. H. Ross (1814-1887), who built the home along the railroad he helped to establish.It was added to the National Register of Historic Places in 1977.The Seaford Historical Society owns the house and operates it as a pre-Civil War period historic house museum known as the Governor Ross Mansion & Plantation. From the Seaford Historical Society's website: "Purchased by the Seaford Historical Society in 1976, this rare and complete Victorian Italianate mansion, ca. 1850s, has been lovingly restored and fully furnished. ... The Gov. Ross Mansion was built in the 1850s by William Henry Harrison Ross for himself and his family. Ross served as the Democratic Governor of Delaware from 1851 to 1855. Extremely popular with the people, he was instrumental in bringing the railroad into Southern Delaware. Trains running daily to Philadelphia vitalized the economy as farmers switched crops from wheat and corn to higher priced tomatoes, strawberries, peaches and other perishables. Ross became a local hero, but he was also a slave owner and Southern sympathizer. When war broke out between the states, Delaware sided with the North. Ross supported the Confederacy, and was forced to England. Today, the Gov. Ross Mansion stands as a reminder of pre-Civil War life." The plantation has the only known slave quarters surviving and documented in Delaware.