The Hersey plate. Relief from Copernicus GLO-30; rivers and lakes from USGS NHD; watersheds from the USGS Watershed Boundary Dataset; roads and city limits from Census TIGER 2024.
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Hersey’s center stands about 810 ft above sea level. Within three miles the land runs from 600 ft to 1,620 ft, a difference of 1,020 ft: steep hill country. The highest named summit within 15 miles is Mount Chase, about 2,430 ft, 3 miles northwest.
Under the town center the state geologic map shows Silurian undifferentiated pelites and sandstones (slate, sandstone), from the Silurian, 422 to 445 million years old.
The section below crosses 11 rock units mapped at the surface.
Heights every 0.1 mile from the Copernicus GLO-90 surface model; vertical exaggeration about 11×. The colored band under the surface is the rock the state geologic map shows at the surface, not a picture of what lies beneath.
Slate, sandstone. Age: Silurian, 422 to 445 million years old. About 10 mi of the line.
Sandstone, mudstone. Age: Early Cambrian, 521 to 542 million years old. About 4 mi of the line.
Mafic-volcanic, felsic-volcanic. Age: Ordovician, 445 to 487 million years old. About 2 mi of the line.
Mudstone, sandstone. Age: Ordovician to Silurian, 422 to 487 million years old. About 1 mi of the line.
Limestone. Age: Silurian, 422 to 445 million years old. About 1 mi of the line.
Conglomerate, sandstone. Age: Silurian, 422 to 445 million years old. About 1 mi of the line.
From the USGS State Geologic Map Compilation (Horton and others, 2017), the states’ geologic maps joined at a common scale. 5 smaller units along the line are not listed.
Heights from Copernicus GLO-90 (a surface model: it includes buildings and tree canopy); summits from USGS GNIS; rivers from USGS NHDPlus HR; rock from the USGS State Geologic Map Compilation.
A raindrop that lands in Hersey reaches the Atlantic Ocean by way of Alder Brook, the West Branch Mattawamkeag, the Mattawamkeag and the Penobscot: about 170 river miles.
Lake on the way: Upper Mattawamkeag Lake.
85 miles of the trip are on the Penobscot.
Traced down the USGS NHDPlus V2.1 river network from the Census center point of Hersey; river miles along the main stem, rounded.
