The Sanford 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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Sanford’s center stands about 1,190 ft above sea level. Within three miles the land runs from 1,140 ft to 1,960 ft, a difference of 820 ft: hilly country. The highest named summit within 15 miles is Tower Mountain, about 2,400 ft, 13 miles east.
Under the town center the state geologic map shows Upper Walton Formation (shale, sandstone, conglomerate), from the Late Devonian, 359 to 384 million years old.
The section below crosses 4 rock units mapped at the surface.
Heights every 0.1 mile from the Copernicus GLO-90 surface model; vertical exaggeration about 17×. The colored band under the surface is the rock the state geologic map shows at the surface, not a picture of what lies beneath.
Shale, sandstone, conglomerate. Age: Late Devonian, 359 to 384 million years old. About 17 mi of the line.
Shale. Age: Late Devonian, 359 to 384 million years old. About 5 mi of the line.
Sandstone, conglomerate, shale. Age: Late Devonian, 359 to 384 million years old. About 1 mi of the line.
Shale, sandstone, conglomerate. Age: Late Devonian, 359 to 384 million years old. About 0.4 mi of the line.
From the USGS State Geologic Map Compilation (Horton and others, 2017), the states’ geologic maps joined at a common scale.
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 Sanford reaches Delaware Bay and the Atlantic Ocean by way of Oquaga Creek, the West Branch Delaware and the Delaware: about 320 river miles.
Traced down the USGS NHDPlus V2.1 river network from the Census center point of Sanford; river miles along the main stem, rounded.
