The Hancock 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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Hancock’s center stands about 2,900 ft above sea level. Within three miles the land runs from 1,140 ft to 3,080 ft, a difference of 1,940 ft: steep hill country. The highest named summit within 15 miles is Mount Abraham, about 3,990 ft, 15 miles north.
Under the town center the state geologic map shows Fayston Formation - albite schist member (muscovite-schist), from the Neoproterozoic to Early Cambrian, 521 to 1,000 million years old.
The section below crosses 22 rock units mapped at the surface.
Heights every 0.1 mile from the Copernicus GLO-90 surface model; vertical exaggeration about 7×. The colored band under the surface is the rock the state geologic map shows at the surface, not a picture of what lies beneath.
Phyllite. Age: Neoproterozoic to Cambrian, 487 to 1,000 million years old. About 3 mi of the line.
Phyllite, muscovite-schist. Age: Neoproterozoic to Cambrian, 487 to 1,000 million years old. About 3 mi of the line.
Phyllite. Age: Cambrian, 487 to 542 million years old. About 2 mi of the line.
Phyllite, metagraywacke. Age: Neoproterozoic to Early Cambrian, 521 to 1,000 million years old. About 2 mi of the line.
Amphibolite, greenstone. Age: Neoproterozoic to Cambrian, 487 to 1,000 million years old. About 1 mi of the line.
Metagraywacke, conglomerate, phyllite. Age: Neoproterozoic to Cambrian, 487 to 1,000 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. 16 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 Hancock reaches Long Island Sound and the Atlantic Ocean by way of Grindstone Brook, Hancock Branch, the White River and the Connecticut: about 270 river miles.
220 miles of the trip are on the Connecticut.
Traced down the USGS NHDPlus V2.1 river network from the Census center point of Hancock; river miles along the main stem, rounded.
