Jacobsville Sandstone

Jacobsville Sandstone
Stratigraphic range: Mesoproterozoic-Mid Cambrian
Sample of Jacobsville Sandstone from Jacobsville, Michigan, in the A.E. Seaman Mineral Museum collection
Type	Formation
Underlies	Munising Formation
Overlies	Freda Sandstone
Lithology
Primary	Sandstone
Other	Conglomerate, siltstone
Location
Region	Michigan  Ontario
Country	United States  Canada
Type section
Named for	Jacobsville, Michigan

Jacobsville Sandstone is a red sandstone formation, marked with light-colored streaks and spots, primarily found in northern Upper Michigan, portions of Ontario, and under much of Lake Superior. Desired for its durability and aesthetics, the sandstone was used as an architectural building stone in both Canada and the United States. The stone was extracted by thirty-two quarries throughout the Upper Peninsula of Michigan approximately between 1870 and 1915.

The sandstone has been variously called redstone, brownstone, Lake Superior Sandstone, and Eastern Sandstone. In 1907, the Jacobsville Formation was given its current classification and the name Jacobsville, in honor of Jacobsville, Michigan, a town known for its production of the sandstone. The sandstone was deposited within terrestrial fluvial environments early in the Neoproterozoic Era.^[1]