In the field of printmaking, there is one technique that hold a particular mystique–and that is called lithography. To make a long story short, this printing method uses huge slabs of special limestone. Traditionally, this limestone has been mined in the quarries of Bavaria near a town named Solnhofen, and because the properties of that stone are quite unique, most of the stone in the world comes from this source. However, right near the Minnesota border in Iowa, there exists an outcropping of a limestone with similar properties, and in 1914-1915 a town sprung up with the the name “Lithograph City”. A nice review of that history can be found here.

This October 18, a field trip is being organized by the “Society for Sedimentary Geology” to these locations of this special limestone, and a printmaking professor will be the speaker at a dinner that evening. Here is a pdf file announcing the field trip. Only printmaking or geology geeks need apply!

Further information from the pdf file follows:

Middle and Upper Devonian Cedar Valley Group and Lime Creek Formation carbonate platform facies and faunas of northern Iowa

The combined 69th TRI-STATE field conference and 2008 GLS-SEPM fall field trip will
focus on carbonate platform deposits and facies of Middle (late Givetian) and Upper Devonian
(Frasnian) rocks in northern Iowa. Stops scheduled for day one will focus on biofacies and
lithofacies of the late Givetian-early Frasnian Lithograph City Formation and the role of micritic
(lithographic) limestones in printmaking. Stops on day two will examine middle and inner shelf
facies and faunas of the middle Frasnian age Shell Rock Formation carbonate platform
deposits, and the middle shelf carbonate platform-ramp deposits fauna, and event history of the
late Frasnian Lime Creek Formation.

Saturday, October 18th
Buses leave the conference hotel parking lot at 8:00am. Field stops will include four exposures
of the Lithograph City Formation in a roughly northwest to southeast transect from Mitchell
County to Black Hawk County. Return to conference hotel at ~5:00pm. Social hour with cash
bar from 6:00pm to 7:00 pm. Banquet at 7:00pm will feature a presentation on lithography by
Dr. Robert Glasgow, Professor of Print, School of Art and Art History, University of Iowa.