Editing RPI and The Erie Canal (section)

== Geologic Tours ==

Amos Eaton led several expeditions that led to multiple published reports and literature of groundbreaking geological surveying that founded what geologists today know. The more prominent expedition he embarked on was from May to June 10th in 1826. 
May 18th 1826, Eaton took 21 Rensselaer students along the Erie Canal from Albany to Lake Erie on his first geological tour, thanking Stephen Van Rensselaer for the expenditure of over $18,000 on behalf of the research. They left on a canal boat called the “Lafayette” that was towed to Troy, NY along the Hudson River. 


November 23rd, 1826 Eaton wrote a letter published “Notes respecting Diluvial Deposits in the State of New York and elsewhere.” Eaton on his expedition took a Canal Survey which mentioned how he found a “diluvial trough” from Little Falls to the Erie Canal approximately 160 miles in length, saying it “could not have been scooped out and filled by an existing cause.” Eaton took this observation and yielded that it was physical proof of “the Flood” as recounted in the Book of Genesis. The term “diluvial” describes a geological turning point associated with the Biblical Flood. The theory that the Earth was shaped by the flood was often used in early geologists and scientists theories before the Ice Age was a known concept. Eaton in 1830 would later embark on another expedition, this one advertised more prominently as the “Rensselaer School Flotilla” for not only students but also teachers.