Southern Apalachia is one of the most heavily mined regions of the U.S. Northern Appalachia, from Upstate New York through Northern New England and ultimately into Canada, has comparatively little resource extraction beyond a history of large scale granite quarrying.
Is this just because the minerals aren't present there or are there other cultural or historic reasons why mining never took place there. If it is simply because coal and other natural resources aren't present there in any significant quantities, what is the geologic explanation for this when it is one mountain range that presumably has the same natural history across its entire length?
This is really a geology question so you might ask at a different sub and get a more detailed answer.
Basically, the minerals (coal and petrochemicals; i.e., energy minerals) aren't there. The Appalachians have mind-bogglingly long and complex geological history spanning about a billion years and including multiple periods of uplift and erosion. The coal and petrochemical deposits formed in what geologists call the Appalachian Basin, which is approximately the western half of the Southern Appalachians. In the Cambrian Period (about 500 million years ago) this was an inland sea and its coastland west of some higher mountains, so it was ideal for formation of coal and petrochemicals from the abundant life. Then in the Permian Period (about 250 million years ago) the Appalachian Basin was uplifted so some of those former seabeds and coastlands ended up on top of mountains. There wasn't a corresponding basin west of the Northern Appalachians, thus they (like the Eastern half of the Appalachians) are mostly just igneous and metamorphic rock without significant exploitable energy mineral deposits.
Hey there,
Just to let you know, your question is fine, and we're letting it stand. However, you should be aware that questions framed as 'Why didn't X do Y' relatively often don't get an answer that meets our standards (in our experience as moderators). There are a few reasons for this. Firstly, it often can be difficult to prove the counterfactual: historians know much more about what happened than what might have happened. Secondly, 'why didn't X do Y' questions are sometimes phrased in an ahistorical way. It's worth remembering that people in the past couldn't see into the future, and they generally didn't have all the information we now have about their situations; things that look obvious now didn't necessarily look that way at the time.
If you end up not getting a response after a day or two, consider asking a new question focusing instead on why what happened did happen (rather than why what didn't happen didn't happen) - this kind of question is more likely to get a response in our experience. Hope this helps!