ABSTRACT

Three basic assumptions are made: (1) tectonic stresses are generated and propagated at depth rather than near the surface, (2) most displacement is horizontal rather than vertical, and (3) the deep, active zone can be studied in terms of the relative motions of more-or-less regular blocks. Model studies based on these assumptions have provided a method of analysis which is here applied to the Southern Appalachians and to various structural elements in Arkansas, Oklahoma and Kansas. The following tentative conclusions are drawn: (1) Deformation of the Southern Appalachians was dominantly left-lateral strike slip, (2) the Oklahoma block (west of Tulsa and Atoka, Oklahoma) was rotated, in a counter-clock-wise direction, by about 40 degrees, late in its deformational history, and (3) the Ouachita Mountains were produced by a combination of rotation and drag-folding, during a sharp, short interval of mountain-making.