Drifting Continents:

When Columbus first changed the world map, Africa, Asia, and Europe were already know to mapmakers. When people looked at the map they wandered why all the continents matched so well. A theory changed the way people looked at maps forever.

A Theory of Continental Drift:

Alfred Weneger made people believe that the seven continents used to be connected and had moved a couple inches a year but maybe less. He named this super continent Pangea. This word means all lands. Pangea existed more than one hundred million years ago if his theory is even correct. While all the continents were supposedly joined together, that's when bugs and insects first appeared. They started to show up in tropical forests which covered very large parts of the earth then.

After tens of millions of years Pangea started to break apart. The pieces started to move (and are still moving today) and formed our continents that we have today. The words for the move is "Continental Drift."

To get people to believe him, Weneger had to get evidence to support his ideas and convince people to believe that the continents had moved and are still moving now.

Evidence From Land forms:

Mountain ranges provide evendence for continental drift. When Weneger made a map of South America and Africa he noticed really strange things. Mountains lines on his map going from east to west from South America and Africa lined up with Argentina.

In the deep part of the ocean the temperature is almost freezing and is really dark. Were it is like this, things rarely live. But some places that are like this are overflowing with life. "The East Pacific rise is just one part of the Mid Ocean Ridge which is the longest mountain range in the world." What the Mid Ocean Ridge does is curves like the seam on a softball or baseball. It does this on the ocean floor and it goes on to all the oceans in the world.

Evidence From Fossils:

Wegener also used fossils to back up his evidence on the continental drift.There is a plant that is called Glossopteris and it is a fernlike plant that established over two hundred and fifty years ago. Fossils from this plant have been found in Africa, South America, Australia, India,and Antarctica. Because the fossils were spread out so much Wegener thought that the continental drift must have happened because the fossils are so far apart.