bluuebunny/crossref_metadata_2025 huggingface dataset:
Not "Just A Petrographer": The Life and Work of Felix Chayes (1916-1993)
Authors: Howarth Richard
Published: April 2015

Felix Chayes's life and career, largely spent at the Geophysical Laboratory of the Carnegie Institution, Washington, DC, are described. His principal motivation was to improve the reliability of geological interpretation and decision-making through the use of quantitative techniques and the application of statistical methods: e.g., as discussed in his monograph Petrographic Modal Analysis (1956b). He attempted to raise the awareness of the geological community concerning the inherent problems connected with the interpretation of percentaged- and ratio-data, in both petrography and geochemistry, and to develop approaches to their solution (as discussed in his monograph Ratio Correlation, 1971a), although these were never wholly successful. From the mid-1960s onwards, he was deeply involved in the development and application of geochemical databases for igneous petrology (International Geological Correlation Programme—1GCP—Projects 163 and 239). From 1984 he was Chair of the International Union of Geological Sciences (IUGS) Subcommission on Electronic Databases for Petrology. Emphasis is placed on Chayes's early research as this established the motivation for his statistical approach to petrology.
Henry A. Ward and the Recovery of the Santa Rosa, Colombia, Meteorite
Authors: Plotkin Howard
Published: April 2015

Henry A. Ward (1834-1906), the celebrated founder and owner of Ward's Natural Science Establishment, one of the most interesting and significant North American scientific institutions in the late 19th century, was also perhaps the shrewdest and most enthusiastic meteorite collector of his day. Toward the end of his career, at age 68, he became very interested in a large (612.5 kg) iron meteorite in Santa Rosa, Colombia that was highly venerated by the local townspeople. In an effort to obtain the meteorite in whole or in part—and hopefully clear up the scientific confusion surrounding it—he journeyed to Santa Rosa in the winter of 1906. His attempt to retrieve the meteorite led to a clever plan with local officials, a daring nighttime removal, and a heated legal battle with the national police, but eventually he was allowed to leave Colombia with a large piece of the meteorite. His subsequent investigation of the meteorite is examined, as is our present understanding of it and its relationship to two meteorites found nearby, Rasgatá and Tocavita. Ward's actions shed light on attitudes and practices in natural history collecting at his time, and how scientists grappled with the problem of interpreting meteoritic structure.
The Central Laboratory of the International Council for the Exploration of the Sea (ICES) and Its Successors
Authors: Smed Jens
Published: April 2015

The International Council for the Exploration of the Sea (ICES) was established in 1902 for the coordination of studies of the Northern Seas. The first intergovernmental marine science organization, ICES played a leading role in marine research for many years. Essential for its work was standardization of the methods and instruments used in the research. Critical for this aim was the establishment of a central laboratory to ensure uniformity of the methods used in hydrography1 and marine biological research. Director of the laboratory, set up in Christiania (Oslo) in 1902, was the Norwegian marine scientist and polar explorer Fridtjof Nansen (1861-1930). During the few years (1902-1908) that the laboratory existed Nansen and his two scientific assistants, Vagn Walfrid Ekman (1874-1954) and Charles J. J. Fox, made pioneering work. When the laboratory was dissolved a few of its functions were assigned to the hydrographical assistant at the ICES office in Copenhagen, Martin Knudsen (1871-1949), who later on developed his own international laboratory. In his several capacities, Knudsen and his laboratory exerted great influence upon the development of marine research.
Pioneering Geologic Studies of the Black Hills, Dakota Territory, USA
Authors: Aalto K.
Published: April 2015

Discovery of significant gold deposits in the Black Hills, Dakota Territory, in the early 1870s led to a Congressional mandate that organized geological exploration of the Hills be undertaken. Ferdinand V. Hayden (1829-1887), who had previously visited the region, principally to collect fossils, was thwarted in his efforts to oversee such exploration by the combined efforts of John Strong Newberry (1822-1892) and John Wesley Powell (1834-1902), who instead promoted Walter P. Jenney (1850-1904?) and Henry Newton (1845-1877), both colleagues of Newberry at the Columbia College School of Mines. In a four-month field season the Jenney/Newton Survey (1875) carefully examined some 6,000 square miles of the Black Hills. Newton then oversaw production of an extensive report on the geology, mineral resources and other aspects of natural history. The report included a detailed geologic map, numerous stratigraphic columns, interpretive figures illustrating the geomorphic evolution of the Hills, thin section petrography of samples collected and a general discussion of the geologic history. Of note are Newton's interpretations of laccolith formation and drainage evolution. Despite Congressional approval funding production, the publication of the report was delayed until 1880, after Newton's untimely death in 1877 during a second visit to the Hills. It appeared under the auspices of John Wesley Powell's Geographical and Geological Survey of the Rocky Mountains Region. G. K. Gilbert (1843-1918) unofficially edited the final version of the report, using Newton's notes, drafts and figures. However, Newton should justly receive credit for its excellence.
Stratigraphic Stand-Off at the 49th Parallel
Authors: Fuller J.
Published: April 2015

The 49th Parallel divides the western Prairies between Canada and the United States, crossing the central part of the Williston basin and marking the International boundary that separates Saskatchewan from the States of Montana and North Dakota. Discoveries of oil in this area during the 1950s triggered widespread geological activity, and revealed significant differences of stratigraphical understanding on each side of the border. Problems seemed to arise from contrasts between ‘American' and ‘English' interpretations of stratigraphical method, particularly for the oil-producing zones of the Mississippian. This study analyzes the differing points of view, and presents historical reasons for them. Difficulties with stratigraphical method and nomenclature in the 1950s were quite real, becoming the subject in 1959 of a special AAPG-SEPM conference at Dallas. Had the delegates attending that meeting (including the present author) possessed a little more history, they would have known that an ‘American' or mineral-focused view of stratigraphy had originated in a German hard-rock mining terrane, principally through the teaching of Abraham Werner. From there, during the first years of the 19th century, it traveled via Scotland to the State of New York, where, from Amos Eaton's Rensselaer School at Troy, it spread to most of the newly-formed State geological surveys. Some years later, on the other hand, an ‘English' or ‘stratum-focused' view of stratified formations migrated across the Atlantic from the pastoral landscapes and gently inclined rock-formations of southern England, where mapping had tended to discount their mineral content in favor of their observable order and continuity.
Charles Lyell, Geologic Change and "Causes Now in Operation"
Authors: Breyer John
Published: April 2015

Charles Lyell's philosophy of science required uniformity of law, kind and degree as a priori methodological assumptions. Lyell adhered to a philosophy of science most authoritatively articulated in his time by the astronomer John F. W. Herschel. His strict interpretation of Herschel's version of the verae causae doctrine necessitated uniformity of kind and uniformity of degree. These methodological assumptions placed severe constraints on Lyell, which he loosened by using what William Whewell termed the method of gradation to extend "now" into the remote geologic past. Lyell believed that known processes operating at present intensities could effect enormous changes either when summed over long periods of time or when acting in unique situations. He clearly recognized the concept of recurrence interval and allowed the intensity of "causes now in operation" to vary to almost any degree so long as the variation was cyclic, not directional. Lyell may have been wrong in assuming uniformity of degree, but he was not confused. His philosophy of science required uniformity of degree as an a priori assumption.
Two Remarkable Women Geologists of the 1920s: Emily Hahn (1905-1997) and Katharine Fowler (1902-1997)
Authors: Dott Robert
Published: April 2015

Emily Hahn and Katharine Fowler challenged gender barriers decades ahead of modern feminism, and, together with other pioneering women geologists, they provide inspiration for all. They met at the University of Wisconsin in 1925. Hahn had chosen engineering because a professor said women can not be engineers. Rejecting an office-only mining career, she then found her ultimate calling as writer and world traveler, spending two years in the Belgian Congo (1931-33) and eight in China (1935-43). During the Japanese occupation of Hong Kong, she had a daughter by a British officer, whom she married in 1945. Fowler came from Bryn Mawr College to Wisconsin to compete in a men's world. They forced acceptance as the first women to take a mining geology field trip and a topographic mapping field course. Later, in disguise, Fowler gained admission to a Black Hills mine and then did Ph.D. field work alone in Wyoming. After an African Geological Congress, she worked in the Sierra Leone bush (1931-33) and then began teaching at Wellesley College (1935). She attended a 1937 Soviet Union Geological Congress, taking harrowing field trips in the Caucusus Mountains and Siberia. From 1938, she and her new husband, Harvard geologist Marland Billings, collaborated in important New England research.
Magnetic World: The Historiography of an Inherently Complex Science, Geomagnetism, in The 20th Century
Authors: Good Gregory
Published: April 2015

The 20th century witnessed a succession of remarkable developments in the history of geomagnetic research. After 1900, geomagnetic researchers increased their activity as they adopted theories by C. F. Gauss and J. C. Maxwell and developed means to bridge the gulf between these theories and masses of data of global phenomena. This paper outlines three main streams in 20th-century geomagnetic research: investigations of processes deep inside the Earth that produce the main geomagnetic field, examinations of crustal magnetism, and research into processes on the edge of space, where Earth's magnetic field interacts with the interplanetary environment. This discussion places these research streams in the historiographic context of disciplinary specialization and transformation. In the early 20th century, geomagnetic researchers thought of their domain as all of Earth's magnetic and electric phenomena. In mid-century, however, many researchers began to narrow their gaze to one problem area or another. This specialization contributed to a period of dramatic developments in the latter half of the century: geodynamo theory, paleomagnetic evidence of plate tectonics, computer modeling of magnetic reversals, and discovery of the solar wind, radiation belts, and magnetic substorms. But there was more to this period than simple specialization. As researchers gradually shifted their research programs, their methods, instruments, and theories moved from one program to another, researchers sometimes going with them. Chameleons and opportunists frequently left one research program for another, more promising one. This paper closes with a discussion of the possibility of "re-connection" among these specializations, as researchers have begun once again to communicate across inter-field lines.
Murchison's Research Method: An Example from Southern Norway
Authors: Diemer John
Published: April 2015

Roderick Impey Murchison (1792-1871) was an eminent geologist whose reputation was in large part based on a research method that comprised an efficient fieldwork procedure followed by public presentations and publication of his findings. His research method enabled him to survey large areas rapidly, apply recent advances in the science of geology to those large areas, and present his results in a timely and widespread manner with maximum impact. This paper focuses on Murchison's two-week visit to Norway in 1844, and the presentation of his findings in the aftermath of that visit, to illustrate his research method in action. Not only did his work result in a significant advance in the understanding of the geology of Norway, but Murchison also applied his Norway results to issues of wide interest in the developing science of geology. In particular, his work in Norway resulted in: (1) an appreciation of the extent of Paleozoic rock systems in Norway; (2) a new name, Azoic, for the older, nonfossiliferous basement rocks; (3) the recognition of the effects of younger igneous intrusions on country rock; (4) a proposed classification scheme for metamorphic grade; and (5) a proposed classification scheme for igneous rocks based on the timing of intrusion.
On the Margins of Science and Civilization: W. K. Gordon's 1895 Geological Reconnaissance in the Trans-Pecos Borderlands
Authors: Francaviglia Richard
Published: April 2015

In 1895, self-trained mining engineer William K. Gordon, Sr (1862-1949) conducted a geological reconnaissance trip to far West Texas in search of coal deposits. A report from that trip reveals how Gordon's training in geology (acquired largely through reading) and his intrinsic interest in stratigraphy and geomorphology helped him effectively advise the Texas and Pacific Coal Company about the bleak prospects there. In 2005, using Gordon's never-before consulted field report, the author retraced, or rather re-hiked, Gordon's route. Gordon's report features hand-drawn maps and a geological cross-section that were field checked and compared to later data. The author concludes that Gordon enthusiastically, but often inaccurately, described the complex petrology in the rugged, semi-arid Eagle Mountains. Gordon was evidently vexed by how to identify some of the highly varied extrusive igneous rocks here. Nevertheless, Gordon's work should be recognized as the earliest serious geological reconnaissance in a remote area that would much later (1963) be studied in detail by geologists who had at their disposal considerably better tools to analyze the petrology, and possessed a growing awareness of plate tectonics that were unknown in Gordon's time.
Hydrographic Work of the INGOLF Expedition (1895 and 1896) to Icelandic and West Greenland Waters
Authors: Smed Jens
Published: April 2015

The Danish expedition in the summers of 1895 and 1896 on board the cruiser Ingolf to Icelandic and West Greenland waters mainly had zoological tasks, the results of which are treated in the present issue by Wolff. However, the expedition also obtained significant results in physical oceanography. The existence of a vast subsurface ridge, the Reykjanes Ridge, was proved. On the basis of the hydrographic stations worked, the expedition's physicist and chemist Martin Knudsen was able to describe the hydrographic situation of the area. He proved the division of the Irminger Current into an easterly and westerly branch northwest of Iceland, and the extent and magnitude of the East Icelandic Polar Current were established. The existence of an overflow over the Iceland-Faroe Ridge of cold, low-salinity bottom water from the Norwegian Sea into the Atlantic was demonstrated. Knudsen designed a new, reliable reversing thermometer for use on the expedition, and he constructed an instrument that made it possible to measure aboard the ship the content of oxygen and nitrogen dissolved in the water. He showed that the supersaturation of surface water with oxygen might be explained from the photosynthetic processes of phytoplankton.
Steps in the History of Mudstone Investigations—A Timeline, 1556 Through 2007
Authors: Potter Paul , Maynard J. , Huff Warren
Published: April 2015

In 1556, Agricola published the first detailed description of a mudstone posthumously, but it was not until 1747 that one of them (a black shale) was formally defined by William Hooson. A review of the world literature since Hooson's time shows a slow, steady activity in the study of mudstones in the 1800s, a sharp break to more frequent activity in the early 1920s, a decline during World War II, followed by a return to the pre-war level, but then followed in the 1990s by a possible decrease in activity.

The trends are similar for both conceptual advances and for new techniques. The break in the 1920s was led by new technologies that expanded observations down to the angstrom level with X-ray diffraction and up to the formation scale with down-hole geophysical logging and seismic reflection. A comparison with a similar compilation for igneous and metamorphic rocks shows the same three phases—early slow phase, intermediate rapid phase punctuated by the Second World War, final slower phase—but in the case of the crystalline rocks, the rapid phase begins much earlier, in the 1880s. We suggest that the common techniques of that time—the petrographic microscope and wet chemistry—were well suited to the investigation of crystalline rocks, but the breakthrough for mudstones had to wait for new technologies.
Madame Curie, Baron de Rothschild, Professor Lacroix and the Madagascar experiment
Authors: Hogarth Donald
Published: April 2015

From 1912 to 1926, over 100 tonnes of crystals of radioactive minerals were shipped from Madagascar to France. The enterprise involved three important people: the indefatigable Professor Alfred Lacroix, who discovered these minerals in material donated to museum collections, the doctor and heir to family fortunes, Henri de Rothschild, who funded a refinery to treat them, and the scientist and humanitarian, Mme Marie Curie, who researched the product of this refinery, namely radium. First intended for medical purposes, in World War I, radium from Madagascar crystals was mainly used to illuminate dials in armored vehicles. After Armistice, it was employed in cancer treatment and research. However, in the 1920s, owing to access to more easily processed ore, the commodity price fell, along with France's import of crystals. By the end of 1926, after a fifteen-year struggle, the once-promising experiment failed; mining and shipment of radioactive crystals ceased.
Notes on Some Early Geological Investigations in Kansas
Authors: Merriam D.
Published: April 2015

Just a little more than 250 years ago, a Frenchman passed up the Kaw (Kansas) River Valley and made note of the granite and quartzite boulders for what may have been the first recorded notes on the geology of Kansas. Most of the early records were sporadic and not systematically taken. Early expeditions were mainly military; later ones were railroad surveys. Scientists, if on the expeditions, were natural scientists and not geologists, so descriptions usually were of topography, agriculture suitability, transportation feasibility, climate, botany, and other natural phenomena, but seldom of the geology. Documents of these early expeditions, including those of expeditions of Lewis and Clark (1804-6), Pike (1805-7), Long (1819-20), Fremont (1843-45), Emory (1846-47), Stansbury (1849), Marcy (1852), and Beckwith (1853-54) were in a narrative form - long on generalities but short on detail. Thus by the mid-19th century, the geology of Kansas was known only in a general way.

The ‘Great American Desert’ was a place to cross, not to stay. The influx of gold seekers and those wanting to exploit the land changed everything and information on the geology became important. To fill the void, ‘guides’ by a variety of self-styled experts on the history, geography, climate, mineral resources, soils, etc., were issued as aids to the emigrants. The guides, usually published by the author, were interesting and popular but included little scientific information. In 1852, David Dale Owen was commissioned a "United States Geologist" and made observations in northeastern Kansas as part of a larger survey. Other geological observations were made by members of early federal government-sponsored territorial surveys of the West. The fossils collected on these surveys and by collectors were described by paleontologists - most reports described the different, new, or spectacular finds. In 1864 the State commissioned the first geological survey headed by B. F. Mudge; the second survey was created in 1865 with G. C. Swallow as State Geologist. Thus the State government assumed responsibility for the surveying - mostly with the idea of making an inventory of economic resources and promoting development of the young state. During the period from creation of the second geological survey in 1865 to the third in 1895, the Kansas Academy of Science Transactions served as one of the leading outlets for information on Kansas geology. The systematic and regular recording of the geology of Kansas commenced in 1895 with creation of the third (and present) State Geological Survey in Lawrence with Erasmus (Daddy) Haworth appointed State Geologist.
Dean Chapman's Contributions to Tektite Science
Authors: Norwick Stephen
Published: April 2015

Dean Roden Chapman (1922-1995), an engineer and scientist at NASA Ames Research Center, was one of the founders of astronautics (rocket science). He used his laboratory to produce objects that are very similar to Australian tektites. There were two major questions about tektites in his day: did they come for the Earth or the Moon? And were they caused by meteor impacts or volcanic eruptions? Chapman came to believe that tektites were caused by meteor impacts on the Moon. He made many contributions to our understanding of tektites and was also one of the people who helped NASA get to the Moon. One percent of the Moon was covered with little glass spheres, but they are quite different from the tektites known on the Earth. The data from the Moon rocks was largely incompatible with the theory that terrestrial tektites are derived from the Moon. Chapman stopped publishing papers about tektites, but he remained interested in the subject for the rest of his life and believed that in the long run the lunar impact theory might become dominant again as new data was returned from the Moon. From our present understanding of tektites and the Moon, Chapman failed because he privileged the facts that he generated himself in his laboratory. He was not prepared to study the messy complexity of natural products. He was misled by the meteorite science traditions used in tektite science. He did not use appropriate statistical procedures, and because he was such a famous scientist in his own field the editors of two major journals in which he published did not properly assist him when he was working outside his area of major competence.
"The sea fryseth not": science and the open polar sea in the nineteenth century
Authors: Carter Christopher
Published: April 2015

While generally dismissed by historians as a romantic fantasy, the theory of an open polar sea fit into the context of a more unified view of the natural world developed in the early nineteenth century and exemplified by romantic philosophical ideas. Oersted's discovery of electromagnetism encouraged research into the possible connections between electricity, magnetism, heat and light. At the same time, there was renewed interest in geomagnetism inspired by Hansteen's revival of the four-pole theory of the Earth's magnetic field. Incorporating these works into a new theory of climate created a space for an ice-free Arctic by allowing a milder climate in the high latitudes. This attempt to fuse the study of meteorology and geomagnetism reinforced existing beliefs in an open polar sea and placed this sailor's dream into a holistic worldview that joined different natural phenomena in an effort to find one unifying principle behind all of nature.
British pioneers of the geology of Gibraltar, Part 1: the artilleryman Thomas James (ca 1720-1782); infantryman Ninian Imrie of Denmuir (ca 1752-1820); and ex-militiaman James Smith of Jordanhill (1782-1867)
Authors: Rose Edward
Published: April 2015

The rocky peninsula of Gibraltar juts south from Spain at the western entrance to the Mediterranean Sea. Long famous as a landmark, it was ceded to Great Britain by the Treaty of Utrecht in 1713, and progressively developed as a naval and military base. Thomas James, a Royal Artillery officer stationed on Gibraltar from 1749 to 1755, was the first member of the British garrison to publish geological observations on the Rock, within a book of 1771 completed in New York. His military career culminated after active service against revolutionary Americans, finally in the rank of major-general, but with no further known contributions to geology. The Scotsman Ninian Imrie of Denmuir, an officer of the First Regiment of Foot (The Royal Scots), served on Gibraltar within the period 1784 to 1793, and was the first to publish an account specifically on its geology, in the Transactions of the Royal Society of Edinburgh in 1798. A career soldier, he achieved the rank of lieutenant-colonel before retiring to Scotland, and to amateur geological studies influenced by active membership of Edinburgh's Wernerian Natural History Society. James Smith of Jordanhill, near Glasgow, served in Great Britain in the Renfrewshire Militia during the Napoleonic Wars but, benefiting from a family fortune, later spent much time as a yachtsman and scholar of wide interests and influence. His studies on Gibraltar, published by the Geological Society of London in 1846, were the first to attempt a tectonic interpretation of the Rock's geological history, and to record local evidence for Quaternary sea level change.
Maurice Ewing, Frank Press, and the long-period seismographs at Lamont and Caltech
Authors: Warner Deborah
Published: April 2015

The name attached to a scientific instrument may identify the scientist(s) who contributed most to its design or, as was the case with the first successful long-period seismographs, the scientist(s) who captured credit for this achievement. These notable instruments were developed at the Lamont Geological Observatory in the early 1950s and funded by the Department of Defense. They were used to understand the structure of the earth and to detect underground bomb tests. Maurice Ewing and Frank Press, the principal investigators, were alpha males whose competition with each other resembled the Cold War relationship between the United States and the Soviet Union. Press moved to the Seismological Laboratory at the California Institute of Technology in 1955. Lehner and Griffith, a small Pasadena firm that was closely connected with the Seismo Lab, began manufacturing "Press-Ewing" seismographs in 1958, and Press was soon applying this term to all devices of this sort, even those that had gone before.
The Earth Sciences in a Small University
Authors: Corgan James
Published: April 2015

Austin Peay State University is a small school, founded 56 years ago. While geology has long been taught, major programs are less than a decade old. Despite small size and shallow historical roots, the earth science faculty have been able to participate in the evolution of American geology through publication and through work on NSF projects. Many small colleges have comparable histories.
Early Medical Dissertation Research on Tennessee Geology
Authors: Corgan James
Published: April 2015

Unpublished doctoral dissertation that predate American Ph.D. programs are an underutilized source of information on the geology of Tennessee, and on other geological topics. The nature of early doctoral research is briefly described and four pioneer dissertations, submitted in M.D. programs, are reviewed. The first dates from 1822 and the last from 1840. Each has continuing academic value, but must be viewed within the context of nineteenth century culture.
Geological Education in Georgia Before 1861
Authors: Cramer Howard
Published: April 2015

Before the war there were private and "old field" public elementary schools, and also private, individual- and church-supported high-schools called academies, seminaries, or institutes. Some even used the word college. Geology and mineralogy were taught in some of the academies, depending upon the availability of teachers; most had the typical classical education of the day.

There were four colleges: Franklin [the University of Georgia], Mercer [Baptist], Oglethorpe [Presbyterian], and Emory [Methodist]. All had geology in the curriculum, either as a distinct one-semester course [combining the present-day physical and historical geology] or as part of a course in natural history. None was a center of great scientific strength, although both Franklin and Oglethorpe had the services of Joseph LeConte for a short while.

Brief biographies of John R. Cotting, James Jackson, Joseph Jones, William L. Jones, Joseph LeConte, Alexander Means, Josiah Meigs, George W. W. Stone, Joseph Willett, and James Woodward are included.
The Biogeographical Aspect of the Debate Over Continental Drift
Authors: Frankel Henry
Published: April 2015

This paper examines the biogeographical component of the sixty-year controversy over the reality of continental drift. It begins with an examination of Wegener's solution to the problem of accounting for the distribution of life forms having a geographically disjunctive distribution and traces the development of the problem through the work of the major as well as many minor participants in the controversy. It closes with a discussion of the most important impact of the acceptance of plate tectonics upon the biogeographical community, namely, the rise of meta-biogeography.
Specialities, Problems, and Localism the Reception of Continental Drift in Australia 1920-1940
Authors: Le Grand H.
Published: April 2015

Although A.L. Wegener signalled that the Australasian region was an important testing-ground for his theory of continental drift, his views aroused little interest among Australian scientists in the period 1920-1940. I argue that specialization and geological "localism" were important factors in this response. Most scientists were silent or perhaps passively resistant, I suggest, because they saw no particular value in the theory for the problems which occupied them. Those few who did publicly support or oppose the theory often did so with respect to specialist concerns or specific problems. This response has implications not only for the general story of the "modern revolution" in the earth sciences but also for philosophical and social models of their acceptance.
A History of Geological Thought
Authors: Visher Glenn
Published: April 2015

The history of the geological sciences has gone through substantive changes in perception, methodology, and changing methods of scientific synthesis. This progression has led to changes in the philosophy of scientific endeavor in the geological sciences. In addition, geological scientists have contributed to the other sciences in changing the methods of demonstrating and validating scientific hypotheses. Scientific approaches useful in one field may not be applicable in all fields of inquiry, and proofs must be demonstrated by differing types of synthesis. Inductive, deductive, teleological, analogous, causal, experimental, developmental, empirical, or conceptual methods have been used in the geological sciences.

Geological thought can be placed in an historical framework from 18th Century Naturalism, to Rationalism of the 19th Century, deductive inferences from causality and experiment, and of special importance, historical syntheses based upon analogous comparison. Actualistic comparisons and quantification were the goals between 1945 and 1965.

The inability to validate geologicl hypotheses in terms of mathematics was a real crisis in geological thought. This inability also was found to exist in physics and mathematics by Heisenberg and Gödel. The introduction of the conceptual model by Rosenblueth and Wiener, 1944-5, provided a new approach to validating hypotheses. Observation could be synthesized by the use of an "idea" or "schema". The model was a useful tool or device that provided the bases for the interrelation of observations, for directed observation, and for prediction of new patterns of observation. Models are now applied to all types of geological observation, and have placed geological thought on a par with other sciences utilizing mathematical theorems. The model approach is a multivariant analysis of independent types of observation. Geologic thought is in transition to new methods and approaches. The new approach is beyond inference, "look alike" comparisons, and statistical statements of association; it is now truly a creative synthesis verifiable by experience, experiment, and new observations.
The Nation's Gem Collection — One Hundred Years
Authors: White John
Published: April 2015

In 1984 the Smithsonian's National Gem Collection celebrated its 100th anniversary. It has grown from a 1,000 specimen collection, which was assembled by F.W. Clarke for the 1884 New Orleans Exposition, and little of which is now exhibited, to a highly respected major gem collection that ranks among the best in the world. From its inception the collection has grown steadily, but it was not until 1958, when the Museum was given the Hope Diamond, that the addition of phenomenal pieces of jewelry and first class gems began. The most recent of these additions was the 168-carat emerald pendant that dominates the Anna Case Mackay necklace, received through bequest in 1984.

Unfortunately, the gem hall is twenty-eight years old, and its age is all too obvious. Obtaining funding for a complete renovation of the exhibit is a high priority of the Museum's staff.
Rudolf Ruedemann: Inheritor of James Hall's Graptolite Legacy
Authors: Berry William
Published: April 2015

James Hall's (1865) Graptolites of the Quebec Group was cited by O. M. B. Bulman as "the first work of real insight" in the study of graptolites. In that work. Hall established standards of excellence in graptolite descriptions and illustrations that future students of graptolites had to match or surpass. Hall also suggested possible phyletic relationships among graptolites and a potential mode of life for them. As well, he reviewed their stratigraphic and geographic distributions. During his career, Hall amassed a large collection of New York graptolites. Only near the end of his career did a person emerge with the seeming skills and insights who could carry out a study of Hall's New York graptolite collection in a style that could match Hall's work with the Quebec Group graptolites. That person was Rudolf Ruedemann. Ruedemann, though he had little contact with Hall, inherited Hall's legacy. That legacy was detailed, precise illustrations and descriptions of graptolites as well as analyses of their relationships, modes of life, and distributions in space and time. Ruedemann carried out that task inherited from Hall, publishing two monographs on New York graptolites. Ruedemann went on in his own career to demonstrate the usefulness of graptolites in solving geologic problems and to document the usefulness of geologic mapping in establishing stratigraphic and geographic distribution patterns among fossils.
James Hall and Fossil Corals
Authors: Oliver William
Published: April 2015

During his long career, James Hall named and described over 250 species and several genera of fossil corals, mostly of Middle Silurian to Middle Devonian age. Hall's principal coral works were published in 1843, 1877, 1882-84, and (with G. B. Simpson) 1887. Sporadic work on corals continued to 1898, the year of his death. In spite of shortcomings, his four main contributions provided the taxonomic base for much of the later work on Helderberg, Onondaga and Hamilton corals in New York and adjacent areas.

Beginning in 1868, George B. Simpson was one of Hall's many assistants. He began as illustrator, became a describer of corals and bryozoans, and ultimately co-author of the 1887 work. His own study of Paleozoic coral genera, based on thin section analyses, began the post-Hall era of coral work in eastern North America.
The Duke, The Professors, And the Great Coral Reef Controversy of 1887-1888
Authors: Stoddart D.
Published: April 2015

In September 1887 the Duke of Argyll published an article entitled ‘A great lesson’ denouncing Darwin's coral reef theory and alleging that it continued to be supported in the face of new evidence contradicting it because of the authority of Darwin's name and the status of his disciples in British science. His attack touched off a robust correspondence in The Nineteenth Century which soon spread to Nature, and in which T. H. Huxley was the chief defender both of Darwin's views and of scientific procedures. Partly this controversy revolved around the interpretation of coral reefs themselves, but partly also it sprang from the resentment of scientists at the Duke's charge that they were swayed in their judgements by other than objective scientific criteria and modes of argument. The Duke was, in effect, anticipating later interpretations of science as a social activity, but as a result of the exaggerated and polemical nature of his contributions this insight was lost sight of as the scientists defended both their methods and Darwin's views. On the substantive question of the origin of coral reefs the Duke and his supporters were later shown to be largely wrong and Darwin largely right, and the incident did nothing to advance the understanding of the reefs. Had this discussion not eclipsed the Duke's point about the nature of reasoning and judgement in science, he might have made a more lasting contribution to the understanding of science itself.
Three Concepts of Fabric Statistics (Curie 1884, Schmidt 1925, and Niggli 1948) and Their Modifications and Elaborations, A Historical Discussion
Authors: Kirchmayer Martin , Germany F.
Published: April 2015

There are three concepts of fabric statistics: (1) the NEUMANN-MINNIGERODE-CURIE (1884) concept; actually Curie originated the fabric models, based on crystallographic elements of the cause-symmetry, media-symmetry, and effect-symmetry. (2) the SCHMIDT (1925) or SANDER (1930) concept classifies fabric diagrams keyed to rock types and to the kind of deformation, and is based on 5 types of tectonites. (3) the NIGGLI (1948) concept, a general symmetry concept, referring to morphology, which can be applied to all media in the entire field of natural and pure sciences.

All three concepts are typically European. In the 1920's and 1930's some American researchers travelled to Europe to study the techniques of fabric statistics. Among them was Haff (1938) who holds the American priority. Today universal stage research is not very common in the U.S.; instead, macrofabrics are studied by geological compass. In the application of the Schmidt-Sander concept to geological environments, Rueger (1928) of Heidelberg holds the priority.

This paper compares the three concepts, and deals with their developments and elaborations in Europe, in regard to their use in a precise 3-dimensional way, on a thin section scale.
Edward Daniel Clarke: The First Professor of Mineralogy at Cambridge
Authors: Roller Duane
Published: April 2015

In 1808, Edward Daniel Clarke was appointed the first professor of mineralogy at Cambridge. This seems peculiar, since Clarke was not a mineralogist, but an antiquarian and world traveller. Nevertheless, the appointment was not unreasonable. Clarke had long been an enthusiastic, almost obsessive collector of minerals, travelling extensively through Scandinavia, Russia, and the ancient world, acquiring minerals, flora, and especially antiquities, and the university was greatly in his debt for the vast collections he gave it. Cambridge was not to regret its choice, for his ability at teaching is reflected in the quality of his students.
Henry Rowe Schoolcraft and the Native Copper of the Keweenaw
Authors: Krause David
Published: April 2015

The Keweenaw copper district of northern Michigan is unique. All other copper mining regions of the world produce primarily ores of copper compounds, but for more than a century that began in the 1840s the Keweenaw produced copper from one mineral: native copper. A major contribution toward recognizing and understanding the importance of this form of copper was made by Henry Rowe Schoolcraft. His travels through Lake Superior occurred at a time when native copper was believed to have no economic importance by those who represented the newly emerging professional tradition in geology. Although their opinions caused him some uncertainty, the observations he made on the Cass expedition of 1820 formed the basis for his important insights into the possibilities that native copper held for future mining. Perhaps better known for his work on the ethnology of the American Indians and his discovery of the source of the Mississippi River, Schoolcraft's reports and publications on the copper of the Keweenaw brought that region to the attention of the country and helped to provide an accurate assessment of its true potential.
Geologic Time: A Semiotic Probing
Authors: Paschoale Conrado , de Mendonca Figueiroa Silvia
Published: April 2015

Time is a continuum and is real, according to Peircean theory. It is also the constitutive category of geology that is equivalent to the Peircean category of Thirdness. As a continuum, time was created and evolved. Although the conceptions of a linear and a cyclic time played a role in the development of geological science, they were not deduced from geological observations; they were a priori assumptions. Hence, time is a methodological device. Continuity, for Peirce, exists on evolutionary terms. Chance or Firstness is always present in every phenomenon. So, time is continual rather then continuous, a continuum where new possibilities of development can be added, by the action of Chance or Firstness. The notion of cycle in geologic time should be reviewed. For Peirce real time is multiply- or n-tracked. Real time is open to firstness. According to this, geologic time is the vestige, a great vestige, of the fixed and definite track which, within the n-possibilities of development, the planet evolved, incorporating changes produced by chance.
The Age of the Earth in the Twentieth Century
Authors: Brush Stephen
Published: April 2015

At the end of the nineteenth century, Lord Kelvin's upper limit of only 20 or 30 million years for the age of the Earth was challenged by the American geologist T. C. Chamberlin, who showed that Kelvin's model of an Earth gradually cooling from an initial molten state was not the only possible one. Kelvin's limit was soon afterwards repealed by the new science of radioactivity, which yielded ages of a few billion years. While some geologists resisted this expanded time-scale, Chamberlin was the only one who could provide a comprehensive cosmogonical theory that did not submit to the epistemological superiority of physics and astronomy. In the 1940s, as radiometric age determinations improved in accuracy, they came into conflict with the expanding-universe cosmology — a conflict which the cosmologists eventually avoided by expanding their distance and time scales. In 1953, Patterson announced the result 4.5 billion years, which is still accepted as the best estimate for the age of the Earth. But geologists, liberated from Kelvin's limit, define the epoch of the Earth's formation as being outside the scope of their science, and their textbooks rarely give credit to the person who established the number that once seemed so important to accounts of the Earth's history.
W. D. Matthew, Fossil Vertebrates and Geological Time
Authors: Rainger Ronald
Published: April 2015

William Diller Matthew (1871-1930) was one of the leading vertebrate paleontologists of the early twentieth century. His taxonomic and phylogenetic researches significantly changed the understanding of evolution of many families and orders of mammals. In addition, Matthew was much concerned with geological questions. His biostratigraphic studies considerably refined understanding of the localities and ranges of Tertiary vertebrate fauna in the western United States, and he extended those interpretations to define correlations between American stratigraphic units and those in other areas of the world. On the basis of that work, Matthew made notable contributions to the understanding and improvement of the geological time scale.
Biography of William Harlow Reed: The Story of a Frontier Fossil Collector
Authors: Breithaupt Brent
Published: April 2015

William Harlow Reed was born in Hartford, Connecticut in 1848. His adventurous spirit led him to the Rocky Mountain West to take positions guiding, hunting game, and fighting Indians. In 1877, while working as a foreman for the Union Pacific Railroad at Como, Wyoming, he accidentally discovered large bones on the nearby ridge. These specimens, reported to O.C. Marsh at Yale University, heralded him into a career in vertebrate paleontology that he would pursue for the next 38 years. Although frustrated by certain aspects of field work and lack of recognition as a field paleontologist, he was a diligent and loyal collector for Marsh. He gave this same dedication in later years to W. C. Knight at the University of Wyoming and W. J. Holland at the Carnegie Museum. Although not formally educated in the sciences, Reed's desire to learn, interest in natural phenomena, and association with the notable paleontologists of his time, allowed him to gain a background in geology and paleontology. After more than 25 years of significant discoveries of dinosaurs, ichthyosaurs, plesiosaurs, pterosaurs, mammals, and cycads in Wyoming, Reed was given the position as curator of the museum and instructor in geology at the University of Wyoming in 1904. He held this position until his death in 1915.
Moisture Drydown in Ultra-High-Purity Oxygen Systems
Authors: Ma Ce , Verma Nishith
Published: April 2015

Semiconductor manufacturing fabs use ultra-high-purity (UHP) oxygen for various process applications such as oxide growth, plasma etch, and chemical vapor deposition. Moisture is identified as one of the key impurities that can affect device production. Moisture drydown in inert gas delivery systems was studied extensively. However, moisture drydown or outgassing characteristics in oxygen were found to be different from those of inert gas systems. Moisture adsorption and desorption in UHP oxygen systems were studied using advanced APIMS techniques for trace-level moisture analysis. To understand moisture reaction pathways, isotopic water was used as an adsorbate on 316L electropolished stainless steel (EPSS) surfaces. Experimental results from moisture drydown in the EPSS tubing were used to validate a theoretical model developed to predict the moisture drydown performance of large-scale, oxygen distribution systems. Both experimental and model results were shown to be useful in UHP oxygen system design, cost control, metrology, and contamination control.
Validation of a Simple Formula for Force Limits in Vibration Testing
Authors: Haile William
Published: April 2015

A new formula for the limiting force to be used in dual control vibration testing is explored by use of a simple but general-purpose example. The results of the force formula are compared with the exact solution and found to be in excellent agreement. Extrapolation from random vibration to sine sweep testing is included.