A short history of geology
Created by DavidBressan on Apr 29, 2011
Last updated: 12/18/11 at 09:16 AM
The Icelandic volcano Grímsvötn causes an ash cloud as response of strong phreatomagmatic eruption, activity lasted until May 25.
http://bigthink.com/ideas/38526
Five years ago, at 5 o'clock in the morning of May 29, the inhabitants of the village of Sidoarjo in East Java witnessed the beginning of the eruption of a mud volcano - and still today every day nearly 30.000 cubic metre of gasses, water and mud emerge from the underground.
http://historyofgeology.blogspot.com/2011/05/29-may-2006-birth-of-mud-volcano-of.html
The Plattenkalk of Pietraroia became worldwide known to the paleontological community in 1998, when a nearly complete skeleton of a dinosaur was described by the Italian palaeontologists Cristiano Dal Sasso and Marco Signore in an article in the prestigious journal "Nature" and the new species named Scipionyx samniticus.
http://historyofgeology.blogspot.com/2011/06/in-geology-we-cannot-dispense-with.html
September 19, 1991 – 20 years ago – two German tourists, Helmut and Erika Simon, accidentally discovered the body emerging from the ice near the Similaun Hut (Ötztaler Tyrolean Alps) after a period of marked ablation, helped by sunny weather and the deposition of Saharan dust on the glacier ice, that absorbed much of the solar radiation.
The prehistoric mummified corpse – soon known worldwide as “Ötzi” the Iceman – together with its unique set of artefacts provided a unique opportunity for the research of a Copper-Age culture in the European Alps.
http://blogs.scientificamerican.com/history-of-geology/2011/09/19/september-19-1991-the-iceman-natural-history/
Pinatubo (Philippines) was, despite some activity of fumaroles, not considered an active or dangerous volcano.
April 2, 1991 an initial explosive eruption phase occurred on a 1,5 kilometre long fissure, until June 8, the eruption changed to a more effusive type with a climax June 15, when the eruption plume reached a height of 20.000 meter.
http://historyofgeology.blogspot.com/2011/06/15-june-1991-pinatubo-eruption-climax.html
The eruption started at 15:00 o’clock local time November 13, 1985 with smaller explosions in the crater. Ash was carried by the wind in north-eastern direction, however only minor ash fall occurred in the city of Armero (Colombia), located 48 kilometers east of the “Cumanday“ – the smoking nose, as the Indians used to call the volcano.
In the evening the intensity of the eruption increased, however it was still considered only a medium sized event for the Nevado del Ruiz. At 23:00 most of the 25.000 inhabitants of Armero were sleeping, despite some preoccupation for the sounds coming from the distant mountain, then suddenly – as an eyewitness describes – “the world screamed.”
http://blogs.scientificamerican.com/history-of-geology/2011/11/13/november-13-1985-the-nevado-del-ruiz-lahars/
The eruption started at 15:00 o’clock local time November 13, 1985 with smaller explosions in the crater. Ash was carried by the wind in north-eastern direction, however only minor ash fall occurred in the city of Armero (Colombia), located 48 kilometers east of the “Cumanday“ – the smoking nose, as the Indians used to call the volcano.
In the evening the intensity of the eruption increased, however it was still considered only a medium sized event for the Nevado del Ruiz. At 23:00 most of the 25.000 inhabitants of Armero were sleeping, despite some preoccupation for the sounds coming from the distant mountain, then suddenly – as an eyewitness describes – “the world screamed.”
http://blogs.scientificamerican.com/history-of-geology/2011/11/13/november-13-1985-the-nevado-del-ruiz-lahars/
Mining activities for silver-bearing minerals have been carried out in the Stava-Valley, in the Italian province of Trento, since the 16th century. In the early 20th century, especially since 1934, the interest shifted to fluorite, an important mineral for the chemical industry. The most important mine was situated at the base of the mountain of Prestavel, overlooking the entire Stava-Valley.
http://blogs.scientificamerican.com/history-of-geology/2011/07/19/july-19-1985-the-val-di-stava-dam-collapse/
On Sunday May 18, at 8:32 an earthquake of magnitude 5.1 triggered one of the largest landslide-avalanche ever to be recorded (estimated 2.8 cubic kilometres of rocks and ice) on the northern slope of the Mount St. Helens, followed by a gigantic explosion. In just 60 seconds the mountain shrinked from 2.950m to 2549m, 600 square kilometres were devastated by a 600°C hot pyroclastic density current and the burst of the explosion. The melting glacier ice and the overspill of Spirit Lake caused lahars that devastated the valley of the Toutle Rivers.
http://historyofgeology.blogspot.com/2011/05/may-18-1980-tah-one-lat-clah-or-st.html
"The Valley of Gwangi" (1969) is considered one of the most important productions in the history of the genre of prehistoric movies and one of the best works of special effects artist Ray Harryhausen.
http://historyofgeology.blogspot.com/2011/06/cowboys-dinosaurs-adn-eohippus-valley.html
"Quatermass and the Pit" was in origin a black and white science-fiction/horror TV-serial broadcasted in 1958 and 1959. The story based on a script by Nigel Kneale was later adapted by the British Hammer Film Productions (a company notoriously known for its B-movies) to a movie with same title (1967). Curiously in the U.S. the film was released under the title "Five Million Years to Earth" and in Germany "Das grüne Blut der Dämonen" ("The green blood of the demons", probably influenced by one autopsy scene).
http://historyofgeology.blogspot.com/2011/05/five-million-years-of-terror-quatermass.html
In the late afternoon of March 27. 1964 Alaska was shattered for three to five minutes by one of the (second) strongest and destructive earthquakes ever to be recorded in modern times, magnitude 9.2.
The earthquake displaced almost the entire south coast of Alaska along Prince William Sound, some areas were raised by 9 meters and along some faults the displacement reached 15 meters. The Earthquake caused heavy damage on 75% of buildings and infrastructure in Alaska, the costs of the disaster was estimated in hundreds of millions dollars, but because of the sparsely inhabited area hit, death toll was low with only 131 people killed.
Ground fissures opened; more than 2.000 landslides and avalanches occurred across south-central Alaska, most remarkable were the generated tsunamis, its effects observed even in Japan. Buildings in Seattle (Washington) begun to swing by the approaching seismic wave, the ground was measurable deformed even in Florida.
On some lakes in Alaska the movement of the water cast chunks of ice onto the land, causing damage on the surrounding trees up to 9 meters above ground. Unusual water movements, attributed cautiously to the earthquake, were observed in the South Dakota and so far as Puerto Rico and Australia.
In Anchorage the earthquake was felt for 10 seconds, then the ground collapsed, up to 400 meter long fissures opened, houses and streets were engulfed by the liquefied underlying argillite.
http://historyofgeology.blogspot.com/2011/03/27-march-1964-alaska-earthquake.html
September 7, 1936 the last officially living thylacine (Thylacinus cynocephalus) died at the Hobart Zoo, modern lore attributed him the name Benjamin and a gruesome death – neglected and forgotten he (or more probably she) died from depression and the harsh weather.
http://blogs.scientificamerican.com/history-of-geology/2011/09/07/september-7-1936-the-last-thylacine/
Caricature published in the newspaper "Ledger" 03.05.1927 depicting the "Old Man River" affected by a severe case of "floods".
The Secretary of Commerce Herbert Hoover and the Commander of the Engineer Corps Major General Edgar Jadwin of the US-Army endorse the common (snake oil ?-)cure: higher and higher dams as projected for the Mississippi River and Tributaries Project after the great flood of 1927 - despite modern methods like reforestation, flood management and limitation of construction in flood plains, dismissed as new-fashion drugs, are available.
http://historyofgeology.blogspot.com/2011/05/old-man-river.html
Roy Chapman Andrews (1884 -1960) was an American explorer, adventurer, naturalist, studied mammologist and later director of the American Museum of Natural History.
In his youth he financed his study by offering services as a taxidermist, a self-taught art. After graduation he tried to get a job at the Natural History Museum, but there were no position vacant. Chapman however did not surrender and responded that he was even willing to clean the floors, if this could him bring into the museum.
Surprised by such ardour, he was hired as janitor and assistant taxidermist. Maybe mocking him in friendly way he was assigned every morning to mop the floors in the taxidermy studio; the afternoons were then devoted to real taxidermy.
However by incessant work and an incredible enthusiasm he managed to lure attention on his persona and he was granted a raise in salary, a full time job as taxidermist and asked to guide guests to the museum. In 1907 he was send on his first expeditions.
http://historyofgeology.blogspot.com/2011/06/roy-chapman-andrews-and-kingdom-of.html
http://historyofgeology.fieldofscience.com/2011/11/november-17-1918-ghost-of-slumber.html
http://historyofgeology.fieldofscience.com/2011/11/november-17-1918-ghost-of-slumber.html
Shortly after midnight of the new-year day of 1916 the Austrian army initiated the mine wars at the Dolomites front with the detonation of 300kg of explosives inside of the Lagazoui. A large boulder was blasted off but it caused only minor damage on the huts of the Italian position.
http://historyofgeology.blogspot.com/2011/05/war-geology.html
In the night between 14. to the 15. April 1912 the passenger liner "R.M.S. Titanic" collided with an iceberg, two hours later at 2:20 the ship sank, 1490 to 1517 passengers died in the cold water of the Atlantic.
The story of the ship became part of history and pop culture, but the story of the iceberg that caused the disaster is less understand or known, only vague descriptions and some photos exists of the supposed iceberg(s).
http://historyofgeology.blogspot.com/2011/04/15-april-2010-iceberg-that-sank-titanic.html
This week we remembered the struggle and final triumph to reach one of the last large white spots of the globe: the interior of the southern continent of Antarctica. 100 years ago only segments of the coast and the approximately contours of Antarctica were known – a perfect scenario for the imagination of writers.
http://blogs.scientificamerican.com/history-of-geology/2011/12/17/geology-of-the-mountains-of-madness/
In the morning of June, 30 1908 eyewitnesses reported a large fireball crossing the sky above the region of the Stony Tunguska (PodkamennayaTunguska) in Siberia. A series of thunder was heard to the village of Achajewskoje - in a distance of 1.200 kilometres.
At the same day at various meteorological stations of Europe seismic and pressure waves were recorded, and in the following days strange atmospheric phenomena were observed, silvery glowing clouds, colourful sunsets and luminescence in the night.
http://historyofgeology.blogspot.com/2011/06/30-june-1908-tunguska-event.html
One of the firsts to note something unusual where the sailors of the transport ship "Wellington" entering the bay in early morning of April 18. 1906, the captain reports that the ship "shivered and shook like a springless wagon on a corduroy road" even if the sea was as "smooth as glass".
At the shores of Ocean Beach the worker Clarence Judson was taking a swim in the sea when he was grabbed by a strong current and sucked into the deep - only with great effort he reached the coast:
"I tried to run to where my shoes, hat and bathrobe lay, but I guess I must have described all kinds of figures in the sand. I thought I was paralyzed. Then I thought of lightning, as the beach was full of phosphorescence. Every step I took left a brilliant iridescent streak. I jumped on my bathrobe to save me."
In Washington Street the police sergeant Jesse Cook observed a terrifying spectacle:
"The whole street was undulating. It was as if the waves of the ocean were coming toward me, billowing as they came..[]"
"Davis Street split right open in front of me, … A gaping trench. . . about six feet deep and half full of water suddenly yawned and sprang up on the sidewalk at the southeast corner while the walls of the building I had marked for my asylum began tottering. Before I could get into the shelter of the doorway those walls had actually fallen inward. But the stacked-up cases of produce that filled the place prevented them from wholly collapsing."
The Geography professor George Davidson awoke from the tumult coming from the street, he grabbed his wristwatch on the desk and noted the length of a first quake - 60 seconds- and the second - again 20 to 40 seconds - and the time that later will be the official date of the great earthquake of San Francisco: 5:12.
http://historyofgeology.blogspot.com/2011/04/april-18-1906-great-san-francisco.html
George Gaylord Simpson (1902-1984) was born in Chicago in a religious family, but already in childhood he rejected religion as childish behaviour and displayed an intense interest in facts.
At age 16 he entered University to become a writer, but in the second year he enrolled in a geology course, and following the advice of his instructor Arthur Tieje he changed to Yale University as the best place to study geology and palaeontology
http://historyofgeology.blogspot.com/2011/06/paleomammologist-george-gaylord-simpson.html
At 7:50 in the morning the Pelée blew itself to pieces. For hours after the four explosions the city burned, and for days it was unapproachable by the great heat emanating from the ruins.
Estimated 28.000 to 40.000 people died, only three survivors were reported.
http://historyofgeology.blogspot.com/2011/05/may-8-1902-la-pelee.html
"Perhaps, however, the most important evidence of what was actually going on at Krakatoa during the crisis of the eruption is that derived from witnesses on board ships which sailed between Java and Sumatra while the great outburst was in progress, or those that were at the time in the immediate vicinity of either the eastern or western entrance of the Sunda Strait. From many more distant points, however, valuable confirmatory or supplementary evidence has been obtained, for which we are indebted to the captains or passengers of vessels passing through the eastern seas during that period. Only three European ships appear to have actually within the Sunda Strait during the heigth of the eruption on the night of the 26th August and the early morning of the 27th, and to have escaped destruction, so that those on board could tell the tale of what they witnessed. "
http://historyofgeology.blogspot.com/2010/08/august-27-1883-krakatoa-day-world.html
The fossil forests of Specimen Ridge and Amethyst Mountain, both situated in the Yellowstone National Park, are peculiar because of many preserved trees still found as upright trunks and stumps emerging from the sediments. The geologist, anthropologist and artist Dr. William H. Holmes was the first to study the outcrop of Amethyst Mountain and published his observations in 1878: "As we ride up the trail that meanders the smooth river bottom [the Lamar River] we have but to turn our attention to the cliffs on the right hand to discover a multitude of the bleached trunks of the ancient forests. In the steeper middle portion of the mountain face, rows of upright trunks stand out on the ledges like the columns of a ruined temple. On the more gentle slopes farther down, but where it is still too steep to support vegetation, save a few pines, the petrified trunks fairly cover the surface, and were at first supposed by us to be shattered remains of a recent forest."
September 2011 marks the 150 years anniversary of the description of an important paleontological discovery – Archaeopteryx lithographica, the first Mesozoic bird recognized by science and considered at the time a compelling proof of Darwin’s theory, published just two years earlier.
http://blogs.scientificamerican.com/history-of-geology/2011/09/30/september-30-1861-the-first-feather/
Under severe examination of Richard Owen soon the first models of all known giant lizard of the time - Ichthyosaurus, Plesiosaurus, pterodactyls and the dinosaurs Megalosaurus, Iguanodon and Hylacosaurus (today referred as Hylaeosaurus) were completed.
Owen reconstructed the Iguanodon as large, quadruped rhinoceros, ignoring the discoveries of Mantell, who noted that the forelegs are smaller than the hind legs.
http://historyofgeology.blogspot.com/2010/07/dinosaur-as-kangaroo.html
It was May 1, 1851 when the first World's fair under the title "Great Exhibition of the Works of Industry of All Nations" was inaugurated in Crystal Palace in Hyde Park. Half a million people gathered there coming with one thousand state carriages and two thousand cabs from all over London - in the end more than six million people will visit the exhibition between May 1, to October 15.
http://historyofgeology.blogspot.com/2011/05/may-1-1851-vision-of-world-and-all.html
Reconstruction of the glacier that filled the valley of St. Amarin (southern Vosges, France), probably the first tentative reconstruction of an ice age glacier - from COLLOMB (1847): "Preuves de l´existence d´anciens glaciers dans les vallées des Vosges."
In a letter to Jean Louis Rodolphe Agassiz the German geographer Alexander von Humbolt mocks his increasing interests in glaciers: "I am afraid you work too much, and (shall I tell you frankly?) that you spread your intellect over too many subjects at once. I think that you should concentrate your moral and also your pecuniary strength upon this beautiful work on fossil fishes .... In accepting considerable sums from England, you have, so to speak, contracted obligations to be met only by completing a work which will be at once a monument to your own glory and a landmark in the history of science ...[ ]...No more ice, not much of echinoderms, plenty of fish..."
The HMS Beagle, with on board the amateur naturalist Charles Darwin, arrived at the remote island of St. Helena on July 8, 1836, where it stayed until noon of July 14, afterwards proceeding its journey back to the United Kingdom and setting sails to the nearby island of Ascension.
Darwin used these five days to explore the geology of the island and hired an elderly man as a guide. Since Van Diemen´s Land Darwin's written notes and observations had become more hasty and fragmentary - as a combination of the short stops by the Beagle on the single islands and maybe a bit of homesickness, nevertheless Darwin dedicated later one of his notebooks, written down in September to December 1938, to the island, the "St Helena Model", where he on 15 pages noted observations and thoughts on the general island geology (and also troubles with the laundry).
As already on the island of St. Jago Darwin noted various geological evidence that the island had risen from the sea in an outcrop of basaltic rocks.
http://historyofgeology.blogspot.com/2011/07/8-july-1836-darwin-on-st-helena.html
In 1826 a publication by the Danish mineralogist and mountain climber Jens Esmark (1763–1839) was translated into English, in this paper Jesmark discussed the possibilities that glaciers were much greater in the past then today.
In the year 1816 Europe was suffering still from the aftermath of the Napoleonic wars ended one year earlier. After years of desperation and destruction people hoped for better times - but the summer that came was too rainy and cold, on the fields the crops did not mature or rotted away, famine and diseases were the consequences. Also the north-eastern states of the U.S. experienced snowstorms and frost in summertime. The year 1816 has come to be known as the "year without a summer."
The strange behaviour of the weather was unexplainable at the time, nobody know that the origin of the strange phenomena was to be found on the opposite side of earth, where an entire mountain had annihilated itself.
http://historyofgeology.blogspot.com/2011/04/10-april-1815-great-tambora-eruption.html
"I am afraid you work too much, and (shall I tell you frankly?) that you spread your intellect over too many subjects at once. I think that you should concentrate your moral and also your pecuniary strength upon this beautiful work on fossil fishes .... In accepting considerable sums from England, you have, so to speak, contracted obligations to be met only by completing a work which will be at once a monument to your own glory and a landmark in the history of science ...[ ]...No more ice, not much of echinoderms, plenty of fish..."
2. December 1837, Alexander von Humbolt in a letter to Agassiz
http://historyofgeology.blogspot.com/2010/05/jean-louis-rodolphe-agassiz-28-may-1807.html
The morning of this sorrowful day begun with strong rain, which became less and lesser until at midday it stopped. Already in the early morning there were fissures in the earth and cracks in the meadows visible.”
The Swiss physician Dr. Carl Zay, who witnessed the landslide of Goldau and in 1807 published a detailed report about the catastrophe, considered today the first naturalistic documentation of a landslide.
http://blogs.scientificamerican.com/history-of-geology/2011/09/02/september-2-1806-the-landslide-of-goldau/
Volcanoes are nothing unusual on Iceland, but after three weeks of earthquakes on 8, June 1783 begun an eruption that is today considered the second largest in Iceland's historic records.
http://historyofgeology.blogspot.com/2011/06/8-june-1783-laki-eruptions.html
The German advocate, author, poet, politician and artist Johann Wolfgang von Goethe (1749-1832) was also strongly interested in natural sciences and in his lifetime investigated various geological and paleontological phenomena.
One of the most extensively studied object of interest laid just before his home, or better said under it.
In 1775, Goethe, already a highly regarded author, was invited to the court of Duke Carl August in the city of Weimar, where he remained for the rest of his life.
Goethe became an enthusiastic collector of mineralogical, paleontological and geological curiosities and in the years 1780 to 1832 he collected, exchanged and purchased more than 18.000 rocks, minerals and fossils. The fossils alone comprise 718 specimens; most notable in this collection are samples of the quaternary travertine of Weimar and surrounding area, with over 100 specimens of a large variety of plant and animal fossils.
The underground of Weimar consists of Mesozoic limestone; the groundwater is therefore supersaturated of calcium carbonate and springs and rivers are often surrounded by deposits of calcareous sinter. During warm periods in the Quaternary the deposition was even stronger than today, many bones or remains of animals and plants became embedded and conserved in this rock.
http://historyofgeology.blogspot.com/2011/05/dr-faust-and-his-fossil-collection.html
In 1760 the Italian geologist Giovanni Arduino proposed to classify the rocks of the Alps in four distinct layers - primary, secondary, tertiary and quaternary sediments.
“Are you then sure, the power which would create
The universe and fix the laws of fate,
Could not have found for man a proper place,
But earthquakes must destroy the human race?”
“Lisbon Earthquake Poem” (1755) by Voltaire
http://blogs.scientificamerican.com/history-of-geology/2011/11/01/november-1-1755-the-earthquake-of-lisbon-wraith-of-god-or-natural-disaster/
It was the Danish Niels Stensen (1638-1686), latinized in Nicholaus Steno, who trained by his anatomical skills, not only recognized the order of layers, but actually tried to explain them and formulate rules for a general interpretation of sediments. Studying the rocks of the Italian region of Tuscany, in 1667 he formulated the main general principles, on which modern stratigraphy is still based:
http://historyofgeology.blogspot.com/2011/02/layers-of-earth.html
“Truthful and terrible new description/
from the sudden destruction/
of the well known village of Plurs in Bergel/
and situated in the provinces of Bünten/
how suddenly a landslide came down from the mountain/
and the entire village in a moment covered/
elevated from ground/ buried/ thrown away and eradicated/ occurred in this year 1618.“
http://blogs.scientificamerican.com/history-of-geology/2011/09/04/september-4-1618-the-landslide-of-plurs/
It was the work of the physician Georgius Agricola, latinized version of the German name Georg Bauer (1494-1555) which for the first time contributed to a broad diffusion of applied strata geology. His book "De Re Metallica" ("On the Nature of Metals"), posthumously published in 1556, is a systematic study of ore deposits, the order and extant of strata and especially mining technology, and was to remain the standard text on mining geology for the next two centuries. Agricolas work, as remarkable as it is, was however following the tradition of his times and so mostly specific and descriptive in its content, it offered little or only metaphysic explanations how layers form and how to study them.
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