Foot Steps of the Ancient Great Glacier of North America: A Long Lost Document of a Revolution in 19th Century Geological Theory

ISBN-13: 9783319379418 / Angielski / Miękka / 2016 / 202 str.

Harold W. Borns Jr; Kirk Allen Maasch

Recenzje

"This book is a treasure for natural scientists interested in the emergence of 19th-century thought. Summing Up: Recommended. Graduate students and researchers/faculty." (J. D. Ives, Choice, Vol. 53 (1), September, 2015)

Spis treści

Part I John Kimball DeLaski.- Biographical sketch.- The manuscript.- Part II The Ancient Great Glacier of North America.- Preface.- The phenomena of boulder drift.- Carver’s Harbor.- Research on rocks.- Vinalhaven and North Haven.- Camden Hills and Mount Desert.-  Mount Desert to Holden.- Bangor to the Piscataquis Valley.- Mount Katahdin.- The inescapable conclusion - A large glacier.- Evidence from all over North America.- Boulder drift theories.- Objection to iceberg theory continued.- An astronomical theory.- Astronomical theory continued.- Theory of mutable axis of the earth.- Continental upheaval and subsidence.- The changeable relations of land and water.- Supposed cause of the cold period.- Geologic record since the Devonian.- The climate cools.- A glacial time.- Duration of the glacial age.- End of the glacial age.- On the motion of glaciers.- Purpose of the glacier.- Late-glacial cold-water marine shells of Maine and adjacent regions.

O autorze

Harold William Borns, Jr. is Professor Emeritus of Glacial and Quaternary Geology at the University of Maine. He has taught geology for 50 years and in retirement has continued Ice Age field research projects in Maine, Denmark and Ireland. Professor Borns has had published about 150 peer-reviewed scientific journal articles, made many geological maps for the Maine Geological Survey and has co-authored one book on the Ice Age. He spent 28 field seasons leading glacial geological research teams in Antarctica and served as Program Manager for Polar Glaciology in the Office of Polar Programs at the U.S. National Science Foundation for three years. He formed the “Climate Change Institute” at the University of Maine in 1973 and served as its director for the first 15 years.

Kirk Allen Maasch is Professor of Climate Studies at the School of Earth and Climate Sciences and the Climate Change Institute at the University of Maine. He has had published over 60 peer-reviewed scientific journal articles and book chapters, and has co-edited one book on climate and culture.

Blurb

Dr. John K. DeLaski practiced medicine in the Penobscot Bay region of Maine and, in addition, was a naturalist with keen powers of observation. His study of the landscape led to his conclusion that a thick glacier had overtopped the highest hills, filled all of Penobscot Bay, extended far to the east and west and probably was part of a greater continental glacier. He published these observations and inferences in numerous local newspapers and magazines, as well as the American Journal of Science. His work put him on the “team” of Benjamin Silliman, James D. Dana and Louis Agassiz, all advocates for glaciation as the regional land shaping force as opposed to that of the Biblical Deluge, a major scientific conflict of the day both in North America and Europe. Agassiz and other prominent naturalists incorporated DeLaski’s observations into their own presentations, often without giving him credit.

Published now for the first time, DeLaski’s summary work presents a holistic discussion of the controversy in which he presents his critical observations of surficial geology in Maine, southern New England and New Brunswick, Canada and concludes that these depositional and erosional features must be of glacial origin. All this was done while most “naturalists” still advocated the Biblical Flood to explain the major components of surficial geology in North America and abroad.