There are some interesting parallels between K.O.’s early years and those of Maurice Ewing (Wertenbaker, 2000), an- other Texan who also experienced the hard times of the Depression era and ultimately achieved international repute as a marine scientist. It is likely that the Rock Stars adaptability, initiative, and confidence to Kenneth Orris Emery (1914–1998): surmount any barrier—characteristics of both of these marine scientists—were a Pioneer Marine Geologist product of those tough times. Early Career and Experiences Donn S. Gorsline and Kelvin S. Rodolfo, University of Southern and Emery and his best friend Robert University of Illinois—Chicago Dietz were Shepard’s graduate assistants and followed him to Scripps to become the first generation of “marine geolo- K.O.’s excellent academic record gists” under his tutelage. The pay was earned him a one-year scholarship poor but they managed to exist student- to any college or university in Texas. style in the “community house” on the However, he decided to work to earn old Scripps Campus with other graduate additional funds during 1932 and 1933 students. Shepard assigned them many as manager of the local gas station, us- tasks, one of which was to row him out ing the time between customers to read on repeated trips to the Scripps and La philosophy books. He attended North Jolla Canyons. There, they Texas Agricultural College, Arlington, took depth soundings using a heavy in 1933 and studied there for two years. weight attached to a fishing line. K.O. In the summers of 1934 and 1935, he would row, make the sounding, and lift and a college classmate hitchhiked and the heavy weight back into the boat, “rode the rails” to see the World’s Fairs while Shepard located the sounding us- at Chicago and San Diego, where they ing horizontal sextant angles between scrounged for work in restaurants to known locations on the beach. Dietz re- earn living expenses. corded the data. These studies resulted Young Emery became interested in in the first detailed maps of the heads of engineering and and upon the submarine canyons. The main discovery recommendation of a favorite geology was a great change in depth over time, An example of Emery’s inventiveness. professor, transferred to the University showing that active marine processes The purpose of this strange contraption is of Illinois in 1935. His intent was to were taking place. lost to history but may have served as a combine geology and engineering into K.O., like others in that pioneering sediment trap. a major in mining engineering. Seeking generation, designed and built most of funds for living expenses, he went to his own shipboard equipment to sample Birth and Formative Years the Geology Department where he met the seafloor. His earlier work as a me- K.O. Emery was born in Swift Current, Dr. Francis Shepard, who noted Emery’s chanic in a gas station may have been a Saskatchewan, in 1914. His father, a car- drafting expertise and recruited him to factor in his equipment-design success. penter and contractor, was there build- go to the U.S. Coast & Geodetic Survey His sea experience, begun in a rowboat, ing barracks for soldiers. offices in Washington, D.C., to work on now progressed to the E.W. Scripps, a The family followed construction jobs maps of seafloor bathymetry (Curray, 110-foot schooner built for the Scripps across the to New York, 2001). This confirmed K.O.’s interest in Institution with support from the Scripps Oklahoma, and Texas, where K.O., marine geology. He continued under family. Early cruises off southern as he was universally known, picked Shepard’s direction after his undergradu- California and in the Gulf of California up his Texas accent and most of his ate years, earning an M.S. and Ph.D. provided data that K.O. and Dietz used schooling through early college years. Shepard was shifting his work to Scripps for their theses and doctoral disserta- During his senior year in high school, Institution of Oceanography, and much tions. They worked with bathymetry he collected, organized, and identified of K.O.’s work for his doctorate was and structure, seafloor sediments and Cretaceous fossils from outcrops in the also centered at that institution. K.O. re- rock, and phosphorite and marine clays, Fort Worth area. In high school, he en- ceived his Ph.D. from Illinois in 1941. making discoveries that laid the basic rolled in ROTC and earned the rank of The difficult years spanning the Great groundwork for future marine geolo- major at graduation. He chose not to Depression and World War II were “sink gists. However, geology was not the continue this program to an eventual or swim” times for an entire genera- sole pursuit of these embryonic scien- Army commission, but the experience tion and they greatly affected Emery’s tists. Ever the experimenter, K.O. talked showed his natural talent for leadership. development as a person and scientist. Dietz into growing a mustache and

18 NOVEMBER 2003, GSA TODAY beard and proceeded to measure how the Persian Gulf and its shorelines for ate studies and had to take the hardest long the hairs grew each week during the U.S. Navy, in preparation for pos- classes and strive for the Bachelor of the expedition. sible amphibious landings to protect Science degree, not the Bachelor of Arts. American interests in the newly discov- Moulded by his strict regimen, many of The War Years ered oil fields there. Typically, K.O. did his students went on to become leaders After receiving his Ph.D., Emery took not miss a chance to do some geology in the field of marine geology. a job with the Illinois Geological Survey along the way, using the continuously- locating water supplies for defense in- recording echo-sounder aboard the USS Culmination of His Career dustries. At that time, the Navy did not Pocono to record a continuous depth In 1961, K.O. accepted an endowed perceive a need for science and profile of the Atlantic Ocean floor from chair at Woods Hole Oceanographic the survey job was the only option. A Norfolk, Virginia, to the entrance of the Institution and leadership of a large big plus during that time was his mar- Mediterranean. comprehensive study of the Atlantic riage to Caroline Alexander in October Following the Persian Gulf expedi- Ocean with U.S. Geological Survey 1941. Caroline was an ideal partner who tion, and with the gift to USC of a new funding and other federal grants. This dedicated her life to supporting K.O.’s oceanographic research ship, the Velero ten-year study was summarized in a science work. The attack on Pearl IV, courtesy of Captain Allen Hancock, monumental monograph, The Geology Harbor (December 1941) and the entry Emery entered a new phase of his ca- of the Atlantic Ocean, published in of the U.S. into war pushed the Navy reer. The ship’s design was based on the 1984 with Elazar Uchupi as coauthor. to recognize needs for oceanographic highly successful tuna boats which were This monograph, much like the earlier research and brought Emery back to beginning to make extended deep-sea book on the California Borderland, was the sea. ventures from San Diego. a characteristically broad coverage of At Shepard’s invitation, K.O. joined The acquisition of the Velero IV fo- every aspect of the Atlantic, including the University of California Division of cused K.O.’s interests on the California economic resources as well as structure, War Research (UCDWR), which was Borderland, the subsea region for which sediments, water, and life of the region. formed in World War II to apply ocean he had compiled bathymetric charts K.O. was eclectic in his choice of re- science to wartime problems. K.O. during his graduate work with Shepard. search. Widely varied topics included made maps that identified different This major episode in his career was continental-shelf sediments, estuaries types of substrate on the ocean floor. summarized some 15 years later in his and marshes, beach processes, sand Combined with the known acoustic re- book, The Sea off Southern California, dunes, evaporites, lakes, and streams. flectances of those substrates, the maps which examined water, sediments, life, K.O.’s other interests included studying could aid in hiding from structure, and economic factors of the the history of oceanography and collect- enemy destroyers. The maps revealed a area. The book is still a primary refer- ing ocean-themed postage stamps from patchy distribution of sand, gravel, mud, ence for the region and a model of a around the world. He wrote a paper and rock outcrops over the offshore complete oceanographic study. It in- concerning such stamps in 1960. At his continental margin; one of his first major corporated the theses and dissertations death in 1998, he had just completed scientific contributions was to explain of his graduate students, and revealed a manuscript on oceanography as de- the distribution patterns by describing what obviously had been the master picted on ancient coins. the processes that formed them. plan for his tenure at USC. At the age of 83, K.O. wrote an auto- After the conclusion of World War II, K.O. did not limit himself to the biography that was recently published Emery joined with the U.S. Geological Borderland and was involved in sev- in Marine Geology (2002). It is a fasci- Survey in a major study of the Pacific eral projects in other areas of interest. nating story of the career of an adven- coral islands as a background for the The arrival of a student from Israel, turesome bright young man who rose atomic bomb tests at Bikini. The work David Neef, provided access to Dr. Y.K. from inauspicious beginnings to receive led to a number of monographs with Bentor, the director of the Geological the highest honors and acclaim in his several co-authors on the characteristics Survey of Israel, and Gen. M. Makleff, profession, including membership in of the atolls and their histories. the director of the Dead Sea Works. the National Academy of Sciences, most Work on the Dead Sea was initiated, the of the prestigious medals and fellow- The Rise to International Prominence necessary facilities were bought, built, ships in geology, and honorary degrees, While completing the Pacific island and installed within a very short period, including one from USC. K.O. died in study, K.O. joined the geology faculty and the first cruise took place only a Falmouth, , in April 1998. at the University of Southern California month after K.O. arrived in 1959. (USC) in 1946. He taught introductory References Cited physical geology, a requirement for Contributions as a Teacher Emery, K.O., 2002, Autobiography: Some early stages of geology and engineering students. His K.O.’s graduate students enjoyed marine geology: Marine Geology, v. 188, p. 251–291. enthusiastic optimism and interest in ev- close relationships with him, including Curray, J.R., 2001, Francis Parker Shepard: GSA Today, v. 11, no. 12, p. 20–21. erything geologic captured the imagina- occasional poker games at his home. He Wertenbaker, W., 2000, William Maurice Ewing: Pioneer tion of all of his students, causing many was a Socratic teacher, challenging stu- Explorer of the Ocean Floor and Architect of Lamont: GSA engineering majors to shift to geology. dents to think deeply about the lecture Today, v. 10, no. 10, p. 28–29. Emery continued his relationship subjects and reading. Undergraduate “Rock Stars” is produced by the GSA History of Geology students had to write term papers to Division. Editorial Committee: Kennard Bork (editor of this with the Office of Naval Research profile), Robert Dott, Robert Ginsburg, Gerard Middleton, while at USC and organized studies of develop this important skill for gradu- Peter von Bitter, and E.L. (Jerry) Winterer.

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