Downloaded from http://pygs.lyellcollection.org/ by guest on September 26, 2021 Yorkshire Geological So 150TH ANNIVERSARY YEAR A message from the President This year has been one of celebration for the Society and give opportunity for discussion, but no one was lost in we have marked it with a special programme of the mist". Mercifully the weather was superb for our trip meetings. Here I mention some of these meetings with on the slopes of Ingleborough in 1988. special bearing on the anniversary celebrations. At the centenary meeting Dr W. S. Bisat, a former Firstly, the Annual Dinner in December 1987 was President of our Society, was given an Honorary Master held on a date very close to that of the original of Science degree by Leeds University. One of our field inauguration of the Society. The spacious Assembly trips this year, led by Dr N. J. Riley, was designed as a Rooms in York were the venue for the dinner. A short tribute to the work of Dr Bisat on goniatites as zonal account and two of the speeches are quoted in the fossils. following pages. The Yorkshire Geological Society was founded (as The four full weekend field meetings included a the Geological and Polytechnic Society of the West Grand Reunion field meeting at Cober Hill, Cloughton Riding of Yorkshire) by coal owners and managers. It near Scarborough. This took place in superb weather, was particularly appropriate, therfore, that the subject and included a visit to the home of Lord Derwent at of 'Recent Advances in British Coalfield Geology and Hackness Hall, where William Smith, the founder of Geophysics1 was chosen as our topic for the session British geology, was land agent. At Scarborough jointly organised by British Coal and the Yorkshire Museum we saw a mural devised by one of the founders Geological Society at the Seventh Meeting of the of our Society, John Phillips. An account of the full Geological Societies of the British Isles at University programme for the Cober Hill meeting is given below College, London this September. (p. 105). At the close of this anniversary year for which I have For our centenary, Professor H. C. Versey, one of our been privileged to be President, I will be making the first honorary members, penned an account of the first award of the Moore Medal. This is a silver medal hundred years of the Society. In the following pages Dr generously contributed by the alumni of Sheffield G. A. L. Johnson, a former Secretary and President, has University, to be awarded for the best undergraduate written an account of the last fifty years which he first dissertation in the northern universities and colleges. delivered as a Special Lecture at the Cober Hill meeting. Finally, may I thank the Officers and Council of the Earlier in the year, a field trip, led by Dr Eric Johnson Society for their ready support and to our members for and Mr Murray Mitchell, was located in Horton in coming to the anniversary celebrations. I wish our Ribblesdale, close to the venue of the centenary field Society continued success in years to come. by guest on September 26, 2021 meeting. At this latter meeting the "summit of Ingleborough was shrouded in mist driven by a strong ALBERTA. WILSON wind. Very little geology could be seen nor did the wind http://pygs.lyellcollection.org/ Downloaded from Downloaded from http://pygs.lyellcollection.org/ by guest on September 26, 2021 The third fifty years: 1938-1988 The Centenary of the Yorkshire Geological Society was arrears. The record numbers of members joining the celebrated in Leeds on the 4th June 1938, A series of Society in one year were in 1971 and 1978, when 103 and special meetings and a dinner with many guests was 104 new members are recorded. In the 1970's and 1980's followed by an anniversary field meeting at Ingleton membership rose to 1205 in 1977, 1310 in 1978 and a from the 5th to the 8th June. E. J. Garwood was the maximum of 1401 recorded in the Annual Report for President for the second occasion. Membership of the 1984; this represents a 778% increase in membership Society stood at 180 of which over 50 were present at the over the fifty year period. Since then, owing to reduction Centenary celebrations. Revenue for 1938 balanced at in the number of persons coming forward for £135 9s. 9d. and postage and printing costs were £47 3s. membership, together with normal losses, membership 7d. Not surprisingly, it was a time of optimism and H. C. had declined to 1243 active members in 1987. The Versey wrote at the time that the Society was going current membership of the Society in April 1988 in the through one of its successful periods and that, owing to various categories laid down by the Council, is as generous benefactors, it could continue its efforts with follows: no financial anxiety for the future (Versey 1939, p.8). By Patrons 9 the 1930's a familiar pattern of indoor meetings during Honorary Members 5 the winter months and field meetings during the summer Life Members 29 was well established and this has continued through the Ordinary Members 810 following fifty years with little change except for the Concessionary Members (over 65 years) 55 period of the Second World War. Similarly, the pattern Student Members 32 of publication of the Society's Proceedings in the form of Associate Members 47 annual or twice yearly parts that evolved by 1840 has Institutional Members 198 continued without a break to the present time. Clearly Institutional Members (Schools Discount) 4 during the first hundred years the Society developed a Honorary Institutional Members successful pattern of affairs that has carried it through to (Copyright offices etc.) 8 the 150th anniversary with a minimum of change or fuss. Honorary Associate Members (Circular exchanges with other societies etc.) 24 Hardly had the euphoria of the Centenary dissipated when Europe was involved in war. Under W. S. Bisat, 1221 who followed E. J. Garwood as President in 1939 and 1940, the Society strove to keep up its activities, but inevitably they had to be curtailed. R. G. S. Hudson In addition: Proceedings exchanges with other Societies etc. 75 held the fort between 1941 and 1942 acting as both President and Editor of the Proceedings. He by himself and with co-authors kept up a steady production of The pattern of indoor meetings has remained very papers on the Carboniferous that kept the Proceedings constant over the period since the last war. Six and alive during this difficult time. Between 1940 and 1945, sometimes seven meetings have been held regularly in 40 papers were published of which 13 were by Hudson the winter months from October to March, with and his collaborators. Unfortunately, Hudson occasionally an April meeting. The venue of meetings discontinued publishing the Annual Report in the has gradually changed, with a regular pattern emerging Proceedings after 1942 and it was not published again over the last twenty years. Initially the Society met at until P. C. Sylvester-Bradley was editor in 1953. This various towns in Yorkshire including — Barnsley, gives a gap in the record of the affairs of the Society that Doncaster, Huddersfield, Hull, Leeds, Middlesbrough, is difficult to fill, but membership certainly kept up with Sheffield and York. But experience showed that the 194 persons and institutions listed in 1944. The needs of members and lecturers was best served in the immediate post-war years are also undocumented well equipped lecture rooms attached to the northern except that 32 original papers were published between universities. Thus a pattern of regular meetings each 1946 and 1953 and the Proceedings records up to six field year in Durham, Hull, Leeds, Newcastle upon Tyne and meetings held annually during this period. Sheffield, with the Annual General Meeting in York, has now become established. In the continuing tradition By 1952, membership had reached 306 and the post• of the Society, several meetings each year have been war expansion of the Society was well on the way. For devoted to the presentation of original papers and the next 20 years the Society continued to grow each between five and eleven of these presentations had been year: 441 in 1956, 509 in 1958, 652 in 1960, 721 in 1962, read each year. At other meetings invited lectures have 814 in 1964, 913 in 1967, 1025 in 1969, 1168 in 1971. been presented and every year one or more of these Reduction in membership numbers in 1972 and 1973 and meetings has been made open to the general public. The in some later years was caused by periodic revision of the symposium meeting was introduced in 1949 under the membership list with the removal of those long in title "The constitution and origin of sedimentary iron 97 Downloaded from http://pygs.lyellcollection.org/ by guest on September 26, 2021 ores"; papers presented by the seven speakers were and black heads), below the white rose of Yorkshire; published in the Proceedings Vol. 28, Part 2 (1951). underneath was the motto "OMNEM MOV ERE Another symposium was held in 1966 when six speakers LAPIDEM" ("leave no stone unturned") in black addressed the topic "The sub-Carboniferous basement letters on a gold scroll, the whole embroidered on a blue in Northern England" at a meeting in Leeds attended by ground (Circular 207, January, 1959). This badge was 209 members and guests. Shortly following on this, a approved by Council in 1958 and went on sale (price joint symposium meeting with the Geological Society of 6/6d) in February 1960.