2014 ® GSA Medals & Awards Presented at the Annual Meeting of the Geological Society of America U 19 October 2014 Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada 2014 MEDALS & AWARDS RIP RAPP AWARD FOR important in reconstructing the earliest On my way home from Fiji, I stopped settlement of western Polynesia. by the Bishop Museum in Honolulu where ARCHAEOLOGICAL His second major contribution to Richard Shutler, Jr. (deceased 2007) was GEOLOGY archaeology has been on the geomorphology serendipitously in residence for a year. of Pacific islands, whose present shorelines Richard knew the value of geology to Presented to differ from those encountered by the earliest archaeology, having been the first scientist William R. Dickinson Lapita voyagers because of mid- Holocene in charge of the radiocarbon laboratory at sea-level changes and subsequent isostatic the University of Arizona. We hatched the uplift. These studies have been immensely scheme of applying sedimentary petrography helpful in prospecting for archaeological sites to the study of temper sands in Lapita and of Lapita age. other ceramic traditions throughout the South The many letters received in support Pacific arena. Our co-conspirator from the of this nomination testify to the reverence outset was Roger Green (deceased 2009), of many Pacific archaeologists for Bill the acknowledged doyen of South Pacific Dickinson as a person, and for their very high archaeology at the University of Auckland. regard for his work. There can be no more As my research unfolded over the years, deserving recipient of the Rip Rapp Award for potsherds were gratefully received from Archaeological Geology. around 100 archaeological collaborators working on at least 150 islands, and have produced perhaps 2850 thin sections as grist Response by William R. Dickinson for interpretations. It is by now abundantly When I first put my standard specialties clear that it was by and large the pot makers who migrated through the islands of Pacific William R. Dickinson of sedimentary geology and tectonics to work University of Arizona, Tucson in the service of geoarchaeology a half century Oceania over the centuries plying their ago, I had no inkling that effort would gain me ancestral skills, and not the pots that moved. such a signal and unexpected honor. I stand Still and all, the same investigative technique here infused with a mixture of humility, pride, has also documented ceramic transfer in Citation by David Killick and unalloyed joy. limited volume between more than 75 pairs I took my first step into geoarchaeology of islands, thereby revealing specific and This is the third time that William in 1965 as a sidelight to mapping the otherwise undemonstrable cultural ties. (Bill) Dickinson has been honored by the Wainimala orogen and its cover rocks on Viti After my retirement from teaching in Geological Society of America. He was Levu in Fiji with a Guggenheim Fellowship 1991, able to spend two to four months a year awarded the Penrose Medal in 1991, and the during my first sabbatical from Stanford. in the islands, I turned my attention to the Laurence L. Sloss Award for Sedimentary Laurence and Helen Birks were at the same influence of hydro-isostasy and lithospheric Geology in 1999. He was also elected to the time excavating the famed Lapita ceramic flexure on the evolution of Holocene National Academy of Sciences in 1992 for his site beneath the Sigatoka sand dunes on paleoshorelines where so much archaeology extraordinary volume of research combining the south coast. At the time, it was unclear is focused within Pacific Oceania. Since my sedimentary petrology with tectonics, applied whether Lapita ware was fabricated at some pursuit of that topic coincided with an era particularly to reconstructing the geological central entrepot in Melanesia, to be carried of easy air access to 60 airstrips on multiple evolution of the Pacific and of North America. from there across some 4000 km of the South far-flung islands, it seems likely that my wife Yet very few of those who know Bill as a Pacific, or whether it was made locally on the Jackie and I have walked more miles of island towering figure in these fields realize that he multiple islands where it is now found. To shorelines than anyone who ever lived. has also had a parallel career in archaeological approach that issue, I undertook a study of the I could literally run on for hours but my geology that began in 1965 and has so far sedimentology and sedimentary petrography allotted time is up. Peace be with you all! produced 121 publications. of the Sigatoka dune sands in parallel with Bill Dickinson’s contributions to a study of the temper sands embedded in archaeological geology have had two foci. Sigatoka pottery. Without a doubt, the pottery The first has been to track the earliest was tempered with local sand. migrations of humans into the Pacific between 1200 and 750 BCE. He has done this by quantitative optical petrography of the Lapita pottery that the migrants took with them. By comparing the frequency of mineral and lithic temper grains in these sherds to those of temper sands that he and his collaborating archaeologists have systematically collected on Pacific islands, Bill has been able to identify the starting points for most of these voyages. These data have been enormously THE GEOLOGICAL SOCIETY OF AMERICA 2014 MEDALS & AWARDS GILBERT H. CADY teacher who immerses himself in his students, Ernie Mancini passed through the mentoring them, and providing sponsorship geology department at Kentucky looking AWARD and guidance. He has served on more than for somebody who could interpret Presented to 50 thesis and dissertation committees at nine paleoenvironments in coal-bearing strata. Jack Pashin major U.S. and Australian universities and Thus began my employment at the Geological supported over 30 B.S., M.S., and Ph.D. Survey of Alabama, where I found myself students on research grants. on the ground floor of the coalbed methane And he doesn’t stop there. He chairs and boom and, incidentally, met my wife, Janyth. participates in research, program, and outreach My background was insufficient for solving committees of AAPG, GSA, USGS, and other the puzzle of coalbed methane reservoir organizations. He is an Associate Editor for geology. If I wanted to have any impact, I the AAPG Bulletin and is a member of the needed to explore the finer points of structural editorial board of the International Journal of geology and basin hydrology; and I thank Coal Geology. He has served in leadership Walt Ayers, Rick Groshong, Bill Kaiser, and positions in the Energy Minerals Division of Steve Laubach for bringing me up to speed. AAPG, GSA Coal Geology Division, and the I was fortunate to serve under three state Alabama Geological Society. geologists during my tenure at the survey Jack C. Pashin has received numerous (Ernie Mancini, Don Oltz, and Nick Tew), awards from AAPG and other organizations. and all three afforded me the freedom to He was elected a GSA Fellow in 2011 and pursue any opportunity that emerged—from was the Chair of the Coal Geology Division offshore petroleum systems to fractured Jack Pashin from 2009-2010. It is time that Jack C. Pashin reservoir characterization and clean coal Oklahoma State University receive the highest honor of our organization – technology. Clean coal technology has the Gilbert H. Cady Award. dominated my career since 1998, and I am pleased to have been involved in several CO2 injection projects. Thanks to Richard Esposito Citation by Jingle Ruppert Response by Jack Pashin at Southern Company, we are hooking coal- Jack C. Pashin’s level of technical It is a great honor to be considered for fired power plants to wells, thereby pointing expertise is vast and covers sedimentary the Gilbert Cady Award, and I am grateful the way toward commercial CO2 storage geology from soup to nuts (petroleum and and humbled to be this year’s recipient. My and expanding opportunities for enhanced interest in geology was kindled as a youth hydrocarbon recovery. I will always fondly coal, CO2 sequestration, sedimentary and structural geology, basin analysis, hydrology, while hunting fossils in Ohio. My career path remember my colleagues at the Geological and geochemistry). He received his Ph.D. began crystallizing at Bradley University Survey of Alabama, whose ideas and efforts degree from the University of Kentucky in in Illinois, where I was educated by Merrill were essential to the success of each research 1990 and began his professional career at Foster, Don Gorman, and Henry Helenek. project we took on. the Geological Survey of Alabama in 1988. There I studied the Desmoinesian section at In 2013 I joined the Boone Pickens He is currently employed as Professor and the Wolf Covered Bridge, which includes the School of Geology at Oklahoma State Devon Energy Chair of Basin Research, Colchester coal. This is my earliest link to coal University, where I find mentoring students Boone Pickens School of Geology, Oklahoma geology and the legacy of Gilbert Cady. highly gratifying and am discovering a range State University, where he develops I whiled away the break before graduate of new research possibilities. In accepting the advanced geoscience curriculum, seeks school trudging the deep gorges and waterfalls Cady Award, I would like to thank all of my grant opportunities for students, and runs around my birthplace near Cleveland, Ohio. mentors, colleagues, and collaborators who, competitive, multi-institutional research Tom Lewis of Cleveland State University alas, are too numerous to name here. In the programs. informed me that some great, unsolved modern world, after all, the most meaningful Jack has produced more than 300 geologic mysteries were lurking right under scientific contributions are achieved by teams.