Geotimes June 1997 - About People

ABOUT PEOPLE

June 1997

The 1996 Medal of the Seismological Society of America was awarded to JAMES N. BRUNE, University of Nevada, Reno, on April 10, at the society's annual meeting in Honolulu, Hawaii. Brune's work has provided the seismological community with a tool to link the observations on seismograms to the geological stresses driving earthquakes. His other contributions include developing the foundations for the use of slip rates of faults as essential input to seismic hazard analysis.

WILLIAM A. WULF, AT&T Professor of Engineering and Applied Sciences at the University of Virginia, Charlottesville, has been elected president of the National Academy of Engineering. Wulf, a computer engineer, has served as assistant director of the National Science Foundation, chair and chief executive officer of Tartan Laboratories Inc., Pittsburgh, and professor of computer science at Carnegie Mellon University, Pittsburgh.

WILLIAM L. FISHER, Benow Chair and professor in the Department of Geological Sciences at the University of Texas, Austin, has been appointed to a White House panel to review the nation's energy research and development programs. The panel will examine issues such as R&D programs, energy and end-use efficiency, renewable and fossil-fuel technologies, and nuclear energy. Fisher is a past president of the American Geological Institute (AGI) and is a trustee of the AGI Foundation.

MARINO PROTTI, a professor at the Observatorio Vulcanologico y Sismologico de Costa Rica, was awarded the National Prize in Science from the Ministry of Science and Technology in Costa Rica. Recognized for his seismological research, Protti is the first earth scientist to receive this award.

The Michigan Earth Science Teachers Association presented Stoney Awards to teachers who have designed innovative earth-science education programs. The following Michigan teachers were recognized: CHERYL CROSS and LANA C. THIBEAULT, Flint; ROSALYN GLAVIN, River Rouge; VIVIAN C. HAMILTON and ROSE MARIE MARTIN, Linden; SHARON S. MELLENDORF, Lakeview; GAYLE SAMANIOTTO, Escanaba; DWIGHT D. SIEGGREEN, Northville; LAURA WILLIAMS, Wayne-Westland; and LIBBI UNGREY, DEB MAGENNIS, KRISTY RIEGER, and GINGER SISSON, Grandville.

OBITUARIES

BENJAMIN M. PAGE and FREDRICK C. KRUGER, professors emeritus at Stanford University, died earlier this year.

Page was a leading expert on the formation of California's coastal ranges and chair of the geology department from 1957 to 1969. In the 1960s, Page recognized the validity of plate tectonic theory and applied it to the geology of California. He was particularly interested in the geology of the Stanford area. Jan. 31, 1997.

Kruger, a geologist and engineer, spent most of his career in industry. He served as chair of the Department of Applied Earth Sciences at Stanford from 1966 to 1977. He earned his doctorate in geology from Harvard University in 1941 and was chief geologist and vice president for the mining and exploration division of International Minerals and Chemical Corp. before accepting the Stanford appointment. Feb. 9, 1997.

FREDERICK BETZ JR., former executive secretary of the Geological Society of America, earned his Ph.D. in geology from Princeton University in 1938. He worked for the U.S. Geological Survey before joining the Space and Environmental Sciences Program of Texas Instruments, Inc. Later he served as executive director of the Coastal Plains Center for Marine Development Services and wrote many articles about military geology and scientific communication. March 5, 1997.

RODERICK A. HUTCHINSON, a research geologist for the National Park Service, died this March in an avalanche in the Heart Lake area of southcentral Yellowstone National Park where he and a colleague had been monitoring the area's thermal features. Hutchinson began working for the Park Service in Yellowstone as a seasonal interpretive specialist in 1970. Known for his expertise on the park's geothermal resources, he was promoted to geothermal specialist and later to geologist. Numerous reports and papers document the deep familiarity Hutchinson had gained of the park's unique geology.