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Panoramic view of a section of the Scablands. Hugefloods.com
Above: Map of the Scablands by J Harlen Bretz
Below: Harlen Bretz University of Chicago
Initially given the first name Harley, Bretz soon changed it to J (no period) Harlen Bretz, because he thought it sounded better. Bretz's first geological forays were while he taught History and Physiography to high school students in in Seattle. There, he explored the glacial changes in Puget Sound, and drew many maps of the area. He went to a GSA meeting, where a geologist was impressed by his maps and encouraged him to pursue geology. He obtained his PhD from the U. Chicago, started teaching at the U. Washington, but soon returned to Chicago. During the summers of 1922 to 1929, he led hundreds of graduate students to the Columbia River Plateau in eastern Washington. The area was near wilderness, and largely unknown to geologists. He and his students hiked and mapped the area each summer. The topography is that of desert and coulees cutting through basalt. Bretz noted that granite erratics sat up high on the steps of the basaltic columns. He noted that the coulees cut though mounds of loess without regard to the local topography. He concluded that there must have been a large erosional force, a great flood, that carved the coulees. He was ridiculed and dismissed through the fifties and early sixties, until more geologists had visited the area, and concluded he was correct. Vindicated at last, he was honored with the Penrose Medal in 1979. He also contributed to the knowledge of karsts in his field mapping of the Ozark Uplift. He presented evidence that limestone caves are indeed formed underwater.
I find J Harlen Bretz interesting because he was a superb field geologist and map maker. He hiked many, many miles in a hot and desolate landscape and produced exquisite and informative maps. He was a challenging teacher, relying heavily on the Socratic method. He loved to party. He enjoyed practical jokes, and most of all, he stuck to his guns despite the humiliation the Geological Society of Washington in Washington D.C. handed out to him in 1927.
Bretz JH. Glaciation of the Puget Sound Region. Washington Geological Survey Bulletin No. 8, 1913, p. 5-244.
In this lengthy monograph, Bretz describes in exhaustive detail the topography of the Puget Sound. This basin is part of the western synclinorium of North America, with the glacial features forming during the Pleistocene Epoch. His area of study was 170 by 50 miles. While exploring and describing the terminal moraines, he noted several errors in the mapping and conclusions of Bailey Willis and George Otis Smith. He noted the changing drainage patterns from the Puget Sound Glacier. He described past glacial lakes and foreset delta beds. He found mammoth teeth and tusks. He also described the enigmatic Mima and larger Ford mounds and proposed that a combination of water and ice action had formed them. The article contains 26 maps and 27 illustrations. The paper ends with a large, beautiful color map of the Pleistocene surface deposits and a bathymetric map of the Sound.
Bretz JH. The Channeled Scablands of the Columbia Plateau. J Geology Nov-Dec 1923, p. 617-649.
In this article Bretz coined the term “scablands” to refer to areas in the Columbia River Basalt where denudation had removed or prevented the accumulation of soil, and the underlying rock is exposed or covered largely by coarse, basaltic, angular debris. This area encompasses 12,750 mi2 in the Columbia Plateau north of the Snake river. He noted that the scablands formed tracts with steep basaltic walls, extinct waterfalls and intervening mature, eroded topography that was covered with up to 200 feet of loess. Bretz found no terminal moraines or glacial till but did note that granitic erratics were emplaced high up on the basaltic cliffs. He concluded that these features were “unique,” and that they were formed by streams from melting glaciers that flooded many preglacial divides of mature topography. He posed the conflict between “diluvialists” and “glacialists” and was likely on the side of the former, although that theory was out of fashion with geologists. His concluding sentence in the article is “It was a debacle which swept the Columbia Plateau.”
Margaret Palmer serves as director of the National Socio-Environmental Synthesis Center. Her interests are coastal and freshwater ecosystems, particularly those involving flowing water and wetlands. She has published greater than 150 articles and chas o-edited Foundations of Restoration Ecology. Palmer is also active in integrating science with public policy. She directs a national synthesis center (SESYNC) that seeks to find new ways to foster research collaborations between social and natural scientists on problems associated with negative human impacts on the environment.
Margaret Palmer, Distinguished Professor,
University of Maryland
MA Palmer, et. al. Mountain Top Mining consequences. Science 327(8):148-149, Suppl:1-4. 2010.
Palmer, with eleven co-workers, studied the changes in biodiversity and stream hydrology in areas where mountain top mining with valley filling is conducted. The regions most involved in this practice are eastern Kentucky, West Virginia and southwest Virginia. Her group notice that sulfate concentrations increased with the intensity of mining. Also associated with mining were increased concentrations of selenium and a decrease in number of genera of stream benthic invertebrates. Also noted was the increased incidence of deformities in fish larvae. She notes that despite the U.S. Clean Water Act and Surface Mining Control and Reclamation Act, this type of mountain top mining continues unabated.
MA Palmer, et. al. Climate change and the world’s river basins: anticipating management options. Frontiers in Ecology and the Environment 6 (2), 81-89, 2008.
Using the WaterGap Model, the authors examined water demand versus river discharge in various locations, such as the Ganges-Brahmaputra region in south Asia, the Tigris-Euphrates system, and parts of the Colorado and Columbia river basin. Each basin has a different projected outcome, depending on human use of water and rate of delivery of water to the basins.
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