Chapter C: E. Dutton, Critical observations on theories of the earth’s (1)

physical evolution, The Penn Monthly, May and June, 1876.

Footnote 92:

B. Willis, Research in China, vol. 2, 1907.

Footnote 93:

Joseph Barrell, Science, 39, 259, 260, 1909; Jour. Geol., 22, 672–683,
1914.

Footnote 94:

T. C. Chamberlin, Geology, vol. 1, pp. 541, 542, 1904.

Footnote 95:

W. M. Davis, The geological dates of origin of certain topographic
forms on the Atlantic slope of the United States, Geol. Soc. Am.
Bull., 2, 541–542, 545–586, 1891.

V
A CENTURY OF GOVERNMENT GEOLOGICAL SURVEYS

By GEORGE OTIS SMITH

Director of the United States Geological Survey

Even a Federal Bureau must be considered a product of evolution: the past of the United States Geological Survey far antedates March 3, 1879. The scope of endeavor, the refinement of method, and especially the personnel of the newly created service of that day were largely inherited from pioneer organizations. Therefore a review of the country’s record of surveys under Government auspices becomes more than a grateful acknowledgment by the present generation of geologists of the credit due to those who blazed the way; it shows the sequence and progress in the contributions made by geologic science to industry.

The earlier stages in industrial evolution mentioned by Hess[96]—exploitation, development, and maturity—determine a somewhat similar progressive development in geologic investigation, so that geographic exploration and geologic reconnaissance of the broadest type are the normal contribution of exact science whenever and wherever a nation is in the state of exploitation and initial development of its mineral and agricultural resources. The refinements of detailed surveys and quantitative examinations belong rather to the next stage of intensive utilization, or, indeed, they are the essentials preliminary to full use. Thus regrets that the results of present-day work were not available fifty years ago are largely vain: the fathers may not have been without the vision; they simply did the work as their day and generation needed it done.

Twenty years ago S. F. Emmons, in a presidential address before the Geological Society of Washington, divided the history of Governmental surveys in this country into two periods, separated in a general way by the Civil War. The first of these was the period of geographic exploration, the second that of geologic exploration. Mr. Emmons of course regarded this subdivision as not hard and fast, yet his dividing line seems logical, for not only did the military activities in the East necessarily suspend exploration in the West, but after the war national, political, and economic considerations led naturally to the demand for a more exact knowledge of the vast national domain in the West. Geography and geology are so closely related that Mr. Emmons’s distinction of the two periods is useful only with the limitations inferentially set by himself—namely, that while geologic investigation entered into most of the explorations of the earlier period, the geologist was regarded as only an accessory in these exploring expeditions; on the other hand, in the later surveys the topographic work was developed because it was essential to the geologic investigations.

The year 1818 was a notable one in American geology, first of all in the appearance of the American Journal of Science, itself so perfect a vehicle for geological thought that, as is so well stated by Dr. G. P. Merrill, “a perusal of the numbers from the date of issue down to the present time will alone afford a fair idea of the gradual progress of American geology.” The beginning of publications on New England geology appeared that year in Edward Hitchcock’s first paper on the Connecticut Valley (1, 105, 1818) and the Danas’ (S. L. and J. F.) detailed geologic and mineralogic description of Boston and vicinity; and the “Index” of Amos Eaton (noticed in this Journal, =1=, 69) was the first of that long list of notable contributions to American stratigraphy that are to be credited to the New York geologists.

In the present discussion, too, the year 1918 can be regarded as in a way the centennial of Government geologic surveys, for it was in 1818 that Henry R. Schoolcraft began his trip to the Mississippi Valley—perhaps the first geologic reconnaissance into the West—and it was his work in the lead region which served to make him a member of the Cass expedition sent out by the Secretary of War in 1820 to examine the metallic wealth of the Lake Superior region. The earlier Government explorations of Lewis and Clark, in 1803–7, and of Pike, in 1805–7, were so exclusively geographic that geologic work under Federal auspices must be regarded as beginning with Schoolcraft and with Edwin James, the geologist of the expedition of Major Long in 1819–20 to the Rocky Mountains. Both these observers published reports that are valuable as contributions to the knowledge of littleknown regions.

Any description of geologic work under the Federal Government that included no reference to the State surveys would be inadequate, for in both date of execution and stage of development the work of the State geologists must be given precedence. In Merrill’s Contributions to the History of American Geology,[97] whose modest title fails even to suggest that this work not only furnishes the most useful chronologic record of the progress of the science on the American continent but is in fact a very thesaurus of incidents touching the personal side of geology, the author by his division of his subject shows that four decades of the era of State surveys elapsed before the era of national surveys began.

Thus the geologic surveys of some of the Eastern States antedate by several decades any Federal organization of comparable geologic scope, and in investigations directed to local utilitarian problems these pioneer geologists working in the older settled States of the East were in fact already conducting work as detailed in type as much of that attempted by the Federal geologists of the later period. Even to-day it is true in a general way that the State geologist can and should attack many of his local problems with intensive methods and with detail of results that are neither practicable nor desirable for the larger interstate investigations or for examinations in newer territory. All this relation of State and Federal work must be looked upon as normal evolutionary development of geologic science in America.

One who reads the names of the Federal geologists of the early days, beginning with Jackson and Owen and following with such leaders in Federal work as Gilbert, Chamberlin, King, R. D. Irving, Pumpelly, Van Hise, and Walcott, may note that these were all connected in their earlier work with State surveys. Nor has the relation been one-sided, for among the State geologists Whitney, Blake, Mather, Newberry, J. G. Norwood, Purdue, Bain, Gregory, Ashley, Kirk, W. H. Emmons, DeWolf, Mathews, Brown, Landes, Moore, and Crider received their field training in part or wholly as members of a Federal Survey. Moreover, under the present plan of effective cooperation of several of the State surveys with the United States Geological Survey, it is often difficult to differentiate between the two in either personnel or results, for it even happens that the publishing organization may not have been the major contributor. The full record of American geology, past and present, can not be set forth in terms of Federal auspices alone.

The three decades preceding the Civil War, then, constitute the era of State surveys, well described by Merrill as at first characterized by a contagious enthusiasm for beginning geologic work, later by a more normal condition in which every available geologist seems to have been quietly at work, and finally by renewed activity in creating new organizations. The net result was that Louisiana and Oregon seem to have been the only States not having at least one geological survey.

From “Contributions to the History of American Geology”
by George P. Merrills.
]

The first specific appropriation by the Federal Government for geologic investigation appears to have been made in 1834, when a supplemental appropriation for surveys of roads and canals under the War Department, authorized in 1824, contained the item “of which sum five thousand dollars shall be appropriated and applied to geological and mineralogical survey and researches.” In July, 1834, Mr. G. W. Featherstonhaugh was appointed United States geologist and employed under Colonel Abert, U. S. Topographical Engineers, to “personally inspect the mineral and geological character” of the public lands of the Ozark Mountain region. Overlooking the incidental fact that this Englishman—a man of scientific attainment and large interest in public affairs—was never naturalized,[98] it must be placed to the credit of this first of United States geologists that within seven months he completed his field work and returned to Washington, and on February 17, 1835, his report was transmitted to Congress. Two years earlier Featherstonhaugh had memorialized Congress for aid in the preparation of a geologic map of the whole territory of the United States, and in connection with this project he suggested that geology as an aid to military engineering should have a place in the curriculum at West Point. This first United States geologist also appears to have combined an appreciation of the practical worth of “the mineral riches of our country, their quality, quantity, and the facility of procuring them,” with an interest in the more scientific side of geology, though his hypotheses regarding both economic geology and stratigraphic and structural geology have not won the endorsement of all later workers in the same regions. In all these respects, however, Featherstonhaugh may stand as a fairly good prototype. His contributions to international affairs subsequent to his scientific service to the United States are of interest; he served as one of Her Majesty’s commissioners in the settlement of the Canadian-United States boundary question in 1839–40 and made an examination of the disputed area, and after the settlement of this controversy he was appointed British Consul for the Department of the Seine, France, where in 1848 he personally engineered the escape of Louis Philippe from Havre.

The Federal geologic work thus started was soon continued in surveys of wider scope and more thorough accomplishment. The position of the Government as the proprietor of mineral lands in the Upper Mississippi Valley led to their examination. These Government lands containing lead had been reserved from sale for lease since 1807, although no leases were issued until 1822. The amount of illegal entry and consequent refusal of smelters and miners to pay royalty after 1834 forced the issue upon the attention of Congress, and in 1839 President Van Buren was requested to present to Congress a plan for the sale of the public mineral lands. In carrying out this policy Dr. David Dale Owen was selected to make the necessary survey.

Owen had served as an assistant on the State Survey of Tennessee and as the first State geologist of Indiana, and he organized the new work promptly and effectively. Although suffering from the handicap unfortunately known by geologists of the present day—the receipt late in the season (August 17, 1839) of authority to begin work—within exactly a month he had his force of 139 assistants organized into 24 field parties, instructed in “such elementary principles of geology as were necessary to their performance of the duties required of them.” His plan of campaign provided for a northward drive at a predetermined rate of traverse for each party, with periodic reports to himself at appointed stations, “to receive which reports and to examine the country in person” he crossed the area under survey eleven times. The result of such masterful leadership was the completion of the exploration of all the lands comprehended in his orders in two months and six days, and his report on this great area—about 11,000 square miles—bears date of April 2, 1840.

Eight years later Doctor Owen made a survey of an even larger area, continuing his examination northward to Lake Superior. Again his report was published promptly, and he continued for several years his examination of the Northwest Territory, submitting his final report in 1851. It is interesting to note that in his earlier report Doctor Owen subscribed himself as “Principal Agent to explore the Mineral Lands of the United States,” but that in the later report he was “U. S. Geologist for Wisconsin.” The two surveys together covered 57,000 square miles.

During the same period similar surveys were being made in northern Michigan by Dr. Charles T. Jackson, 1847–48, and Foster and Whitney, 1849–51. These surveys also had been hastened by the “copper fever” of 1844–46, with wholesale issue of permits and leases, Congress in 1847 authorizing the sale of the mineral lands and a geological survey of the Lake Superior district. The execution of these surveys under Jackson and under Foster and Whitney and the prompt publication in 1851 of the maps of the whole region materially helped to establish copper mining on a more conservative basis. and the development of the Lake Superior region was rapid.[99]

These land-classification surveys, with their definite purpose, represent the best geologic work of the time. The plan necessitated thoroughgoing field work with considerable detail and prompt publication of systematic reports, and in the working up of the results specialists like James Hall and Joseph Leidy contributed, while F. B. Meek was an assistant of Owen. It is worthy of note that had not Doctor Houghton, the State geologist of Michigan, met an untimely death in 1847, effective cooperation of the State Survey with the Federal officials would have combined geologic investigation with the execution of the linear surveys.[100]

Belonging to the same period of geologic exploration was the service of J. D. Dana, as United States Geologist on the Wilkes Exploring Expedition, the disaster to which compelled his return from the Pacific Coast overland and resulted in his geologic observations on Oregon and northern California.

The military expeditions during the decade 1850–60 and the earlier expeditions of Fremont added to the geographic knowledge of the Western country and also contributed to geologic science, largely through collections of rocks and fossils, usually reported on by the specialists of the day. Thus the names of Hall, Conrad, Hitchcock, and Meek appear in the published reports on these explorations, while Marcou, Blake, Newberry, Gibbs, Evans, Hayden, Parry, Shumard, Schiel, Antisell, and Engelmann were geologists attached to the field expeditions. In 1852 geologic investigation was seemingly so popular as to necessitate the statutory prohibition “there shall be no further geological survey by the Government unless hereafter authorized by law.”

Certain of these explorations had a specific purpose: several of them sought a practical route for a transcontinental railroad; another a new wagon road across Utah and Nevada; and one under Colonel Pope, with G. G. Shumard as geologist, was sent out “for boring Artesian Wells along the line of the 32d Parallel” in New Mexico. The published reports varied greatly in scientific value and in carefulness of preparation, while the publication of at least two reports was delayed until long after the war, and the manuscript of another was lost. The report of the expedition of Major Emory contained a colored geologic map of the western half of the country, a pioneer publication, for the map prepared by Marcou extended only to the 106th meridian.

Thus in the first period of Government surveys, covering about forty years, the great West, with its wealth of public lands, was well traversed by exploratory surveys, which furnished, however, only general outlines for a comprehension of the stratigraphy and structure of mountain and valley, plain and plateau. To an even less degree was there any realization of the economic possibilities of the vast territory west of the Mississippi. President Jefferson, in planning the Lewis and Clark expedition, had stated his special interest in the mineral resources of the region to be traversed. Nearly forty years later Doctor Owen was strongly impressed with the commercial promise of the region he surveyed. His reports contain analyses of ores and statistics of production; he compared the lead output of Wisconsin, Iowa, and Illinois with that of Europe and foretold the value of the iron, copper, and zinc deposits of the area; he outlined the extent of the Illinois coal field; and he laid equal emphasis upon the agricultural possibilities of the region. Indeed, so optimistic were Owen’s general conclusions that he referred to his separate township plats, with their detailed descriptions, as the basis for his sanguine opinions, realizing that “the explorer is apt to become the special pleader.” With equal breadth of view and thoroughness of execution the surveys of Foster and Whitney laid the foundation for the development of the copper and iron resources of the Lake Superior region, and although these areas were largely wilderness and not adapted to rapid traverse or easy observation the reports on their explorations nevertheless compare most favorably with the contributions of geologists working in the more hospitable regions in the older States.

The period following the Civil War naturally became one of national expansion, the faces of many were turned westward, and exploration of the national domain for its industrial possibilities took on fresh interest. Home-seekers and miners largely made up this army of peaceful invasion, and the winning of the West began on a scale quite different from that of the days of the military path-finding expeditions of Fremont and other Army officers. Thus the nation was aroused to the task of investigating its public lands and Congress gave the support needed to make geologic exploration possible on a large scale.

Geologic surveys of a high order were continued in the older States, as shown by the contributions during this period of J. P. Lesley and G. H. Cook in the East, W. C. Kerr, E. W. Hilgard, and E. A. Smith in the South, and J. S. Newberry, C. A. White, Raphael Pumpelly, T. C. Chamberlin, Alexander Winchell, and T. B. Brooks in the Central States. To the north the Canadian Survey, organized in 1841 under Logan, had continued under the same sturdy leadership until 1869, when the experienced and talented Doctor Selwyn became Director. As contrasted with the short careers of most of the State Surveys and with the temporary character of all of the Federal undertakings in geologic investigation, the continuance of the Canadian Geological Survey for more than half a century under two directors gave opportunity for continuity of effort in making known to the people of the Dominion its resources and at the same time contributing to the world much pure science.

Passing with simple mention the two Government expeditions into the Black Hills, which afforded opportunity for geologic exploration by N. H. Winchell in 1874 and by Jenney and Newton in 1875, the record of geologic work under Government auspices in the period immediately following the Civil War groups itself around the names of four leaders—Hayden, King, Powell, and Wheeler. The four organizations, distinguished commonly by the names of these four masterful organizers, occupied the Western field more or less continuously from 1867 to 1878, and the sum total of their contributions to geography and geology was large indeed. In the words of Clarence King,[101] “Eighteen hundred and sixty-seven, therefore, marks, in the history of national geological work, a turning point, when the science ceased to be dragged in the dust of rapid exploration and took a commanding position in the professional work of the country.” Together these four expeditions covered half a million square miles, or more than a third of the area of the United States west of the one-hundredth meridian, and the cost of all this work was approximately two million dollars, which was a small fraction of its value to the nation counting only the impetus given to settlement and utilization.

As viewed from a distance of nearly half a century, these four surveys differed much in plan of organization, scope of purpose, and success of execution, so that comparison would have little value except as possibly bearing upon the work of the larger organization which followed them and became the heir not only to much that had been attained by these pioneer surveys but also to the great task uncompleted by them. So, if in the earliest days of the present United States Geological Survey there may have been a certain partisanship in tracing derived characters in the new organization, it is even now worth while to recognize the real origin of much that is credited to present-day development.

Dr. F. V. Hayden was the first of these Survey leaders to engage in geological exploration. He visited the Badlands as early as 1853, and his connection with subsequent expeditions was interrupted only by his service as a surgeon in the Federal Army during the war. In 1867, however, Hayden resumed his geologic work as United States Geologist in Nebraska, operating under direction of the Commissioner of the General Land Office. In the following eleven years the activities of the Hayden Survey—the “Geological and Geographical Survey of the Territories”—extended into Wyoming, Colorado, New Mexico, Montana, and Idaho, covering with areal surveys 107,000 square miles. This Survey, as might be expected from the long experience of its leader, made large contributions to stratigraphy, which involved notable paleontologic work by Cope, Meek, and Lesquereux. Next in importance was the structural work of A. C. Peale, W. H. Holmes, Capt. C. E. Dutton, and Dr. Hayden himself, and the influence of these expeditions in popularizing geology should not be overlooked. The expedition of 1871 into the geyser region on the upper Yellowstone resulted in the creation of the first of the national parks. W. H. Holmes began his artistic contributions to geology in 1872 with this Survey. Topographic mapping was added to the geologic exploration, James T. Gardner and A. D. Wilson joining the Hayden Survey after earlier service on the King Survey and Henry Gannett being a member of parties, first as astronomer and later as topographer in charge. The accomplishment of the Hayden Survey itself and the later work of many of its members show that this organization possessed a corps of strong men.

The King Survey was a smaller organization, with Congressional authorization of definite scope and a systematic plan of operation. The beginning of construction of the Union Pacific terminated the period of the railroad surveys under the War Department and afforded opportunity for geologic work that would be more than exploratory: the opening up of the new country made investigation of its resources logical. This fact was recognized by Clarence King, who had traversed the same route as a member of an emigrant train with his friend James T. Gardner. His plan to make a geological cross section of the Cordilleras, with a study of the resources along the route of the Pacific railroads, won the support of Congress, and the “Geological Exploration of the Fortieth Parallel” was authorized in 1867, with Clarence King as geologist in charge, under the Chief of Engineers of the Army. Field work was begun in the summer of that year, and it is interesting to note that Mr. King and his small force of geological assistants—the two Hagues and S. F. Emmons—began at the western end of this cross section, and in this and subsequent years extended the survey from the east front of the Sierra Nevada to Cheyenne, covering a belt of territory about 100 miles in width. This comprehensive plan was carried out in the field operations, and the scientific and economic results were systematically worked up in the reports, which appeared in 1870–80. The only departure from this plan was a study of the volcanic mountains Shasta, Rainier, and Hood, in 1870, occasioned by an unexpected and unsolicited appropriation for field work, and that summer’s work resulted in the discovery of active glaciers, the first known within the United States.

The Fortieth Parallel Survey is to be credited with contributions to the knowledge of the stratigraphy of the West, the region traversed being remarkably representative of the stratigraphic column, to which was added the paleontologic work of Marsh, Meek, Hall, and Whitfield, while the attempt was made to interpret the sedimentary record in terms of Paleozoic, Mesozoic, and Tertiary geography. King’s plan of survey included large use of topographic mapping with astronomic base and triangulation control and contours based upon barometric elevations. The results were pronounced by an unfriendly critic[102] as “very valuable, especially from a geological point of view,” but unfortunate in being the forerunner of work in which Government geologists “have presumed to arrogate the control of the fundamental operations of a topographic survey.” To the King Survey must be credited the introduction of systematic contour mapping and the use of contour maps for purposes of geology. In two other respects the King Survey contributed largely to future Government work: microscopical petrography in the United States may be said to have begun with the visit of Professor Zirkel to this country as a member of this Survey in 1875, and the report of J. D. Hague on “Mining Industry” was the fitting expression of the emphasis then put on the study of the mineral resources of this newly opened territory, a subject of investigation that was in large part the true basis of King’s project rather than simply “the immediate excuse for the Survey.” An earlier influence in the scientific study of ore deposits had come from Von Richthofen’s investigation of the Comstock Lode in 1865 and his subsequent work with Whitney in California. The incident of King’s relation to the diamond fraud in Arizona in 1872 furnished a precedent for public servants of a later day; he investigated the reported find from scientific interest but exposed it with all the zeal of a publicist and truth lover. In a word, the Fortieth Parallel Survey commands our admiration for its brilliant plan, thoroughgoing work in field and office, and high quality of personnel.

Major J. W. Powell began his large contribution to Government surveys with his exploration of the Grand Canyon in 1869, the Congressional recognition of his expedition being limited to an authorization for the issue of rations by the War Department. Small appropriations were made in the following years, and in 1874 full authorization was given for the continuance of his survey in Utah under the Secretary of the Interior and was followed by the adoption of the name “United States Geographical and Geological Survey of the Rocky Mountain Region.” This organization was the least pretentious of the four operating during this period—it covered less area, expended less public money, and published much less—but its contribution to American geology is not to be measured by miles or pages but by ideas. Its physical environment favored this survey, and in the work of Powell, Dutton, and Gilbert can be seen the beginnings of physiography on the heroic scale exemplified in the Grand Canyon and the High Plateaus. The first use of terms like “base-level of erosion,” “consequent and antecedent drainage,” and “laccolith” marked the introduction of new ideas in the interpretation of land sculpture and geologic structure. The daring boat trip of Powell was no less brilliant than his simple explanation of the Grand Canyon itself.

“The United States Geographical Surveys West of the 100th Meridian” was the title given to the explorations made under Lieut. G. M. Wheeler, of the Engineer Corps, which began with topographic reconnaissances in Nevada, Utah, and Arizona, specifically authorized by Congress in 1872. From the standpoint of American geology this could be better known as the Gilbert Survey, Mr. G. K. Gilbert serving for the three years 1871–73, the later part of the time with the title of chief geological assistant. Gilbert’s contributions included his description of Basin Range structure, his first account of old Lake Bonneville, and his discussion of the erosion phenomena of the desert country. J. J. Stevenson also served later as a geologist of this Survey, and A. R. Marvine, E. E. Howell, E. D. Cope, Jules Marcou, and I. C. Russell were connected with the field parties. Captain Wheeler’s own claim for the work of his Survey emphasized its geographic side, for he regarded the results as the partial completion of a systematic topographic survey of the country.

By 1878, when the Fortieth Parallel Survey had completed the work planned by its chief, three of these independent surveys still contended for Federal support and for scientific occupation of the most attractive portions of the Western country. Unrestrained competition of this kind, even in the public service, proves as wasteful as unregulated competition in private business,[103] and Congress appealed to the National Academy of Sciences for a plan for Government surveys to “secure the best results at the least possible cost.” Under instructions by Congress the National Academy considered all the work relating to scientific surveys and reported to Congress a plan prepared by a special committee, whose membership included the illustrious names of Marsh, Dana, Rogers, Newberry, Trowbridge, Newcomb, and Agassiz. This report, which was adopted by the Academy with only one dissenting vote, grouped all surveys—geodetic, topographic, land parceling, and economic—under two distinct heads, surveys of mensuration and surveys of geology. At that time five independent organizations in three different departments were carrying on surveys of mensuration, and the Academy recommended that all such work be combined under the Coast and Geodetic Survey with the new name Coast and Interior Survey. For the investigation of the natural resources of the public domain and the classification of the public lands a new organization was proposed, the United States Geological Survey. The functions of these two surveys and of a third coordinate bureau in the Interior Department, the Land Office, were carefully defined and their interrelations fully recognized and provided for in the plan presented to Congress. Viewed in the light of 39 years of experience the National Academy plan would be indorsed by most of us as eminently practical, and the report stands as a splendid example of public service rendered by America’s leading scientists. The legislation which embodied the entire plan, however, failed of passage in Congress.

The natural activity behind the scenes of the conflicting interests represented by those connected with the several surveys may be seen in the legislative history of the moves leading up to the creation of the United States Geological Survey. In the last session of the 45th Congress the special legislation embodying the recommendations of the National Academy was included in the Legislative, Executive, and Judicial Appropriation bill as it passed the House of Representatives, while the Sundry Civil Appropriation bill carried an item simply making effective the longer section in the other appropriation bill. The item in the Legislative appropriation bill created the office of the Director of the Geological Survey, provided his salary, and defined his duties, as well as specifically terminating the operations of the three older organizations. The item in the Sundry Civil bill as it passed the House appropriated $100,000 for the new Geological Survey, but when this appropriation bill was reported to the Senate a committee amendment added the words “of the Territories,” and further amendments offered on the floor changed the item so as to provide specifically and exclusively for the continuation of the Hayden Survey. Other amendments provided small appropriations for the completion of the reports of the Powell and Wheeler surveys, and the bill passed the Senate in this form. The Legislative Appropriation bill was similarly pruned, while in the Senate, of all reference to the proposed new organization. This bill, however, died in conference, but in the last hours of the session the conferees on the Sundry Civil bill took unto themselves legislative powers and transferred from the dead bill to the pending measure all the language which constitutes the “organic act” of the United States Geological Survey. This action was denounced in the Senate as “a wide departure from the authority that is possessed by a conference committee,” and it was further stated in debate that the inserted provision which created a new office and discontinued the existing surveys was one “which neither the Committee of the Senate nor the Senate itself ever saw.” This assertion was perhaps parliamentarily sound in that the language was new to the Sundry Civil bill, yet actually the Senate had only two days before stricken the same proposed legislation from the pending Legislative Appropriation bill. However, the House conferees—Representatives Atkins of Tennessee, Hewett of New York, and Hale of Maine—had realized their tactical advantage, and the Senate, after a brief debate, voted on March 3 to concur in the report of the committee of conference, thus reversing all their earlier action, in which the friends of the Hayden and Wheeler organizations apparently had commanded more votes than the advocates of the National Academy plan.

Clarence King was appointed first Director of the United States Geological Survey on April 3, 1879, and began the work of organization. With his proven genius for administration, King promptly resolved the doubt as to the meaning of the term “national domain” in the language defining the duties of the Director by taking the conservative side and limiting the work of the new organization to the region west of the 102d meridian. This region was divided into four geological divisions, and for economy of time and money field headquarters were established for these divisions. The Division of the Rocky Mountains was placed under Mr. Emmons as geologist in charge, the Division of the Colorado under Captain Dutton, the Division of the Great Basin under Mr. Gilbert, and the Division of the Pacific under Arnold Hague. The Division of the Colorado was intended as merely temporary for the purpose of bringing to completion the scientific work of the Powell Survey. Similarly Dr. Hayden was given the opportunity to prepare a systematic digest of his scientific results. This organization of the work and the selection of geologists in charge showed the relation of the new and the old, and a glance at the personnel of the new Survey indicates the extent to which the geologic investigation of the Western country was to continue without interruption. Of the twenty-four geologists and topographers listed in the first administrative report, four had been connected with the Powell Survey, two with the Hayden, three with the Wheeler, and five with the King Survey.

In planning the initial work of the United States Geological Survey, the Director speaks of the “most important geological subjects” and “mining industries,” of “instructive geological structure” and “great bullion yield” in the same sentences, so that the intent was plain to make the geologic investigations both theoretical and practical.

It was expected that the field of operations of this Federal Survey would be at once extended by Congress over the whole United States, but the measure making this extension, which would simply carry out the intent of the framers of the legislation creating the new bureau, passed the House alone, and it was only by subsequent modification of the wording of appropriation items that the United States Geological Survey became national in scope as well as in name. The critical question of the effective coördination of State and Federal geologic surveys was met by Director King, who corrected an erroneous impression “industriously circulated” by stating his policy to be to urge the inauguration and continuance of State surveys.[104] This was the initial step in the cooperation between State and Federal surveys which became effective on a large scale in subsequent years.

Though the Geological Survey has extended its operations over the whole United States, its largest activities have always been directed toward the exploration and development of the newer territory in the public-land States. All four of its directors had their field training in the West: the name of Major Powell, who succeeded King in 1880, is inseparably connected with scientific exploration; Charles D. Walcott, who was Director from 1894 to 1907, the period of the Survey’s greatest expansion, made the largest contribution to the Paleozoic stratigraphy and paleontology of the West; and the present Director spent seven field seasons in the Northern Cascades and one in a mining district in Utah. The scope of the activities both East and West as developed during the 39 years since the establishment of the new bureau can be best described, perhaps, in terms of its present functions as expressed in the organization of to-day.

The growth of the Survey is measured in the increase of annual appropriation from $106,000 in 1879–80 to the amount available for the current year—$1,925,520, not including half a million dollars from War Department appropriations being spent in the topographic work of the Survey. The corresponding increase in personnel has been from 39, listed in the first report, to 911 holding regular appointments at the present time, divided among the different branches as follows: A scientific force of 173 in the Geologic Branch, 169 in the Water Resources Branch, 71 in the Topographic Branch, and 15 in the Land Classification Board, with a clerical force of 168 divided among the same branches, and the remainder the technical and clerical employees of the publication and administrative branches. These personnel statistics are not expressive of normal conditions, since a large number of the topographic engineers are commissioned officers and thus are not included on the civilian roll, while, on the other hand, the classification of the stock-raising homestead lands makes the technical force of the Water Resources Branch unusually large this year.

The primary aim of the Geological Survey is geologic, whether directed by authority of law toward the “examination of the geological structure, mineral resources, and products of the national domain,” toward the preparation of the authorized “reports upon general and economic geology and paleontology,” of the “geologic map of the United States,” or of the “report on the mineral resources of the United States,” or toward the “continuation of the investigation of the mineral resources of Alaska” or “chemical and physical researches relating to the geology of the United States.” The spirit and the purpose of the Survey’s work in all these fields are not believed to have materially changed from those of the founders of the science in America. From time to time too much emphasis may have appeared to be laid upon applied geology as contrasted with pure science, yet the report of the National Academy to Congress in terms placed the stress upon economic resources and referred to paleontology as “necessarily connected” with general and economic geology. The practical purpose of geologic research under Government auspices must be recognized by the administrator, whether he be the paleontologist like Walcott, the philosopher like Powell, or the mining geologist like King. That the task of steering the true course is no new problem can be seen from the statement of Owen[105] written 70 years ago, and these words describe conditions of Government geological work even to-day:

Scientific researches, which to some may seem purely speculative and
curious, are essential as preliminaries to these practical results.
Further than such necessity dictates, they have not been pushed,
except as subordinate and incidental, and chiefly at such periods as,
under the ordinary requirements of public service, might be regarded
as leisure moments; so that the contributions to science thus
incidentally afforded, and which a liberal policy forbade to neglect,
may be considered, in a measure, a voluntary offering, tendered at
little or no additional expense to the department.

The increased attention given to mineral resources has been a matter of gradual growth. Mr. King early organized a Division of Mining Geology with Messrs. Pumpelly, Emmons, and Becker as geologists in charge, to whom were assigned the collection of mineral statistics for the Tenth Census. These Survey geologists and Director King himself held appointments as special agents of the Census Bureau, and on the staff selected for this work appear the names of T. B. Brooks, Edward Orton, T. C. Chamberlin, Eugene A. Smith, George Little, J. R. Proctor, R. D. Irving, N. S. Shaler, John Hays Hammond, Bailey Willis, and G. H. Eldridge, indicating the extent to which the supervision of these inquiries was placed in the hands of economic geologists. This procedure was reverted to by Director Walcott and in the last ten years has become a well-established policy, the statistics of annual production of all the important mineral products being under the charge of geologists, as best qualified to comprehend the resources of the country. Another of these special assistants in 1880 was Albert Williams, Jr., who became the first chief of the Division of Mineral Resources, in 1882. The study of ore deposits, which may be said to have begun with the King Survey, was inspired by King’s own appreciation of the broad geologic relations of the distribution of mineral wealth and by the detailed studies of individual mining districts by his associates, “based upon facts accurately determined in the light of modern geology.”

Geological surveys have been prosecuted in Alaska since 1895, and in the last few years the annual appropriation for the work has been the same as that made for the expenses of the whole Survey in the first year of its history. The Division of Alaskan Mineral Resources is in fact a geological survey in itself, except that it shares in the administrative machinery of the larger organization and has the advantage of the cooperation of the scientific specialists of the Survey as they may be needed to supplement its own force. All the investigations in this distant part of the country represent the Geological Survey at its best, for here the organization’s long experience in the Western States can be applied to most effective and helpful work on the frontier, where the geologist and topographer in their exploration do not always follow the prospector but often precede him. Undoubtedly no greater factor has contributed to the development of Alaskan resources than this pioneer work of the Federal Survey, yet the work has also contributed notable additions to the sciences of geology and geography.

The first duty laid upon the Director of the Geological Survey in the law of 1879 was “the classification of the public lands,” and this phrase undoubtedly expressed the idea of the committee of the National Academy. The same legislation, however, contained provision for the further consideration by a commission of the classification and valuation of the public lands, as also recommended by the National Academy. Thus the decision of Director King that the classification intended by Congress was scientific and was intended for general information and not to aid the Land Office in the disposition of land by sale or otherwise was really based upon the deliberate opinion of the Public Lands Commission, of which he was a member, that classification would seriously impede rapid settlement of the unoccupied lands. Nearly forty years later those who are intrusted with the land-classification work of the Geological Survey recognize this familiar argument, which undoubtedly had much more force in that earlier stage of the utilization of the Nation’s resources of land.[106] The conception of land classification as a business policy on the part of the Government as a landed proprietor belongs rather to this day of more intensive development. At present current public-land legislation calls for highest use, and hence official investigation of natural values and possibilities must precede disposition. This type of mineral and hydrographic classification of public lands has been in progress in increasing amount since 1906, so that now the Geological Survey is the kind of scientific adviser to the Secretary of the Interior and Commissioner of the General Land Office that may have been contemplated by the National Academy of Sciences in 1878. It is plain, however, to everyone at all conversant with Western conditions that the recent land-classification surveys in Wyoming, for instance—detailed geologic surveys which form the basis for the valuation of public coal lands in 40–acre units—would have possessed no utility in 1871, when the coal-land law was passed but when the demand for railroad fuel had just begun.

The land-classification idea is of course the basis of the National forest and irrigation movements. The laws of 1888 and 1896, which mark the beginning of active endorsement by Congress of these conservation movements, placed upon the Survey the duties of examining reservoir sites and forest reserves respectively. The earlier of these laws began the investigation of the water resources of the country, which is still an important phase of the Survey’s activity, and led to the creation of an independent organization—the Reclamation Service. It is easy to trace the beginnings of Federal reclamation of arid lands in the pioneer work of Powell, whose report in 1878 on the arid region of the United States was the first adequate statement of the problem of largest use of these lands in terms broader than those of individualistic endeavor. For years, however, Powell’s appeal for Congressional consideration of this National task was like the “voice of one crying in the wilderness.”

In a somewhat similar way the forestry surveys under the Geological Survey helped in the organization of a separate bureau—now the Forest Service. The other important Federal bureau tracing direct relationship to the Survey is the Bureau of Mines, established in 1910, which continued the investigations in mining technology specifically provided for by Congress for six years under the Geological Survey but in some degree begun in the early days of the Survey under Directors King and Powell.

Another equally important organization of a public nature, though not a Federal bureau, traces its beginnings to the Geological Survey: the Geophysical Laboratory of the Carnegie Institution, which now exercises so potent an influence over geologic investigation, had its origin in the official work of the Geological Survey’s Division of Chemical and Physical Research, and its personnel was at first largely recruited from the Survey. The highly original experimental work of this laboratory has extended far beyond the scope of the Survey’s work—at least far beyond the scope possible with the Federal funds available—yet most of the results of these investigations may eventually come under even a strict construction of the language used in the Survey’s appropriation “for chemical and physical researches relating to the geology of the United States.”

The topographic work of the present Survey continues with constant refinement of standards and economy of methods the work of the earlier organizations. The primary purpose of these topographic surveys is to provide the bases for geologic maps, yet these topographic maps, which cover 40 per cent of the area of the United States, are used in every type of civil engineering as well as by the public generally. The annual distribution by sale of half a million of these maps is an index of their value to the people.

The hot discussion that was waged for years on the question of military versus scientific administration of topographic surveys is in striking contrast with the present concentration of all the topographic mapping under the Geological Survey in those areas where it may best serve the needs of the Army. In 1916 Congress specifically recognized the possibility of greater cooperation of this kind, both in the appropriation made to the Geological Survey and in a special appropriation made to the War Department. For a number of years indeed special military information had been contributed to the Army by the Survey topographers, but since March 26, 1917, every Geological Survey topographer has worked exclusively on the program of military surveys laid down by the General Staff of the Army, and the places of some of the 44 Survey topographers now in France as engineer officers are filled by 34 other reserve engineer officers detailed by order of the Secretary of War to the Director of the Geological Survey to assist in this military mapping and to receive instruction fitting them in turn for topographic service in France.

The contribution of this civilian service to the military operations in the present emergency forms a fitting conclusion to this review of a century of Government surveys. At present 215 members of the Geological Survey are in uniform, 107 as engineer officers, two of whom are on the staff of the American Commanding General in France. In the war work carried on in the United States the Survey’s contribution is by no means limited to military mapping: the geologists are also mobilized for meeting war needs, assisting in developing new sources of the essential war minerals, in speeding up production of mineral products, in collecting information for the purchasing officers both of our own and of the Allied governments, in coöperating with the constructing quarter-masters in the location of gravel and sand for structural use and in both general and special examinations of underground water supply and of drainage possibilities at cantonment sites, and in supplying the Navy Department with similar technical data. A special contribution has been the application to aërial surveys of photogrammetric methods developed in the Alaskan topographic work and the perfection of a camera specially adapted to airplane use. The utilization of the Survey’s map engraving and printing plant for confidential and urgent work for both the Army and Navy has necessitated postponement of current work for the Geological Survey itself. Throughout the organization the records, the methods, and the personnel which represent the product of many years of scientific activity are all being utilized; thus is the experience of the past translated into special service in the present crisis.

_Notes._

Footnote 96:

Hess, R. H., Foundations of National Prosperity, p. 100.

Footnote 97:

Report Nat’l Museum, 1904, pp. 189–733.

Footnote 98:

Featherstonhaugh, J. D., Am. Geol., 3, 220, 1889.

Footnote 99:

Whitney, Mineral Wealth of the United States, pp. 248–250.

Footnote 100:

Foster and Whitney, 31st Cong., 1st session, House Doc. 69, pp. 13–14,
1850.

Footnote 101:

First Annual Rept. U. S. Geol. Survey, p. 4.

Footnote 102:

Wheeler, Report 3d Internat’l Geog. Cong., p. 492, 1885.

Footnote 103:

The views of the writer on “natural monopolies” in the Government
service are set forth in an address delivered at the centennial
celebration of the U. S. Coast and Geodetic Survey, April 5, 1916.
(See Science, vol. 43, pp. 659–665, May 12, 1916.)

Footnote 104:

For correspondence on this subject, see Minnesota Geol. Survey, Eighth
Ann. Rept., 1880, p. 173.

Footnote 105:

Owen, D. D., 30th Cong., 1st sess., Senate Doc. No. 57, p. 7, 1848.

Footnote 106:

This essential difference between present-day requirements and the
needs of earlier generations has been discussed by W. C. Mendenhall,
the geologist in charge of the Land Classification Board of the
Geological Survey: Proceedings 2d Pan-American Sci. Cong., 1915–16, 3,
761.

VI
ON THE DEVELOPMENT OF VERTEBRATE PALEONTOLOGY

By RICHARD SWANN LULL

_Introduction._

Unlike its sister science of Invertebrate Paleontology, which has been approached so largely from the viewpoint of stratigraphic geology, that of the vertebrates is essentially a biologic science, having its inception in the masterly work of Cuvier, who is also to be regarded as the founder of comparative anatomy. For long decades, vertebrate paleontology was simply a branch of comparative anatomy or morphology in that it dealt almost exclusively with the form and other peculiarities of fossil bones and teeth, often in a more or less fragmentary condition, very little or no attention being paid to any other system of the creature’s anatomy. Distribution both in space and in time was recorded, but the value of vertebrates in stratigraphy was still to be appreciated and has hardly yet come into its own. It is readily seen, therefore, that the two departments of paleontology did not enlist the same workers or even the same type of investigators, for while the two sciences have much in common and should have more, the vertebratist must, above all else, be a morphologist, with a keen appreciation of form, and a mind capable of retaining endless structural details and of visualizing as a whole what may be known only in part. The initial work of the brilliant Cuvier set so high a standard of preparedness and mental equipment that as a consequence, the number of those engaged in vertebrate research has never been large as compared with the workers in some other branches of science, but the results achieved by the few who have consecrated their research to the fossil vertebrates has been in the main of a high order.

At first, as has been emphasized, this work was largely morphological, dealing both with the individual skeletal elements and later with the bony framework as a whole. Then came the endeavor to clothe the bones with sinews and with flesh—to imagine, in other words, the life-appearance of the ages-departed form—with such of its habits as could be deduced from structure of body, tooth, and limb. Next came the working out of systematic series of vertebrates and their marshalling into species, genera, and larger groups, and much time was thus spent, especially when rapid discovery brought a continual stream of new forms before the systematist, and hence some appreciation of the countless hosts of bygone creatures which peopled the world in the geologic past. This systematic work, however, was based upon the most painstaking morphologic comparisons and so the science was still within the scope of comparative anatomy.