Clarence King

Clarence King Clarence Rivers King (January 6, 1842 – December 24, 1901) was an American geologist, author, mountaineer, and explorer of the Sierra Nevada. He was from 1879 to 1881 the inaugural director of the United States Geological Survey. He was elected in 1871 a Member of the American Philosophical Society and in 1876 a Member of the U.S. National Academy of Sciences. Quotes If poor, puny little Eruption of Mount Vesuvius in 79 AD Vesuvius could immortalize itself by burying the towns at its feet, if the feeble energy of a 1755 Lisbon earthquake Lisbon earthquake could record itself on the grave-stones of thousands of men, then the Yellowstone hotspot volcanic period in Western America was truly catastrophic. Modern volcanism is but the faint, flickering survival of what was once a world-wide and immense exhibition of telluric energy, one whose distortions and dislocations of the crust, whose deluges of molten stone, emissions of mineral dust, heated waters, and noxious gases could not have failed to exert destructive effect on the life of considerable portions of the globe. It cannot be explained away upon any theory of slow, gradual action. The simple field facts are ample proof of the intensity and suddenness of Tertiary period Tertiary vulcanism. Catastrophism and Evolution August 1877 XI 8 The American Naturalist https://books.google.com/books?id=39kEAAAAQAAJ&pg=PA460 449–470 (quote from p. 460) Few great men have been fortunate in their contemporary biographers. Even when they chose them themselves, as some of the Caesar (title) Cæsars did, there is something in the attitude of Royal court court Favourite favorite and leader of a literary claque that begets triviality and servility, something in the passive pose of a mere observer that incapacitates them from a living knowledge of the struggles and purposes of a high career.To know the life of a contemporary, one must share it. Biographers of Lincoln The Century Magazine October 1886 XXXII 6 https://books.google.co.zm/books?id=zGIJAAAAQAAJ&pg=868 861–869 (quote from p. 868) Quotes about Clarence King His first experience was as an assistant to William Henry Brewer Professor Brewer, when, in September, 1863, they explored the regions in northern California, where the granite crest of the Sierra Nevada suddenly breaks down and is succeeded by broken hills and lava-capped plains out of which rise the imposing volcanic cones of Peter Lassen#Legacy Lassen's Peak and Mount Shasta Mt. Shasta. Here he had his first opportunity for a field study of volcanic rocks—a study in which, aided by the teaching of his great friend, the German geologist Ferdinand von Richthofen Von Richthofen, he afterward became so proficient that for many years he was recognized as the highest American authority upon the subject. Samuel Franklin Emmons, Biographical Memoir of Clarence King, 1842-1901 Biographical Memoirs, Volume 6 U.S. National Academy of Sciences 1909 https://books.google.com/books?id=4wHSy1ypZUAC&pg=PA33 25–55 (quote from p. 33) External links Clarence King The Atlantic https://www.theatlantic.com/author/clarence-king/ (articles published in the 1870s) Category:1842 births Category:1901 deaths Category:Authors from Rhode Island Category:Explorers from the United States Category:Geologists from the United States Category:Members of the American Philosophical Society Category:Members of the United States National Academy of Sciences Category:Science authors from the United States Category:Yale University alumni