When I was young my Dad took me to this fossil reef in Stroudsburg PA. It is solid fossils. You may collect there, and keep your fossils, on the field trip.

All slides are copyright © Charles and Susan SmartSome are also copyright ©National Geographic SocietyPermanent stock collection

When I was a young Marine in Vietnam we passed a fossil Mastodon skeleton while coming back from patrol. Geology seemed an interesting major.

West of Dong Ha Marine Base, RVN

As soon as possible, I took degrees in Geology at Rutgers and Princeton.My first job in Geology was Natural Gas exploration for Shell Oil.

Mapping the White River Oligocene, containing many fossil mammals, South Dakota

This course provides the fundamentals of Geology. In the laboratory we will learn the skills of the field geologist. We will learn to read and make maps, recognize common rocks and minerals, make and interpret geologic cross sections, make observations, and on the field trip, correctly take samples.A field geologist’s equipment is usually simple.

Mapping the Careless Creek Dinosaur sites, North of Shawmut, Montana

In the early 60’s, Geology was collection of unrelated topics without an underlying theory.

Prospecting for Silver in Montana

For example, long volcanic arcs and deep ocean trenches were discussed in separate courses. As students, we didn’t realize how they are related.

Deep trench the entrance to a subduction zone

The Aleutians, a volcanic island arc, made of basalt that rose

up from partial melts of the mantle, wetted by subducted

ocean lithosphere

Climate changes in the past, with growing and melting glaciers, were still another separate course. As students, we didn’t realize extreme climate changes were caused, in part, by plate movements.

A Tarn, a glacial meltwater lake, in the Swiss Alps. Photo by Susan Smart

There were courses on rift valleys with long axial lakes, and separate courses on long linear seas. As students, we didn’t realize they were the same thing at different stages.

Research Vessel, Lake Turkana, Northwest Kenya

Or that oceans were just old seas.

Limestone coast, Curaçao

Everyone had a specialty. Some geologists studied coastal erosion

Sunset, Curaçao

others studied coral reefs

Dive site, Bonaire

or stream erosion

Stream, Swiss Alps, (c) Susan Smart

or sedimentation in small ponds called oxbows

Our swimming pool, Middle Awash Basin, Ethiopia

Desert specialists knew of a connection to equatorial weather

Sunset, Bonaire

and tried to understand the physics of dunes and desert pavement

Sand Dune, Northwest Lothagam, Kenya

or weathering by flash floods

Flooded Kerio River, Kenya

whose water disappeared as quickly as it arrived.

Lomenyenkuperat River, Kanapoi, Kenya

Water formed erosional features such as this toadstool

Lothagam, Kenya.

and this arch. Both are explained by flash floods. But as students we were never told about any connections between the topics we studied.

Finally, in the early 1970’s, the geology faculty members let students in on the secret. Now geology has a robust central model that relates folded mountains, rift valleys, mid-ocean ridges and oceans, deep trenches and long ranges of volcanoes, and earthquakes, to a single process: very slow convection in the Mantle. The paradigm, called Plate Tectonics, has made the Earth much easier to understand.

Of course, geologists still specialize.

Plate Tectonics

Some geologists who study long extinct fossils still set out to look for modern counterparts

Bonaire

With colleagues from universities from all over.

Bonaire

Deep dives in remote regions sometimes lead to understanding a fossil

Malindi, Kenya

when modern animals give up insights to past life

Bonaire, 130 feet

Some were captured with bottles

Bonaire

Or nets

Bonaire

and brought up for examination

Bonaire

For example, this jellyfish from offshore of Malindi, Kenya has a hard disc similar to fossils in the Shawangunk Formation near here.

Malindi, Kenya

Students of fossil plants study modern forests

Susan in the Karura Forest, KenyaSusan in the Karura Forest, Kenya

as do students of weathering, erosion and soils.

Karura Forest, Kenya

From studies of fossil plants, we know that climates cooled and dried in the Oligocene. Plate Tectonics explains this cooling. Forests retreated, and were replaced over large areas by drought tolerant grasslands.

South of Nairobi, Kenya, near the Athi River

Herbivores evolved to eat the grasses.These are impala.

South of Nairobi, Kenya

Horses became increasingly adapted for grasses; they developed large molars and very long feet.

Elaborate social structures evolved to allow huge herd migrationsin search of fresh pasture and water

Treetops, near Nyeri, Kenya

A great variety of carnivores appeared,

Ashok’s pet Otters, Calcutta

Some groups, e.g. dogs and cats diversified into social, cooperating hunters

South of Nairobi, Kenya

including some really large ones.

South of Nairobi, Kenya

Hominids evolved as grassland hunter-gatherers(this guy had malaria, note the thickened skull bones)

Bodo D’Ar, Middle Awash Basin, Ethiopia

Mad dogs, Englishmen and geologists. This is my student, Dr. Assefa Mebrate

Bodo D’Ar, Middle Awash Basin, Ethiopia

Recently our civilizations arose. This is a burial of a Corinthian soldier in northwestern Kenya

220’ bench, Lothagam, Kenya

Some geologists study Taphonomy, the processes that preserve fossils

This civet has just died. Will a fossil form? Insects and scavengers will remove the flesh.

On the road escarpment to Naivasha, Kenya

If the bones are on a floodplain they may be covered with sediment

Water Buffalo killed by Lions, South of Nairobi, Kenya

This fossil hippo skull is 5 million years old

Lothagam, Kenya

These dinosaur bones are about 70 million years old

AvaceratopsAvaceratops level, Careless Creek Ranch, near Shawmut, MT level, Careless Creek Ranch, near Shawmut, MT

Here Prof. Peter Dodson collects dinosaurs from a Cretaceous stream

AvaceratopsAvaceratops level, Careless Creek Ranch, near Shawmut, MT level, Careless Creek Ranch, near Shawmut, MT

Sometimes Field Geology is hazardous. This geological survey crew ran out of Petrol. When we happened by five days later, they had run out of water. We gave them water and gasoline.

Pokot District, Kenya

Camps, however, can be luxurious. Here our shower water is heating up in the equatorial sunshine.

Kanapoi, Kenya

Sources of water, groceries and the doctor are a short drive to town

Note the cinder cone volcano

Lodwar, Kenya

Bathrooms are spacious

Sundown, Lothagam, Kenya

We fend for ourselves; here a tire tube needs a patch.

Prof. Dennis Powers, UTEP

Lothagam, Kenya

Infrastructure is up-to-date

Crossing the Awash River, Gewane, Ethiopia

Of course, some of the local fauna are a nuisance

Red Spitting Cobra, Lothagam, Kenya

Some downright dangerous. Our friend John M. Kioko is holding a dead five-stepper, Echis carinatus. It has been preserved in alcohol for the Kenya National Museum

Kanapoi, Kenya

But the neighbors are great.

Mary, near Gewane, Ethiopia

So if you like learning about the world, welcome to geology.