Karen Berry has completed her time as Colorado State Geologist

Karen A. Berry has retired from the role of Colorado State Geologist, a position she was appointed to in 2013, as CGS was being transferred from state government to Colorado School of Mines in Golden. She joined the Survey in 1999, and was engineering geologist, land use program manager, and deputy director prior to appointment as director. 

Before that, she was an exploration geologist for Petro Lewis in Texas, engineering geologist for CRS Sirrine in Arizona, geotechnical reclamation specialist for the Colorado Mined Land Reclamation Board, and County Geologist for Jefferson County. She obtained her degree in geological engineering from Colorado School of Mines in 1982.

Karen was AASG VP in 2016/17, President Elect in 17/18, President in 18/19, and Past President in 19/20. Best of luck for your next steps, Karen!

Eric Carson has been named Interim Wisconsin State Geologist

Eric C. Carson has been named Interim Wisconsin State Geologist. He has been a geologist with the Wisconsin Geological and Natural History Survey since 2008. Previously, he was Lecturing Faculty at San Jacinto College in Houston for almost 5 years. 

He received his BS from West Virginia University and his MS and PhD from UW–Madison. His research focuses on the advance and retreat of the last great ice sheet across North America, processes associated with rivers and floods, and how rivers sculpt landscapes. Welcome to AASG, Eric!

A mineral is named after former State Geologist Priscilla Grew!

Priscillagrewite-(Y), ideally (Ca2Y)Zr2Al3O12, is a garnet discovered by Irina Galuskina and her colleagues in 2020, from an exposure of marble in Jordan. It is the eighth new garnet species discovered by Galuskina. 

It is named for Priscilla Grew, who has held several posts, including State Geologist of Minnesota from 1986 to 1993. As Priscilla P. Dudley, she was first to reveal oscillatory zoning in eclogitic garnet using scanning electron beam photography; hence the nickname “the garnet lady” that she shares with Galuskina. Grew’s mother introduced her to collecting minerals in 1947 when Grew was only seven and the family was on vacation in Colorado. 

Congratulations, Priscilla!

https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/00357529.2022.2074257

Joe Gillman to complete his time as State Geologist of Missouri

After 27 years in state government, and 14 years as State Geologist of Missouri, Joe Gillman will retire on October 1^st, 2022. The Missouri Survey has flourished under his leadership.

Joe was AASG President in 2015/2016, having joined Executive in 2011, and Annual Meeting Host in 2017; he currently is the Finance Committee chair for the National Association of State Boards of Geology.

Joe has been serving on the State Oil and Gas Council, Missouri Mining Commission, Missouri Board of Geologists Registration, Well Installation Board, and Industrial Minerals Advisory Council.

Best of luck for your move to Colorado, Joe!

Bob Milici, State Geologist of Virginia from 1979 to 1991

Robert C. Milici, State Geologist of Virginia from 1979 to 1991, passed away on August 18, 2022. Previously, Bob was with the Tennessee Survey for 19 years, and he finished his career with USGS in Denver and Reston for 21 years. He was born in New Haven, Connecticut in 1931, and attended university at Cornell and Tennessee. His research production was prodigious, for which he received several awards. He is very well remembered by us all.

https://www.legacy.com/us/obituaries/name/robert-milici-obituary?id=36360708

Larry Woodfork, State Geologist of West Virginia from 1988 to 2002

Larry D. Woodfork, former West Virginia State Geologist, passed away on August 22, 2022, in Morgantown, at the age of 83.

Larry attended Indiana and WV Universities, joined the WV Survey in 1968, was appointed assistant state geologist in 1969, and was director and state geologist from 1988 until his retirement in 2002. Larry was AASG President in 1998-99, and he also served as President of AGI, and AIPG, as well as Chair of the 2007-2009 International Year of Planet Earth.

He received the AIPG Parker and Van Couvering Medals, the AGI Campbell Medal, and the AAPG Galey Medal. He will long be very well remembered by us all, for many reasons, including his role as the 'father of the Pick and Gavel'.

https://www.dominionpost.com/2022/08/27/larry-woodfork-2/

Early Career Award to Kansas Geological Survey Scientist

Sam Zipper of the Kansas Geological Survey has been awarded the 2022 Kohout Early Career Award from the Hydrogeology Division of GSA.

Sam has been working on how water and land management decisions affect the people, economy and environment of the Great Plains, including relationships between intermittent and ephemeral streams and playas and other ecological systems, studying the effects of irrigator-driven groundwater conservation programs on water resources and developing easy-to-use tools to estimate streamflow depletion caused by groundwater pumping. His current work in part is funded by NSF, USDA, USGS, and NASA.

Zipper has been with the Kansas Survey since 2019, and is the author or co-author of 58 scientific publications with more than 250 co-authors from more than 150 institutions. Congratulations, Sam!

https://today.ku.edu/2022/08/17/kansas-geological-survey-scientist-receives-early-career-award

Priscilla Grew wins the 2022 GSA President's Medal

Priscilla Grew, State Geologist of Minnesota from 1986 to 1993, is the 2022 winner of the GSA President’s Medal. The award is conferred on those whose impact has profoundly enhanced the geoscience profession. Priscilla was born in Glens Falls, New York, attended Bryn Mawr, earned her doctorate in geology from Berkeley in 1967, and joined the Boston College faculty. Her early research was on blueschists and eclogites in California. She later became an assistant research geologist at UCLA, and in 1977, director of the California Department of Conservation, which included the State Geological Survey and the oil and gas agency. In 1981, she was appointed to the California Public Utilities Commission. She became director of the Minnesota Geological Survey and University of Minnesota Professor in 1986. From 1993 to 1999, she was vice chancellor for research at the University of Nebraska at Lincoln, and after then being faculty for a while, from 2003 to 2015, she was Director of the Nebraska Natural History Museum. Her service has been extensive, and she now is on the Finance Committee of the International Union of Geodesy and Geophysics. Congratulations, Priscilla!