Background
Arthur Holmes was born on January 14, 1890, at Heb-burn-on-Tyne.
(Excerpt from The Nomenclature of Petrology: With Referenc...)
Excerpt from The Nomenclature of Petrology: With References to Selected Literature Some years ago I began the compilation Of a card catalogue Of petrographic and associated terms, for the use Of students in the Geological Department Of the Imperial College Of Science and Technology. About the Publisher Forgotten Books publishes hundreds of thousands of rare and classic books. Find more at www.forgottenbooks.com This book is a reproduction of an important historical work. Forgotten Books uses state-of-the-art technology to digitally reconstruct the work, preserving the original format whilst repairing imperfections present in the aged copy. In rare cases, an imperfection in the original, such as a blemish or missing page, may be replicated in our edition. We do, however, repair the vast majority of imperfections successfully; any imperfections that remain are intentionally left to preserve the state of such historical works.
http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/1332239145/?tag=2022091-20
Arthur Holmes was born on January 14, 1890, at Heb-burn-on-Tyne.
At school he became interested in the age of the earth through reading Lord Kelvin's Addresses. Winning a scholarship to London's Imperial College, he graduated in geology and physics in 1911
Arter graduation he immediately began research on the radioactivity of rocks, guided by R. J. Strutt (later 4th Baron Rayleigh). Strutt's studies had revealed a source of heat within the earth, unsuspected when Kelvin made his estimate that not more than 40 million years had elapsed since the earth's crust had solidified from the molten state. Holmes shared with Strutt in overthrowing this conclusion, and he made successive advances toward establishing a new and much longer geological time scale, eventually showing the earth to be at least 4. 5 billion years old.
Holmes's researches were twice interrupted by participation as geologist in commercial explorations, first in Mozambique (1911-1912), where he contracted tropical diseases which precluded military service in World War I, and in Burma (1921-1924); the latter expedition failed, and he had to sue for his pay on return to England.
Holmes was demonstrator in geology at the Imperial College from 1912 to 1921, where he wrote three books and published many scientific memoirs. From 1924 to 1943 he headed the geology department of Durham University, which gained international fame as a center of petrological research. He was regius professor of geology and mineralogy at the University of Edinburgh from 1943 until his retirement, in poor health, in 1956.
Holmes's work touched nearly all aspects of geology except paleontology. His geological researches were widespread, concerning India, Mozambique, and elsewhere in Africa, besides his native Britain. His textbook Principles of Physical Geology (1944; 2d ed. 1965) is considered a classic. He did not shrink from the controversies that have figured so notably in the history of his science. He was one of the earliest and most forceful supporters of the theory of continental drift and held that it must be produced by convection currents in the substratum of the crust. In his textbook Holmes gives some diagrams describing the formation of new ocean floor by rising materials—diagrams which are almost prophetic in their anticipation of later results. He died, after a prolonged illness, in London on September 20, 1965.
(Excerpt from The Nomenclature of Petrology: With Referenc...)
(Since the appearance of the first edition, Principles of ...)
(The Age of the Earth Classic Reprint)
In 1955 he became a Foreign Member of the Académie des sciences, Institut de France.
He also was a Fellow of the Royal Society and a Fellow of the Royal Society of Edinburgh.
He was a man of quiet demeanor.
He married his first wife, Margaret Howe in 1914. After she died in 1938, Holmes in the following year married Doris Reynolds, a geologist who had joined the teaching staff at Durham. After his death she edited the third edition of the Principles.