Henry William Menard

H. William Menard
Menard as Director of USGS, 1978-1981
Born	(1920-12-10)December 10, 1920 Fresno, California, USA
Died	La Jolla, California, USA
Nationality	United States
Fields	Marine Geology
Institutions	US Geological Survey
Alma mater	California Institute of Technology and Harvard University

Henry William Menard (December 10, 1920 - February 9, 1986) was an American geologist. His interests included ocean-floor sedimentation, geomorphology, tectonics, geophysics, oceanography, geostatistics, and the sociology of science.. His knowledge of the Pacific was a key factor in putting together the seafloor spreading history of the East Pacific Rise and its ocean-spanning fracture zones, one of which is named after him. He was eulogized as the "patriot of the plate-tectonic revolution and patriarch of modern marine geomorphology."

Menard's field work was extensive, involving 1,000 aqua-lung dives and 20 or 30 oceanographic expeditions from 1949 until 1978 when he became Director of the U.S.G.S. His research focused on the mapping, morphology, and sedimentation of the ocean floor, particularly the East Pacific Rise.

Menard's historical and sociological writings have been cited by historians of science. He is perhaps best known for his promotion of the theory of Plate Tectonics before it was widely accepted in the academic community. Menard served many roles during his career as a marine geologist. He was a field worker, a theorist, an educator, a popularizer, an entrepreneur, and a government employee. He became the 10th Director of the USGS under President Carter.

Life and career

Menard earned a B.S. and M.S. from the California Institute of Technology in 1942 and 1947. He was a USN naval officer, having served for three years in the South Pacific during World War II as a photo interpreter. He had "Top Secret" and "Ultrasecret" clearances. In 1949, he completed a Ph.D. in marine geology at Harvard University. Menard began his professional career in 1949, in the Sea Floor Studies Section of San Diego's Navy Electronics Laboratory, where he world for six years as a marine geologist. He joined the Scripps Institution of Oceanography (SIO) in 1955 as associate professor of geology. During the 1950s, Menard also started a scuba-diving business with a few colleagues that included consulting for AT&T on the laying of cable.

He became a full professor of the University of California, San Diego in 1961. Two years were spent at Churchill College (1962 and 1970-71). Following a year in Washington, D.C. as technical advisor in the Office of Science and Technology (1965-66), Menard served as Director of the University of California's Institute of Marine Resources. In April 1978, H. William Menard became the United States Geological Survey's tenth Director but remained only through the balance of the Carter administration.

A member of the National Academy of Sciences, Menard was a recognized worldwide authority in marine geology and oceanography and had helped discover, map, and characterize notable topographic and structural features of the sea floor. After his return to the Scripps Institution of Oceanography in 1981, Menard continued to teach, write, and do research.

Advocacy

Menard was dedicated to an understanding of the history and sociology of science and brought together his observations in "Science: Growth and Change", published by Harvard University Press in 1971. The Science reviewer (C. Albritton, Science 176:639-41) noted that it was "an engaging and prophetic exposition of scientism at its operational best." Menard surveys the development of science in the United States, to a large extent based on his associations with the geological community. He develops many of the background problems of scientists—conflicts with administrators, absence of positions in specialties, the temporal ups and downs of scientific disciplines, salaries, and productivity. He utilizes elections to the highest-level scientific societies, such as the U.S. National Academy of Sciences and the Royal Society of London, and the receipt of prestigious awards, such as the Penrose Medal of the Geological Society of America, as more or less objective measures of scientific creativities, both in this volume and in The Ocean of Truth. Menard was well aware that prolific publication did not guarantee such recognition by peers and neither did notoriety in the media. Menard was a "lumper" as opposed to a "splitter" in his ideas on the management of science. He proposed in "Science: Growth and Change" a coalescence of federal science departments into one superagency through which scientists could more effectively control their destinies.

:The Ocean of Truth: A Personal History of Global Tectonics, is Menard's insider account of the history of the seafloor-spreading concept and Plate Tectonics, which was also called Global Tectonics at the time.

A generalist and a humanistic natural scientist, he read widely and could apply the principles or results of one field—say, plastic deformation in tested materials—to the observed shape of major geographic entities, in order to draw instructive, sometimes prescient, inferences. Ever the realist, Bill could judge how long, or far, to hold such views.

Death

Menard died of cancer in February, 1986, while his book, The Ocean of Truth, was in press. He reviewed the galleys for that book on his deathbed.

Awards and honors

• 1968 - elected to the National Academy of Sciences
• Penrose Medal from the Geological Society of America
• 1985 - William Bowie Award from the American Geophysical Union

Publications

• "Marine Geology of the Pacific", 1964
• "Anatomy of an Expedition", 1969
• "Science: Growth and Change", 1971 ISBN 0-674-79280-7
• "Geology, Resources, and Society", 1974 ISBN 0-7167-0260-6
• "Ocean Science", 1978 ISBN 0-7167-0013-1
• "Islands", 1986 ISBN 0-7167-5017-1
• The Ocean of Truth: A Personal History of Global Tectonics, 1986 ISBN 0-691-08414-9

External links

• Portrait of William Menard from U.S. Geological Survey Museum Collection
• Photograph of Dr. Henry William Menard from U.S. Geological Survey Photographic Library (Portraits Collection)
• Photograph of Henry William Menard from U.S. Geological Survey History (USGS: The Survey at 100)