Guide to the J Harlen Bretz Papers


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Table of Contents

• Acknowledgments
• Descriptive Summary
• Information on Use
• Access
• Citation
• Biographical Note
• Scope Note
• Related Resources
• Subject Headings
• INVENTORY
• Series I: Biographical
  • Subseries 1: General
  • Subseries 2: Departmental and Professional
  • Subseries 3: Louise A. Boyd Expedition to East Greenland
  • Subseries 4: Channeled Scablands Controversy
• Series II: Correspondence
• Series III: Field Notes
  • Subseries 1: Notebooks
  • Subseries 2: Looseleaf Binders
• Series IV: Publications
  • Subseries 1: Caves and Karst Formations
  • Subseries 2: Channeled Scablands
  • Subseries 3: Glaciation
  • Subseries 4: Other Publications
• Series V: Photographs
  • Subseries 1: Biographical
  • Subseries 2: Alberta
  • Subseries 3: Caves
  • Subseries 4: Channeled Scablands
  • Subseries 5: Greenland

Acknowledgments

Descriptive Summary

Information on Use

Access

No restrictions.

Citation

When quoting material from this collection, the preferred citation is: Bretz, J Harlen. Papers, [Box #, Folder #], Special Collections Research Center, University of Chicago Library

Biographical Note

J Harlen Bretz was born in 1882 in Ionia County, Michigan. After receiving an A.B. from Albion College in 1905, he taught high school for several years in Seattle, Washington, where he began independent field work in the geology of the Puget Sound region. In 1911, Bretz entered the University of Chicago as a graduate fellow in geology, studying under Thomas C. Chamberlin, Rollin D. Salisbury, and Stuart Weller. Upon completing his Ph.D. in 1913, he accepted a position at the University of Washington as assistant professor of geology. One year later, at the invitation of Salisbury, he returned to the University of Chicago as an Instructor in Geology (1914-1915). Bretz spent the remainder of his career at Chicago as Assistant Professor (1915-1921), Associate Professor (1921-1926), and Professor of Geology (1926-1947).

Bretz' major contribution to geology was his study of the channeled scablands, a rugged, heavily scoured section of the Columbia plate in eastern Washington. Challenging the gradualist uniformitarianism that had governed previous interpretations of the area, Bretz attributed the topography of the scablands to the action of a sudden, catastrophic flood brought on by the release of waters from glacial Lake Missoula. Bretz' theory was disputed by many leading authorities in Pleistocene geology and attracted particularly severe criticism from the U.S. Geological Survey at a meeting of the Geological Society of Washington, D.C. in 1927. Later studies by Bretz and others, however, contributed supporting evidence to the theory, and final confirmation was supplied by aerial photographs taken from orbiting satellites in the mid-1970's. By that time, the geological profession had reversed itself and embraced the theory it once rejected, hailing Bretz in publications and at conferences as a courageous empiricist vindicated by fact.

Bretz also made important advances in the geological study of limestone caves and karst landscapes. In 1930, geologist William Morris Davis had argued that caves were not formed above the water table, as was commonly supposed, but were instead the result of underground water circulating below the water table. Bretz' work on the caves of Missouri, begun in the late 1930's, furnished crucial evidence to support Davis' theory and went on to make substantial contributions to the description of limestone caverns and the analysis of the general erosional history of the Ozark Uplift.

Results of Bretz' field work in Washington, Missouri, Alberta, Greenland, Bermuda, and the Chicago region were published in numerous articles and a number of monographic studies, including Glaciation of the Puget Sound Region (1913), Geology of the Chicago Region (1939-1956), Earth Sciences: Meteorology, Oceanography, Geology (1940), Caves of Missouri (1956), and Geomorphic History of the Ozarks of Missouri (1965). Bretz also received two major professional awards, the Niel A. Miner Award of the National Association of Geology Teachers in 1959, and the Penrose Medal of the Geological Society of America in 1979. Bretz died in 1981 at his home in Homewood, Illinois, at the age of 98.

Scope Note

The papers of J Harlen Bretz comprise 12.5 linear feet of material, including a Bretz family genealogy; Bretz' autobiography, Memories; a journal of the Louise A. Boyd Expedition to East Greenland (1933); publications and correspondence related to Bretz' controversial theory of the channeled scablands of Washington; professional correspondence; field notes; offprints; and photographs. The papers were presented to the Library in 1981 by Bretz' son and daughter, Rudolf C. Bretz and Rhoda Bretz Riley. The collection has been divided into five series.

Series I: Biographical

Material in this series has been divided into four subseries: General, Departmental and Professional, Louise A. Boyd Expedition to East Greenland, 1933, and Channeled Scablands Controversy.

Most of the General sub-series is devoted to typescript and printed copies of Bretz' autobiography, Memories, which was issued in four parts from 1973 to 1975. Friends and colleagues responded warmly to Bretz' vigorous and occasionally ribald recollections of field work and campus life at the University of Chicago. This sub-series also includes a family genealogy compiled by Bretz in 1949; a Sears, Roebuck catalog containing the model for the Bretz house in Homewood; and a humorous 95th-birthday tribute by Rudolf Bretz asserting that Bretz was born Harley but changed his to J Harlen while at Albion College. Bretz recalled in Memories, Part II that the period after the J was dropped several years later at the insistence of Rollin Salisbury, who noted that it was not properly an abbreviation of any name.

The Departmental and Professional material consists of chronologically organized folders containing bibliographies of Bretz' publications; notes taken at a course given by Stuart Weller; letters from students; correspondence related to the Miner Award and Penrose Medal; and a tribute to Bretz' field pedagogy from M. King Hubbert. Bretz' remarks at his retirement dinner in 1947 are also worth noting in that they anticipate many of the themes developed later in the Memories, and include an admission by Bretz that he sometimes imitated the harsh classroom manner of his mentor, Salisbury.

The Louise A. Boyd Expedition to East Greenland in 1933 was financed and led by Louise Boyd, a wealthy amateur photographer, under the auspices of the American Geographical Society. Bretz joined the expedition as physiographer and published the results of his observations in "Physiographic Studies in East Greenland." This sub-series devoted to the expedition includes correspondence with Louise Boyd and Isaiah Bowman of the A.G.S.; short vignettes of wildlife and scenery; and Bretz' journal describing his personal experiences on the trip.

The controversy over the channeled scablands is documented in the fourth sub-series. Here can be found Bretz' outline for his 1927 lecture at the Cosmos Club; a U.S. Geological Survey booklet of 1973 incorporating Bretz' conclusions; articles by Victor R. Baker comparing Bretz' scablands to similarly channeled areas on the planet Mars; congratulations from friends and colleagues on Bretz' vindication; and two articles by Stephen Jay Gould summarizing the entire debate.

Series II: Correspondence

This series consists of alphabetically arranged professional correspondence. Topics reflected in the correspondence include Victor Baker's defense of Bretz' scablands theory; Bretz' dispute with William H. Hobbs over the interpretation of scablands topography; a proposal to John C. Merriam of the Carnegie Institution for possible grant support for scablands studies; discussion with Rollin Salisbury regarding a fellowship at the University of Chicago in 1911; and the editing and publication of Earth Sciences (1940) by John Wiley and Sons.

Series III: Field Notes

Field notes in this series have been arranged into two chronological sub-series. The first, Notebooks, consists of 78 small field notebooks or notebook fragments containing Bretz' manuscript notes on field work from 1905 to 1954. The early notebooks concentrate on Puget Sound glaciation and the formation of the channeled scablands, while later ones reflect his subsequent travels and research interests. A series of nine numbered notebooks from 1948 deals exclusively with Bretz' study of limestone caves in Missouri.

The second group of notes, Looseleaf Binders, consists of typescript field notes from 1916 to 1956 bound in 13 looseleaf binders with some additional disbound looseleaf material. In general, the binders contain notes for a particular year or group of years, although some are devoted largely to a single topic. A binder from 1928, for instance, contains reports on soil samples taken at various points in Washington and Oregon, while other binders have notes on such specific subjects as the Chicago region; Greenland; limestone caves in Arkansas, Missouri, Pennsylvania, Virginia, and other states; Grand Coulee; Alberta; Ozark peneplanation; and Bermuda. A final binder contains undated notes.

Series IV: Publications

This series contains offprints of Bretz' published work and occasional folders of related correspondence. The series is divided into four subseries: Caves and Karst Formations; Channeled Scablands; Glaciation; and Other Publications. Within each sub-series, offprints have been arranged in strict chronological order by date of publication.

Series V: Photographs

Photographs in this series have been separated into two general groups: those which are essentially Biographical, and those which document Bretz' studies of Alberta; Caves; Channeled Scablands; and Greenland. Biographical photographs depict Bretz in the field with colleagues and students and demonstrate his interest in double entendre signs, of which he had a large collection. Three folders of photographs concern the Bretz Laboratory for Geomorphology and Sedimentation at Albion College and Bretz' donation of boulders for study by geology students at his alma mater.

Related Resources

The following related resources are located in the Department of Special Collections:

http://www.lib.uchicago.edu/e/spcl/select.html

Additional information on geology at the University of Chicago during Bretz's tenure on the faculty can be found in the President's Papers and the papers of Rollin D. Salisbury and Stuart Weller.

Subject Headings

• Bretz, J Harlen, 1882-1981
• Columbia Plateau
• Caves
• Geologists
• Geology
• Geology, Washington (State)

INVENTORY