Honorary Degrees of Retiring Faculty
John C. Palmquist, Professor of Geology, 1996
"John Palmquist, for 28 years as a dedicated teacher and scientist, you have been an apostle for geology at Lawrence, and you have witnessed your faith in your discipline to all who hade ears to hear and eyes to see: 'I believe in Plate Tectonics Almighty,' you have intoned, 'Unifier of the Earth Sciences, and explanation of all things geological and geophysical; and in our Xavier LaPichon, revealer of relative motion, deduced from spreading rates about all ridges; Hypothesis of Hypothesis; Theory of Theory; Very Fact of Very Fact.' Committed to the axiom that geology is a field science and nurtured by your work and publications on the structure and petrology of Montana's Beartooth Mountains, in the Marquette Mineral District, and at the University of Illinois' field camp at Sheridan, Wyoming, you have made field work in geology a hallmark of your professional life.
In promoting your discipline, you were one of the principle founders of the Associated Colleges of the Midwest summer field program in geology and you also instituted a Lawrence Field Term, which took students from Appleton during the winter term to undertake geological investigations in the more hospitable climes of the American southwest. For you, spring break was always the time to leave campus to such destinations as Grand Canyon, Death Valley, and Big Bend National Park, where hands-on learning was accomplished by camaraderie with colleagues and students.
The continental United States did not satiate your need for time in the field, and your international field work notebook and the bulging storage cabinets in Stephenson 22 hold the records of your work in Nova Scotia, Mexico, Costa Rica, the British Isles, Papau, New Guinea, and, most recently, eleven other countries on your Semester at Sea voyage.
Committed to the furtherance of your profession, you were one of the first geologists appointed to the Council on Undergraduate Research, assumed an active role in the Geological Society of America, and have provided leadership to the National Association of Geoscience Teachers, which you served ably as president. Now, as you leave active teaching at Lawrence, you can anticipate more time at your cottage on the shore of Lake Superior at Marquette, where we hope you will not only reflect on your considerable achievements at and for Lawrence and Lawrentians, but will assault those several outcrops in the Upper Peninsula which have not yet felt the strike of your rock hammer. We are pleased that you will now join two of your children as recipients of a Lawrence degree.
By the authority vested in me, I now confer upon you the degree of Master of Arts, ad eundem, and admit you to its rights, its privileges, and its obligations."