Achterhaven 1906 Rotterdamse diergaarde 1908 Het Witte Huis 1915.
Professor Martin Glaessner 1906–1989
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Precambrian Research, 47 (1990) 1-2 1 Elsevier SciencePublishersB.V.,Amsterdam -- Printed in The Netherlands Obituary Professor Martin Glaessner 1906-1989 Born on Christmas day, 1906, at Aussig (now Ustl nad Labem), an ancient port city on the Elbe (or Labe) River, in northwestern Bo- hemia, then a part of the Austro-Hungarian Empire, Martin Glaessner was a scion of the scholarly tradition. His father, Arthur Glaes- sner was a prominent Viennese ceramicist and pharmacologist. Educated entirely in Vienna, Martin earned degrees in both law and science from the University there. For, like Charles Lyell, he supposed that income from the prac- tice of law might be needed to support his early passion for natural history. His wide interests, deep roots, global travels, linguistic versatility, and openness to new ideas and opportunities marked him as a renaissance man in the classic sense of that term. Already an assistant at the Museum of Nat- ural History in Vienna at age 16, his first paper, on the brachyuran fauna of the Vienna Basin, was published before he entered law school. Sixteen more papers, extensive European travel, and two research sojourns at the British Mu- seum of Natural History followed, before his doctorate in law, and two years later, in science, all papers in German, and most on Cenozoic de- capod crustaceans. But his subject matter was broad and eclectic, and he was to become the author of seminal papers on fossil primates, other vertebrate and invertebrate fossils, plants, biostratigraphy, and nomenclatural problems. Then, with his brand new PhD, he was in- vited to Moscow at age 26 to organize research in micropaleontology for the Petroleum Re- search Institute of the U.S.S.R. Academy of Sciences. Returning to Vienna five years later with a change of focus and a bride, the ballerina Tina Tupikina, he headed for New Guinea, where he had been called upon by the Austral- asian Petroleum Company to organize their mi- cropaleontological laboratory in that region. War in the Pacific put an end to that, but en- gaged him in military geology work for the Aus- tralian Army and in the preparation of his clas- sic volume, Principles of Micropaleontology (Melbourne University Press, 1945). For this and other achievements Glaessner was awarded his third doctorate, the honorary Doctor of Sci- ence degree at Melbourne University in 1946. And he became a member of the faculty of Ade- laide University in South Australia in 1950 - the year after Reg Sprigg announced his discov- ery of the renowned, soft bodied Ediacarian fauna, the oldest known metazoan fossils. About a third of all the papers published by Prof. Glaessner since that time, mainly in English, have dealt with some aspect of these ancient Metazoa - most notably his monograph on The Dawn of Animal Life (Cambridge University Press, 1984). All of his work was characterized by meticulous attention to detail, embedded in a solid context of relevant background matter. I first met Martin Glaessner on a Paleozoic field trip of the 21st International Geological Congress in southern Norway in the summer of 1960 and was immediately impressed. He was one of the few passengers on our bus who could speak knowledgably with everyone else in his own language, and he did. We became and re- mained friends for the rest of his long and pro- ductive life, and I count the pleasure of coau- thoring a paper with him during my year in Australia in 1981 high on my list of memorable joint ventures. We interacted agreeably, exten- sively, and fruitfully, resolving inevitable dif- ferences of opinion to produce a mutually agreeable joint product. He met all the challenges at home and abroad 0301-9268/90/$03.50 © 1990ElsevierSciencePublishersB.V.
Transcript of Professor Martin Glaessner 1906–1989
Precambrian Research, 47 (1990) 1-2 1 Elsevier Science Publishers B.V., Amsterdam -- Printed in The Netherlands
Obituary
Professor Martin Glaessner 1906-1989
Born on Christmas day, 1906, at Aussig (now Ustl nad Labem), an ancient port city on the Elbe (or Labe) River, in northwestern Bo- hemia, then a part of the Austro-Hungarian Empire, Martin Glaessner was a scion of the scholarly tradition. His father, Arthur Glaes- sner was a prominent Viennese ceramicist and pharmacologist. Educated entirely in Vienna, Martin earned degrees in both law and science from the University there. For, like Charles Lyell, he supposed that income from the prac- tice of law might be needed to support his early passion for natural history. His wide interests, deep roots, global travels, linguistic versatility, and openness to new ideas and opportunities marked him as a renaissance man in the classic sense of that term.
Already an assistant at the Museum of Nat- ural History in Vienna at age 16, his first paper, on the brachyuran fauna of the Vienna Basin, was published before he entered law school. Sixteen more papers, extensive European travel, and two research sojourns at the British Mu- seum of Natural History followed, before his doctorate in law, and two years later, in science, all papers in German, and most on Cenozoic de- capod crustaceans. But his subject matter was broad and eclectic, and he was to become the author of seminal papers on fossil primates, other vertebrate and invertebrate fossils, plants, biostratigraphy, and nomenclatural problems.
Then, with his brand new PhD, he was in- vited to Moscow at age 26 to organize research in micropaleontology for the Petroleum Re- search Institute of the U.S.S.R. Academy of Sciences. Returning to Vienna five years later with a change of focus and a bride, the ballerina Tina Tupikina, he headed for New Guinea, where he had been called upon by the Austral-
asian Petroleum Company to organize their mi- cropaleontological laboratory in that region.
War in the Pacific put an end to that, but en- gaged him in military geology work for the Aus- tralian Army and in the preparation of his clas- sic volume, Principles of Micropaleontology (Melbourne University Press, 1945). For this and other achievements Glaessner was awarded his third doctorate, the honorary Doctor of Sci- ence degree at Melbourne University in 1946. And he became a member of the faculty of Ade- laide University in South Australia in 1950 - the year after Reg Sprigg announced his discov- ery of the renowned, soft bodied Ediacarian fauna, the oldest known metazoan fossils. About a third of all the papers published by Prof. Glaessner since that time, mainly in English, have dealt with some aspect of these ancient Metazoa - most notably his monograph on The Dawn of Animal Life (Cambridge University Press, 1984). All of his work was characterized by meticulous attention to detail, embedded in a solid context of relevant background matter.
I first met Martin Glaessner on a Paleozoic field trip of the 21st International Geological Congress in southern Norway in the summer of 1960 and was immediately impressed. He was one of the few passengers on our bus who could speak knowledgably with everyone else in his own language, and he did. We became and re- mained friends for the rest of his long and pro- ductive life, and I count the pleasure of coau- thoring a paper with him during my year in Australia in 1981 high on my list of memorable joint ventures. We interacted agreeably, exten- sively, and fruitfully, resolving inevitable dif- ferences of opinion to produce a mutually agreeable joint product.
He met all the challenges at home and abroad
0301-9268/90/$03.50 © 1990 Elsevier Science Publishers B.V.
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that called on his legal and scientific expertise, and he received honors graciously. He became a fellow of the Australian Academy of Sciences in 1957, served on its Council during 1960-1962, and chaired its National Committee for the Geological Sciences during 1962-1977. He served various offices in the International Union of Geological Sciences and on the Inter- national Geological Correlation Program. He was an honorary member or correspondent of the Geological Society of India, the Vienna Geological Society, the Austrian Federal Geo- logical Institute, and the German Academy of Science Leopoldina.
His medals and awards include the Clark Memorial Lectureship of the Royal Society of New South Wales, 1953; the Walter Burfitt Prize of that Society, 1962; the Verco Medal of
the Royal Society of South Australia, 1970; the Medal of the Australian-New Zealand Associ- ation for the Advancement of Science, 1980; and, in 1982, the Charles Doolittle Walcott Award and Medal of the U.S. National Acad- emy of Sciences, for achievements in the study "of pre-Cambrian and Cambrian life and his- tory". He became a "big wheel" in his adopted country and the scientific world.
A giant has fallen but a few weeks short of his 83rd birthday. His works live on. Questions he raised continue to provoke discussion. We cel- ebrate the achievements of the long, fruitful, and exemplary life of Prof. Martin Glaessner.
Preston CLOUD (University of California,
Santa Barbara, Calif.)
