Major john wesley powell biography template

Cambridge, Mass. La SalleIII. Stegner, Wallace E. Boston: Houghton Mifflin. Warman, P. Washington Academy of Science, Proceedings — American geologist, anthropologist, and scientific explorer, John Wesley Powell made the first dramatic descent of the Colorado River through the Grand Canyon. His life was dedicated to exploring and conserving the natural resources—scientific, scenic, economic, and human—of the American West.

Major john wesley powell biography template

During John's childhood the family migrated from Ohio to Wisconsin to Illinois, so his education was sporadic. He attended Wheaton and Oberlin colleges but obtained no degree. Powell early demonstrated interest in botany and traveled extensively, collecting specimens as part of his self-education. He joined the Illinois Society of Natural History at the age of 20 and was soon elected secretary.

Prior to the Civil Warhe worked as a schoolteacher and lyceum lecturer. Powell joined the Union Army and lost his right arm in the bloody Battle of Shiloh. Released from service, Powell became professor of natural history at Illinois Wesleyan College. He transferred to the Illinois Normal University as curator of the museum, thereby gaining time and financial support for western exploration.

In he conducted a party of students and amateur scientists to Colorado; he and his wife ascended Pike's Peak and explored the Grand River. The next year he took a party of 21 men to the Rockies. In Powell and a small party descended the Colorado River through the Grand Canyona feat never before accomplished. In Powell voyaged major john wesley powell biography template the Green and Colorado rivers a second time and for the remainder of the decade, with the financial support of Congress, explored the Colorado Plateau.

His reports and lectures on natural history and the Native American tribes made him a national hero. His importance as a scientific explorer was recognized when he became director of the U. Geological Survey in As a geologist, Powell provided detailed explanations of how the erosion of rivers creates gorges during periods when a rocky region is undergoing gradual elevation.

An early conservationist, Powell was obsessed by the idea that a vast wasteland was being created in the West by farmers who, by breaking the earth's cover, were inviting erosion. He believed that water monopolists and lumbermen were excessively exploitative. His proposal ultimately led to the creation of the Bureau of Reclamation. While traveling among the tribes of the High Plains, Powell took notes on their languages and customs.

In he organized the Bureau of American Ethnology in the Smithsonian Institution ; he directed it for 23 years. His classification of American Indian languages is still valuable. He was also responsible for the Irrigation Surveya systematic appraisal of the land and water resources of the West that became the basis for all irrigation legislation in the United States.

Perhaps Powell's greatest contribution was as an administrator who recognized that government and science should work in partnership. He urged creation of a Federal department to consolidate all government activity in the scientific field. As director of the Geological Survey, he coordinated the scientific efforts of many men and institutions.

He also sponsored extensive publication programs by the Federal government, including the bulletins begun and monographs inaugurated of the Geological Survey. Most important was the series of atlases from Powell's contribution was recognized with honorary degrees from Harvard and Heidelberg universities. He died on Sept. Frederick S. Dellenbaugh, A Canyon Voyageis the most complete published narrative of Powell's second expedition along the Colorado River.

His career within the national pattern of exploration and scientific achievement is delineated in Richard A. American Geologist — During America's Gilded Age, John Wesley Powell contributed significantly to a better understanding of the influence of running water on landscapes and the importance of a more rational use of water resources in the American West.

His geomorphologic-based classification of rivers and drainage systems is major john wesley powell biography template used today, more than years after he first articulated the concepts. John Wesley Powell left formal education, teaching, and natural history to command Union artillery units in the western theater during the American Civil War.

Major Powell, who lost his right arm at the Battle of Shiloh in Tennesseereturned in to teaching and museum curation. Summer excursions to the central Rocky Mountains generated productive exploration, when he led two daring reconnaissances by boat down the Colorado River in and Powell then managed four federal organizations funded by the U.

Department of Interior: the U. Powell, reflecting on the dynamic relations between moving waters and the geologic structures they crossed or matched, presented in a three-fold classification of rivers and drainage systems based on their history and his concept of a base level of erosion below which streams could not cut. His "antecedent" streams predated geologic uplifts of plateaus and mountains and maintained their courses during elevation; "consequent" streams postdated these uplifts and were controlled by them; and "superimposed" streams exceeded uplift rates to expose older structural settings.

InPowell formally proposed reforming land and water use in the West. A decade later Congress funded the Irrigation Survey to aid development in the region. When Powell refused to recommend promptly the dam and reservoir sites whose selection would have reopened the public lands to entry and released federal dowry lands to six new states, Congress terminated the Irrigation Survey.

Powell continued to promote reclaiming the West by wise communal irrigation and land useincluding organizing drainage basins as counties in new states. Inwith the USGS under a new director, Congress restored funds for water-resource investigations by the agency and continued them thereafter. Darrah, William Culp. Powell, John Wesley.

Washington, D. Government Printing Office, Rabbitt, Mary C. Government Printing Office, — Boston, MA: Houghton Mifflin, New York : Oxford University Press, Nelson, Clifford M. Powell, John Wesley gale. Complete Dictionary of Scientific Biography. Learn more about citation styles Citation styles Encyclopedia. Wallace Stegner. William C. Darrah [ Other relevant material may be found in Conservation; Indians, North American; Science, article On science-government relations.

Princeton Univ. Civil War and aftermath [ edit ]. Geologic research [ edit ]. Expeditions [ edit ]. After the Colorado [ edit ]. Anthropological research [ edit ]. Environmentalism [ edit ]. Legacy, honors, and namesakes [ edit ]. The standard author abbreviation J. Powell is used to indicate this person as the author when citing a botanical name.

Awards [ edit ]. Personal life [ edit ]. Notes [ edit ]. Retrieved December 9, National Geographic. Archived from the original on December 8, Retrieved December 5, Oxford University Press. ISBN Retrieved March 24, Illinois College. Retrieved August 25, Americans without Law. New York University Press. Geological Survey. United States Department of the Interior.

The Pantagraph. Bloomington, IL. Archived from the original on 31 January Retrieved 17 January Geological Survey". National Atlas of the United States. Archived from the original on 16 October Retrieved 9 October National Park Service. Department of the Interior. The Promise of the Grand Canyon. Retrieved 28 January Under the Banner of Heaven: A story of violent faith.

Knopf Doubleday Publishing. Flagstaff, Arizona: Vishnu Temple Press. Retrieved February 15, The early photographs are by E. Beaman, James Fennemore, John K. Hillers, photographers on the Powell expedition. The collection includes University of Nebraska Press. Report of special commissioners J. Powell and G. Outcasts from Evolution: Scientific attitudes of racial inferiority, — SIU Press.

Retrieved March 2, University of California Press. American Anthropologist. JSTOR Exploration of the Canyons of the Colorado. Date Civil War, Place Colorado River Colo. Grand Canyon Ariz. He argued that because of their arid nature, western public lands should be classified as to their potential use for irrigation, pasturage, timber, and mineral or coal extraction.

Powell also maintained that the traditional acre farm as provided for in the Homestead Act was much too small for grazing purposes in the West. Instead, grazing farms there should be expanded to no less than 2, acres in order profitably to support herds.