Extending modern cartography to the ocean depths: military patronage, Cold War priorities, and the Heezen-Tharp mapping project, 1952-1959

Journal of Historical Geography

Volumn 32, Issue 3, 2006, Pages 605-626

  Doel, Ronald E ^a   Levin, Tanya J ^b   Marker, Mason K ^a  

^a Medicine   (United States)

^b Oregon Institute of Technology ^*

Author keywords

Cartography; Cold War; Heezen; North Atlantic; Oceanography; Physiographic map; Tharp

Indexed keywords

HISTORICAL CARTOGRAPHY; OCEAN BASIN; OCEANOGRAPHY; SEAFLOOR MAPPING;

ATLANTIC OCEAN; ATLANTIC OCEAN (NORTH);

EID: 33745202061     PISSN: 03057488     EISSN: 10958614     Source Type: Journal    
DOI: 10.1016/j.jhg.2005.10.011     Document Type: Article

References (114)

1. Wüst G. Zur Nomenklatur der Grossformen der Ozeanboden. Publication Scientifique (International Association of Physical Oceanography) 8 (1940) 12-124
2. First published in. Elmendorf C.H., and Heezen B.C. Oceanographic information for engineering submarine cable systems. The Bell System Technical Journal 36 5 (1957) 1047-1093
3. The most definitive presentation of this map and its supporting data is. Heezen B.C., Tharp M., and Ewing M. The floors of the oceans: I. The North Atlantic. The Geological Society of America Special Paper 65 (1959)
4. Recent histories of twentieth century cartography and geographic thought have overlooked mapping efforts directed at the ocean floor; see for instance. McMaster R., and McMaster S. A history of twentieth-century academic cartography. Cartography and Geographic Information Science 29 3 (2002) 305-321
5. G.J. Martin and P.E. James, All Possible Worlds: A History of Geographical Ideas, Third Edition, New York, 1993.
6. E.F. O'Neill (Ed.), A History of Engineering and Science in the Bell System: Transmission Technology (1925-1975), Murray Hill, NJ, 1985, 366.
7. Further background appears in. Kelly M., and Radley G. Transatlantic communications-an historical resume. The Bell System Technical Journal 36 1 (1957) 1-5
8. J.B. Harley, Maps, knowledge, and power, in: D. Cosgrove and S. Daniels (Eds), The Iconography of Landscape: Essays on the Symbolic Representation, Design and Use of Past Environments, Cambridge, 1989, 277-312, esp. 278-279.
9. P.E. Steinberg, The Social Construction of the Ocean, Cambridge Studies in International Relations: 78, Cambridge, 2001, 2.
10. J. Hamblin, Oceanographers and the Cold War: Disciplines of Marine Science, Seattle, 2005; Steinberg, The Social Construction of the Ocean, 134.
11. On post-war developments in cartography and their implications for reading modern maps, see J. Pickles, A History of Spaces: Cartographic Reason, Mapping, and the Geo-coded World, London, 2004, 13.
12. Pickles, A History of Spaces. A more radical postmodern critique of cartographic traditions is J.B. Harley, The New Nature of Maps: Essays in the History of Cartography, Baltimore, 2001.
13. The most satisfactory historical account of this map's origins to date is C. Barton, Marie Tharp, oceanographic cartographer, and her contributions to the revolution in the earth sciences, in: D.R. Oldroyd (Ed.), The Earth Inside and Out: Some Major Contributions to Geology in the Twentieth Century, London, 2002, 215-228. Helpful first-hand accounts include M. Tharp, Mapping the ocean floor-1947 to 1977, in: R.A. Scrutton and M. Talwani (Eds), The Ocean Floor, New York, 1982, 19-31;
14. Tharp M., and Frankel H. Mappers of the deep: how two geologists plotted the mid-Atlantic Ridge and made a discovery that revolutionized the earth sciences. Natural History 10 (1986) 48-62
15. M. Tharp, Connect the dots, in: L. Lippsett (Ed.), Lamont-Doherty Earth Observatory: Twelve Perspectives on the First Fifty Years 1949-1999, Palisades, New York, 1999, 33-37.
16. On this larger theme see N. Oreskes and J.R. Fleming (Eds), Perspectives on geophysics, special issue of Studies in the History and Philosophy of Modern Physics, 31B, Sept. 2000;
17. Hacker B.C. Military patronage and the geophysical sciences in the United States: an introduction. Historical Studies in the Physical and Biological Sciences 30 2 (2000) 309-313
18. Doel R.E. Constituting the postwar earth sciences: the military's influence on the environmental sciences in the USA after 1945. Social Studies of Science 33 5 (2003) 635-666
19. L. Martins, Mapping tropical waters: British views and visions of Rio de Janeiro, in: D. Cosgrove (Ed.), Mappings, London, 1999, 148-168; F. Driver and L. Martins (Eds), Tropical Visions in an Age of Empire, Chicago, 2005;
20. Blakemore M.J., and Harley J.B. Concepts in the history of cartography: a review and perspective. Cartographica 17 4 (1980) esp. 23-26
21. Levin T.J., and Doel R.E. The Lamont-Doherty Earth Observatory Oral History Project: a preliminary report. Earth Sciences History 19 1 (2000) 26-32
22. M.F. Maury, Physical Geography of the Sea, New York, 1855.
23. On these developments see. Rozwadowski H.M. Technology and ocean-scape: defining the deep sea in mid-nineteenth century. History of Technology 17 (2001) 217-247 esp. 222, 224-225, 232, 242-243
24. H.M. Rozwadowski, Fathoming the Ocean: The Discovery and Exploration of the Deep Sea, Cambridge, MA, 2005, 69-95.
25. J. Carpine-Lancre et al., The History of GEBCO 1903-2003: The 100-Year story of the General Bathymetric Chart of the Oceans, Lemmer, The Netherlands, 2003.
26. Höhler S. Profilgewinn. Karten der Atlantischen Expedition (1925-1927) der Notgemeinschaft der Deutschen Wissenschaft. NTM 10 4 (2002) 234-246
27. Höhler S. Depth records and ocean volumes: ocean profiling by sounding technology, 1850-1930. History and Technology 18 2 (2002) 119-154 M.T. Greene, Geology in the Nineteenth Century: Changing Views of a Changing World, Ithaca, NY, 1982, 181-183.
28. Library of Congress, J.C. Merriam papers, Box 175, Folder 'Vaughan, T. Wayland,' Vaughan to Merriam, Nov. 2, 1933.
29. Dennis M.A. Earthly matters: on the cold war and the earth sciences. Social Studies of Science 33 5 (2003) 809-819
30. Oreskes N. A context of motivation: US Navy oceanographic research and the discovery of sea-floor hydrothermal vents. Social Studies of Science 33 5 (2003) 697-742
31. R.E. Doel, The earth sciences and geophysics, in: J. Krige and D. Pestre (Eds), Science in the Twentieth Century, London, 1997, 361-388.
32. No study adequately addresses the history of this institution. An introduction to recent work appears in Levin and Doel, The Lamont-Doherty Earth Observatory Oral History Project; participant accounts are found in Lippsett (Ed.), Lamont-Doherty Earth Observatory.
33. Doel, Constituting the postwar earth sciences.
34. Scientists in this era similarly faced a challenge in gaining access to earth's upper atmospheres and space itself, although in this instance state funding alone could support such work, see D.H. DeVorkin, Science with a Vengeance: How the Military Created the US Space Sciences after World War II, New York, 1992.
35. Bracker M. Vast canyon found in Atlantic Ocean. The New York Times (Oct. 6, 1952) 7
36. Ewing M., and Heezen B.C. Oceanographic research programs of the Lamont Geological Observatory. Geographical Review 46 (1956) 508-535
37. N. Oreskes (Ed.), Plate Tectonics: An Insiders History of the Modern Theory of the Earth, Boulder, CO, 2002; Levin and Doel, The Lamont-Doherty Earth Observatory Oral History Project.
38. Comprehensive biographies exist neither for Heezen nor Tharp.
39. On Heezen, see. Tharp M. Heezen, Bruce. Dictionary of Scientific Biography 17 (1990) 387-390
40. on Tharp, Barton, Marie Tharp, oceanographic cartographer.
41. See for instance. Freeman I.H. Crack in world is found at sea. The New York Times (Feb. 1, 1957) 22
42. Gendered work in oceanography in this period is discussed in. Oreskes N. Laissez-tomber: military patronage and women's work in mid-20th-century oceanography. Historical Studies in the Physical and Biological Sciences 30 2 (2000) 373-374
43. Broader context appears in M.W. Rossiter, Women Scientists in America: Before Affirmative Action, 1940-1972, Baltimore, 1995; L. Schiebinger, Has Feminism Changed Science?, Cambridge, MA, 1999.
44. Barton, Marie Tharp, oceanographic cartographer, 218, makes this observation, borne out in the Lamont-Doherty Earth Observatory Oral History Project interviews. The best introduction to this topic is H.M. Pycior, N.G. Slack and P.G. Abir-Am, Creative Couples in the Sciences, New Brunswick, NJ, 1998.
45. J.H.F. Umbgrove, The Pulse of the Earth, The Hague, 1947, quoted at 224, see also 100, 220. Heezen's personal copy of this work is at the Rare Book Room, National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (hereafter NOAA) Central Library, Silver Spring, MD, USA.
46. Tharp, Heezen, Bruce, Dictionary of Scientific Biography; Scrutton and Talwani, The Ocean Floor.
47. Heezen B.C., and Ewing M. Turbidity currents and submarine slumps and the 1929 Grand Banks earthquake. American Journal of Science 250 (1952) 849-873
48. Tharp, Heezen, Bruce, Dictionary of Scientific Biography, 388; Center for History of Physics, American Institute of Physics, Marie Tharp oral history interview by R.E. Doel, Sept. 14, 1994.
49. Gradual acceptance of Heezen's turbidity current studies by marine geologists is noted in. Kuenen P.H. No geology without marine geology. Geologische Rundschau 47 1 (1958) 1-10
50. C.C. Albritton, Jr., The Abyss of Time: Changing Conceptions of the Earth's Antiquity After the Seventeenth Century, New York, 1980; D.R. Oldroyd, Thinking about the Earth: A History of Ideas in Geology, Cambridge, MA, 1996; N. Oreskes and R.E. Doel, Geophysics and the earth sciences, in M.J. Nye (Ed.), The Cambridge History of Science, Vol. 5: Modern Physical and Mathematical Sciences, Cambridge, 2003, 538-552. On the acceptance of turbidity currents as a geological phenomenon see Smithsonian Institution, Bruce C. Heezen papers (hereafter Smithsonian-Heezen), Box 6, Folder 'Kuenen, Ph. (Professor),' Heezen to Kuenen, Oct. 28, 1957.
51. Carpine-Lancre et al., The History of GEBCO, 58.
52. Private files of Marie Tharp, Heezen, Annex 4A, 3 (no date, circa 1966).
53. On SOSUS see Oreskes, A context of motivation.
54. Weir G.E. From surveillance to global warming: John Steinberg and ocean acoustics. International Journal of Naval History 2 1 (2003). available online at http://www.ijnhonline.org/volume2_number1_Apr03/PDF%20Apr%2003/article_weir_pdf_apr03.pdf
55. Heezen also worked directly with subsidiary Bell Labs/AT&T firms involved in the TAT-1 cable project; see for instance Smithsonian-Heezen, Box 9, Folder 1956-57, Heezen to Mr. B. Nichols, Long Lines Department, American Telephone and Telegraph Company, Apr. 2, 1956.
56. Smithsonian-Heezen, Box 9, 1956-57, Heezen to J.A. Smalle, Jan. 11, 1957, and NOAA Central Library, Bruce C. Heezen papers (hereafter NOAA-Heezen), Box 1, 'Notes-Elmendorf, Bell Telephone Labs,' Heezen to Elmendorf, Aug. 27, 1956.
57. Smithsonian-Heezen, Box 9, 1956-57, Heezen to Elmendorf, Aug. 27, 1956; Heezen to Nichols, Apr. 2, 1956.
58. Smithsonian-Heezen, Heezen to Elmendorf, Aug. 27, 1956.
59. M.D. Fagen, A.E. Joel, E.F. O'Neill, G.E. Schindler and Bell Telephone Laboratories Inc., A History of Engineering and Science in the Bell System, New York, 1975.
60. See for instance Smithsonian-Heezen, Box 9, Folder 1957-57, Heezen to Chuck [Charles Drake], Jul. 3, 1956.
61. NOAA-Heezen, Box I, Heezen, BTL OI Report, early draft [no date, circa 1956], 18-23.
62. On Pacific Ocean mapping see H.W. Menard, The Ocean of Truth, Princeton, 1986.
63. N. Oreskes, From continental drift to plate tectonics, in: Oreskes (Ed.), Plate Tectonics, 3-23, on 23.
64. National Archives II, R.G. 330, Research and Development Board (hereafter NARA-RDB), Box 446, Folder 3, Earl Droessler to Athelstan Spilhaus, Mar. 23, 1953.
65. G.E. Weir, An Ocean in Common: American Naval Officers, Scientists, and the Ocean Environment, College Station, TX, 2001.
66. NARA-RDB, Box 446, Folder 3, Straus to Earl G. Droessler, Dec. 11, 1952.
67. NARA-RDB, Box 446, Folder 3, Droessler to Athelstan F. Spilhaus, Mar. 23, 1953.
68. A.K. Lobeck's Geomorphology: An Introduction to the Study of Landscapes, New York, 1939, expanded on his earlier Block Diagrams and Other Graphic Methods Used in Geology and Geography, New York, 1924. Heezen and Tharp also acknowledged the influence of the Harvard cartographer Erwin Raitz in preparing their 1957 map; see Heezen, Tharp and Ewing, The floors of the oceans, unpaginated introduction.
69. NOAA-Heezen, Box I, Heezen, draft LGO Technical Report 28 A Mid-Atlantic Ridge Profile, no date (circa 1955) 26.
70. Elmendorf and Heezen, Oceanographic information for engineering submarine cable systems.
71. Heezen, Tharp and Ewing, The floors of the oceans, unpaginated acknowledgements page.
72. Barton, Marie Tharp, oceanographic cartographer, 220; Heezen, Tharp and Ewing, The floors of the oceans, 4.
73. See Heezen, Tharp and Ewing, The floors of the oceans;
74. see also. Heezen B.C., and Tharp M. Physiographic diagram of the North Atlantic. Geological Society of America Bulletin 67 (1956) 1704
75. Barton, Marie Tharp, oceanographic cartographer, 220. Further analysis appears in C.J. Barton, Cartoons or cartography? The physiographic diagrams of Bruce C. Heezen and Marie Tharp, MA thesis, University of Maryland, Baltimore County, 1999.
76. Heezen was not always fastidious in handling classified depth data; see Smithsonian-Heezen, Box 3, Folder Dunkle, Dr. M. William, Jr., William M. Dunkle, Jr. to Heezen, Apr. 10, 1957.
77. Tharp and Frenkel, Mappers of the deep; Smithsonian-Heezen, Box 14, Folder Read File Aug. 1975 to Aug. 1976, Heezen to James H. Shea, Feb. 23, 1976; Barton, Marie Tharp, oceanographic cartographer, 221.
78. Heezen B.C. The rift in the ocean floor. Scientific American 203 (1960) 98-100
79. Heezen B.C. Géologie sous-marine et déplacements des continents. la topographie et la geologie des profondeurs oceanographiques 83 (1959) 204-295
80. B.C. Heezen, Paleomagnetism, continental displacements, and the origin of submarine topography, International Oceanographic Congress 31 August-12 September 1959, Washington, DC, 1959, 26-28. Columbia University Oral History Research Office (Lamont-Doherty Earth Observatory Oral History Project; hereafter LDEO) interview, Gordon Hamilton OHI (Doel, Mar. 15, 1996).
81. These arguments are borne out in the LDEO oral history interviews; see for instance Alma Kesner OHI (Doel, interviewer, Oct. 1995, 44), and Mark Langseth (Doel, interviewer, Dec. 13, 1995, 179).
82. Elmendorf and Heezen, Oceanographic information for engineering submarine cable systems.
83. Heezen, Tharp and Ewing, The floors of the oceans, 103.
84. One indication of this monograph's importance was its high citation rate: more than 80 researchers other than the authors referred to it by the early 1960s, a large number for the earth sciences community at the time; see the Science Citation Index 1955-1964, column 33629.
85. Smithsonian-Heezen, Box 1, Anthony S. Laughton to Heezen, Jan. 27, 1958; see also Tharp oral history interview (Doel, Sept. 14, 1995), 183.
86. C. Mukerji, A Fragile Power: Scientists and the State, Princeton 1989, 126.
87. Menard H.W. Geology of the Pacific sea floor. Experientia 15 (1959) 205-213
88. Scripps Institution of Oceanography Archives, Henry William Menard papers, Box 69, Folder 6, Menard to Heezen, Jan. 6, 1958.
89. A more detailed discussion of this larger issue appears in Oreskes and Doel, Geophysics and earth sciences.
90. Heezen-SI, Box 9, Folder 1958, Heezen to Mr. C.A. Boudreau, Jr., Apr. 14, 1958 and NOAA-Heezen, Box A, Heezen to R. Griffith, Canadian Overseas Telecommunications Corp., Feb. 18, 1958.
91. B.C. Heezen and M. Ewing, The mid-oceanic ridge and its extension through the arctic basin, in: G.O. Raasch (Ed.), Geology of the Arctic: Proceedings of the First International Symposium on Arctic Geology, Toronto, 1960, 622-642.
92. Even though the US Navy ended its classification of bathymetric data in 1961 (in part to bolster a cooperative US-Soviet program to map the Arctic Ocean promoted early in the Kennedy Presidency), by this time both Heezen and Tharp were convinced that the physiographic approach communicated valuable geologic information and continued this strategy.
93. For background see. Sullivan W. U.S., Soviet, Canada to pool arctic data. The New York Times (Jan. 26, 1960) 1
94. Funding for the final world physiographic ocean map (1973-1977) also came from the US Office of Naval Research; see Barton, Marie Tharp, oceanographic cartographer, 221. A larger context for interpreting iconographic maps is provided in D.E. Cosgrove, Apollo's Eye: A Cartographic Genealogy of the Earth in Western Imagination, Baltimore, 2002.
95. Private files of Marie Tharp, interview John Lear of Bruce Heezen, Oct. 17, 1985, 10.
96. Smithsonian-Heezen, Box 6, Folder Jordan, Pascual, Jordan to Heezen, Jan. 20, 1964; Heezen, Géologie sous-marine. Heezen continued to advocate the expanding earth hypothesis into the 1970s; see B.C. Heezen and C.D. Hollister, The Face of the Deep, New York, 1971.
97. Sullivan W. Scientists doubt earth expansion. The New York Times (Jan. 8, 1961) 66
98. On the influence of geophysical methods in the acceptance of plate tectonics see Oreskes, From continental drift to plate tectonics;
99. Barth K.-H. The politics of seismology: nuclear testing, arms control, and the transformation of a discipline. Social Studies of Science 33 5 (2003) 743-781
100. H.E. LeGrand, Shifting Continents and Drifting Theories, Cambridge, 1988.
101. Smithsonian-Heezen, Box 4, G-Miscellaneous, R. George to Heezen, Jul. 1, 1975; Barton, Marie Tharp, oceanographic cartographer, 225.
102. S. Schulten, The Geographical Imagination in America, 1880-1950, Chicago, 2001, 239-242. Heezen and Tharp plotted their findings on unpublished globes (including acrylic applied to a basketball), avoiding Mercator projection distortions; see R. Grim, The Library of Congress Geography and Map Division's globe collection, News (The International Coronelli Society for the Study of Globes), 2003, 9-15.
103. Smithsonian-Heezen, Box 7, Folder Udintsev, Dr. G.B., Heezen to G. Udintsev, Nov. 23, 1960.
104. LDEO oral history interview with William B.F. Ryan (Levin, Jul. 1, 1997) 54.
105. On this issue see Pickles, A History of Spaces, 9.
106. J.B. Harley [New Nature of Maps, 151] rightly emphasizes that the veneer of science can divert attention from underlying non-objectivity, and that map silences ought be identified and addressed. In this instance Heezen, Tharp, and Ewing (1959) did offer candid assessments of the map's uncertainties and extrapolations. Silences certainly existed in the Heezen-Tharp 1957 map, although earth sciences colleagues became aware of many of them as the map's larger implications were debated in the 1950s.
107. Pickles, A History of Spaces, 19; see also D. Cosgrove, Introduction: mapping meaning, in: Cosgrove (Ed.), Mappings, 1-23, esp. 2-3.
108. M. Monmonier, Drawing the Line: Tales of Maps and Cartocontroversy, New York, 1995.
109. Rozwadowski, Technology and ocean-scape, 243.
110. B. Latour, Drawing things together, in: M. Lynch and S. Woolgar (Eds), Representation in Scientific Practice, Cambridge, MA, 1988; D. MacKenzie, Inventing Accuracy: A Historical Sociology of Nuclear Missile Guidance, Cambridge, MA, 1990.
111. Smith W.H.F., and Sandwell D.T. Global seafloor topography from satellite altimetry and ship depth soundings. Science 277 (1997) 1957-1962
112. P.R. Vogt and B.E. Tucholke, Imaging the ocean floor: history and the state of the art, in: P.R. Vogt and B.E. Tucholke (Eds), The Western North Atlantic Region, Boulder, CO, 1986, 22.
113. McMaster and McMaster, A history of twentieth century academic cartography.
114. These magnetic stripes-successively younger towards the ridge and mirrored on both sides-provided direct evidence for seafloor spreading; see LeGrand, Shifting Continents and Drifting Theories; new perspectives appear in R. Mason, Stripes on the ocean floor, 31-45; L.W. Morley, The zebra pattern, 67-84; N. Oreskes, From continental drift to plate tectonics, 3-27, all in Oreskes, Plate Tectonics.