Уильям Маклюр: Америка геологиясының әкесі және картографы

18th/19th century American geologist and cartographer

William Maclure (27 October 176323 March 1840) was an Americanized Scottish geologist, cartographer and philanthropist. He is known as the 'father of American geology'. As a social experimenter on new types of community life, he collaborated with British social reformer Robert Owen, (1771–1854), in Indiana, United States. Maclure had a highly successful mercantile career, making a fortune that allowed him to retire in 1797 at the early age of 34 to pursue his scientific, geological and other interests. In 1809 he made the earliest attempt at a geological map of the United States of America.

Maclure was born in 1763 in Ayr, Scotland. After a brief visit to New York City in 1782, he began work with the merchants Miller, Hart & Co, who traded and shipped goods to and from America. Maclure was based in the London office but regularly travelled to France and Ireland on business. In 1796 business affairs took him to Virginia, which he thereafter made his home. In 1803 he visited France as one of the commissioners appointed to settle the claims of American citizens on the French government; and during the few years then spent in Europe he applied himself with enthusiasm to the study of geology. While residing in Switzerland, he became impressed with what is now called the Pestalozzi School System, from Swiss pedagogist Johann Heinrich Pestalozzi (1746–1827).

The New Harmony commune in Indiana produced a number of geologists, naturalists, and botanists which were influenced by Maclure, such as the siblings Robert Dale Owen (1801–1877), social reformer; David Dale Owen (1807–1860), geologist, artist; Jane Dale Owen Fauntleroy (1806–1861), educator; and Richard Dale Owen (1810–1890) geologist, first president of Purdue University, Lafayette, Indiana. They interacted there with a formidable crop of contemporary geologists, social reformers, botanists, paleobotanists, ethnologists, civil engineers, etc.

Maclure, W. 1817. Observations on the geology of the West India Islands, from Barbadoes to Santa Cruz, inclusive. Journal of the Academy of Natural Sciences of Philadelphia 1(6), 134–149. (BHL link)
Maclure, W. 1818. Essay on the formation of rocks, or an inquiry into the probable origin of their present form and structure. Part 1. Journal of the Academy of Natural Sciences of Philadelphia 1(7), 261–276. (BHL link)
Maclure, W. 1818. Essay on the formation of rocks, or an inquiry into the probable origin of their present form and structure. Part 2. Journal of the Academy of Natural Sciences of Philadelphia 1(7), 285–310. (BHL link)
Maclure, W. 1818. Essay on the formation of rocks, or an inquiry into the probable origin of their present form and structure. Part 3. Journal of the Academy of Natural Sciences of Philadelphia 1(7), 327–345. (BHL link)
Maclure, W. 1818. On the geology of the United States of North America, with remarks on the probable effects that may be produced by the decomposition of the different classes of rocks, on the nature and fertility of soils: applied to the different states of the Union agreeably to the accompanying geological map. Transactions of the American Philosophical Society new series 1, 1–92. (BHL link)

The European Journals of William Maclure was a monumental book, describing, charting, and chronicling much of the features of Europe.

Charles Alexandre Lesueur described a new genus of fossil ammonites called Maclurite. Macluritidae an extinct family of relatively large, Lower Ordovician to Devonian, macluritacean gastropods is named in honor of Maclure. Maclura a genus of flowering plants in the mulberry family, Moraceae is named in honor of Maclure. The genus includes the inedible Osage orange, which is used as mosquito repellent and grown throughout the United States as a hedging plant.

Mount Maclure in Yosemite National Park. Maclure Glacier, one of the last remaining glaciers in Yosemite National Park.