The UGS in Retrospect
by The Employees
For this issue of Survey Notes, we ask current and former long-term employees to reflect on what they thought had changed the most during their career at the UGS. We also asked if they had a fond or favorite memory they would like to share. The following are their responses.
Use the slideshow dot buttons on the right to view responses.
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Rick Allis – State Geologist/Director of the UGS, 2000–2018

In 2020 Rick Allis received Utah’s Energy Pioneer Award for his years of leadership at the UGS and commitment to advancing our understanding of Utah’s geothermal resources.
The dominant theme underpinning the first two decades of the 21st century for the UGS was the digital transition and widespread use of the internet for information. Digital reports, files, core images, maps and databases in all programs were gradually added to the UGS website. Monitoring of visits to the UGS website confirmed increasing usage and resulted in Utah’s geological information being more easily accessible. There was a period in the early 2000s when Mineral Lease revenue began to increase due to rising prices for Utah’s oil and gas production. The UGS used the extra funds to improve its Core Research Center, expanding core storage, creating a workshop/meeting room, and a paleontological preparation room. There was a three-year period when the UGS took over the Utah Energy Office (UEO). This coincided with the global financial crisis in 2008, and the federal TARP (Troubled Asset Relief Program) initiative to kick-start the U.S. economy again. Close to $50 million was awarded to the UEO over two years to fund energy efficiency grants across the state. The UGS took on extra staff to solicit, award, and monitor contract proposals. Extra office space in the Department of Natural Resources building was commandeered, including filling the ground floor library with cubicles. Total UGS staff briefly peaked at about 110. Then in 2010 the UEO was handed over to the Department of Environmental Quality and the UGS returned to its geological mission. The variations in Mineral Lease revenue hurt the UGS in 2014 when the crude oil price rapidly declined from over $100 to less than $50 per barrel. Around 15% of its staff, including all staff classified as temporary, were let go. The legislature helped with some backfill funding, and staffing rebounded to around 70.
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Kimm Harty – Senior Geologist/Deputy Director, 1984–2021

Rick Allis, Kimm Harty, and John Kingsley at the 2008 UGS advisory board field trip to Bingham Canyon mine.
Of the many changes the UGS went through while I worked there, two stand out for me.
- In 1984, when I joined the UGS, the staff included about 52 geologists and supporting staff. Ten to 15 years later, the UGS staff had reached close to 70 due to expansions through the additions of the Paleontology and Groundwater disciplines. The UGS’s efforts to adequately staff these new functions was aided in part by the successful initiation of a contract and grant process whereby funds primarily from the Federal Government were matched by the State.
- In the early 1990s, the UGS greatly expanded its legislative directive to disseminate geologic information by creating a largely self-supporting Book and Map Store that soon became the second-largest of its kind operated by a state geological survey. Once sold behind a small counter at the UGS headquarters at the University of Utah Research Park building, the publications and geologic maps produced by UGS geologists were now displayed and disseminated through a new customer-focused bookstore housed at the Freedom Mortgage building on Foothill Drive. When the U.S. Geological Survey office in Salt Lake City decided to reduce its operations, the UGS took over the topographic map sales and distributions aspects and became, in 1996, a “one-stop shop” for geologic maps, publications, and topographic maps at the new Department of Natural Resources building.
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Bob Biek – Senior Scientist, Geologic Mapping Program, 1996–2022
What changed the most during my tenure at the UGS? Map production techniques and the development of portable GPS. The multi-year transition from analog to digital map production involved significant changes to how mapping geologists went about creating geologic maps. I began by mapping in detail directly on stereophoto pairs and later transferring that work to a topographic base map using an analytical stereoplotter. Eventually, with the availability of statewide digital photogrammetry, lidar, and GPS, fieldwork focused on collecting data at GPS waypoints and building the map digitally in the comfort of the office. More efficient data gathering and map production techniques and access to improved imagery meant that mapping geologists now typically require less time in the field for a given project, saving on field expenses. Still, to accurately interpret the geology of an area, there is no shortcut to looking at rocks and structures and landforms in the field with a fresh pair of eyes.
Favorite memories include all the little discoveries made every time you mapped in the field, mostly little things like modifying contacts or faults or stratigraphy from earlier less-detailed work, sometimes big things like discovering mega-landslides. But one of my fondest memories was when I asked Jim Kirkland, Don DeBlieux, Alan Titus, and others to accompany me for a day to look at strata of uncertain Cretaceous or Tertiary age near Cedar City. Happily, we found several thin carbonaceous mudstones from which we could extract fossil pollen and date the beds. While we were digging one site, Alan looked up at an overhanging cliff and saw the cast of a foot-long theropod dinosaur track just above our heads. The strata must be Cretaceous as my mapping was telling me, not Tertiary as had long been reported!
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Craig Morgan – Senior Geologist, Energy & Minerals Program, 1989–2018

Stephanie Carney, Mike Laine, Tom Chidsey, and Craig Morgan, “man” the booth at the 2008 American Association of Petroleum Geologists annual meeting.
A benefit of working at the UGS was the great diversity of geological expertise I encountered. I came from a petroleum exploration background. Working in the Energy & Minerals section of the Survey, I was in daily contact with people working on coal, metals exploration, industrial minerals, and geothermal projects. I enjoyed once a week getting a cup of coffee and visiting all the other sections, groundwater, geological hazards and paleo seismic, geological mapping (they helped keep my subsurface mapping well grounded), paleontology, and outreach. The discussions were always interesting and I learned a great deal over the years.
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Tom Chidsey – Senior Scientist, Energy & Minerals Program, 1989–2020

Tom Chidsey and Mike Vanden Berg in front of the “map that changed the world,” William Smith’s geologic map of Great Britain, published in 1815. Displayed at the Geological Society (of London), 2013.
I started at the UGS in 1989 having worked for the previous 10 years for a Salt Lake City-based oil company where I mainly explored for hydrocarbons in the thrust belt and Uinta Basin of Utah. To my knowledge, the UGS had never conducted any major petroleum studies in these areas. Lee Allison was the UGS Director having been appointed a few months before I started. Before long the UGS was offered an opportunity to participate with the Surveys of New Mexico, Colorado, and Wyoming to produce the “Atlas of Major Rocky Mountain Gas Reservoirs,” funded by the Gas Research Institute. Shortly after the project got started, the U.S. Department of Energy (DOE) announced a program to fund studies to prevent premature abandonment of oil wells in various types of reservoirs; e.g., fluvial deltaic, shallow-shelf carbonate, etc. Lee decided that the UGS would go after these DOE funding opportunities. The proposals themselves were a huge undertaking involving both the petroleum and administrative staff working at a frantic pace to prepare proposals consisting of two to as many as five large volumes, including technical and budgetary, as required by DOE and submit them by deadline. Submission of proposals in those days was not done electronically but as hard copies sent via FedEx, dropped off at the airport just under the wire. We were very successful in being awarded these grants and they became our funding bread and butter, a huge change for the UGS. Projects included Bluebell in the Uinta Basin, three shallow-shelf carbonate studies in the Paradox Basin in southeastern Utah, the Ferron Sandstone outcrop study in central Utah, to name a few. All the projects included industry partners, geologic consultants, and professors from local universities funding their student’s theses or dissertations. The DOE also required a certain percentage of the project budget be dedicated to technology transfer. This paid for our attendance and display booths at annual conventions of the American Association of Petroleum Geologists, where we presented talks and posters about our project work. In addition, literally dozens of UGS-authored technical publications, core workshops, and field trips resulted from these projects. The UGS’s image became one of a very active state agency whose publicly available research was invaluable to the petroleum industry and beneficial to the citizens of Utah. One final note—we always included in our proposals field work to study outcrop or modern reservoir analogs. That is why I was able to raft down the Grand Canyon and snorkel in the Bahamas, and claim to be working!
My favorite memory involved a presentation in London, England, at the famous Geological Society (of London), the oldest geological society having been founded in 1807 and based at Burlington House, Piccadilly, London, since 1874. Past members include Charles Lyell, Adam Sedgwick, and Charles Darwin! In 2010, the UGS and Dave Eby (Eby Petrography & Consulting, Inc., Denver) had been evaluating microbial carbonates in cores and outcrops of the lacustrine Eocene-age Green River Formation in the Uinta Basin and their modern counterparts now exposed in Great Salt Lake due to the ongoing drought. Our work was in response to new huge oil discoveries in microbialite reservoirs offshore Brazil and elsewhere around the world. In 2013, we were invited to present some of the results of our work at a special symposium on microbialites at the Geological Society of London. We thought, why not take some of Utah’s microbialites to London! With the help of the Core Research Center staff, two special boxes of slabbed Green River core were prepared to fit into my suitcase, along with 50 small bags of oolitic sand from Great Salt Lake and 50 thin slabs of Green River microbialites to give to the attendees. After my arrival at London’s Heathrow International Airport and raising a few eyebrows at customs, I carried our treasured displays and samples through the underground(subway) to the Piccadilly Circus station and rolled my heavy suitcase down the street to Burlington House. Burlington House was everything I thought it might be—old polished wood, marble floors, huge oil paintings of famous geologists, and of course, William Smith’s original1815 geologic map of Great Britain, the world’s first geologic map, hanging prominently in the main lobby area. I was joined the next day for the symposium by UGS geologists Mike Vanden Berg (now Manager of the Energy & Minerals Program) and Mike Laine (past UGS Core Research Center Curator). We gave two presentations at the poster session in one of the Burlington House’s beautiful libraries, displaying the boxes of cores that had crossed “the pond” in my suitcase. As part of the presentations, we passed out our unusual samples of oolitic sand and Green River microbialites much to the delight of the many international attendees.
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Tom Dempster – Assistant Curator, Utah Core Research Center, 2000–present

Core samples from Utah’s Green River Formation fill the main hall of the Utah Core Research Center from beginning to end, October 2019.
I started with the UGS in November of 2000. I’ve found the best part about working at the UGS is the people, especially during the staff picnics and Christmas “walk-arounds.”
The first day on the job, the Curator of the Core Center, Carolyn Olsen, took me to the warehouse part of the building—pallets of core from front to back were waiting to be shelved. I surprised her by having it all done within two weeks. A lot of times I’ve had to lift some really heavy cores, but most of the time it was a joy to come to work, learn, and chat with my co-workers. I’m thinking most people reading this article have known Tom “Chids” Chidsey. He and I spent a lot of time out in the field collecting samples, measuring sections, measuring radioactivity of outcrops, and taking people on tours of various geological formations throughout the state. The most humorous time I spent with Chids was when we were escorting a bus load of state geologists down around Moab at Arches National Park and Canyonlands. I was driving a “chase vehicle” in case of emergencies and followed the bus throughout the days. The tour was just before Halloween, so Chids handed out packets filled with holiday goodies, which was a big hit with everyone! On the final day of the tour, the bus took the backroad from Moab headed for Grand Junction, Colorado, where we had picked them up when the tour started. About halfway down the road, before it connects to I-70, the bus stopped and Chids said his goodbyes then jumped into the van with me to go back to Moab. I’m not sure what the reaction from the group left on the bus was!
Other memorable field trips were when I hauled select boxes of the Muddy Creek cores to Emery, Utah, for RPS (formerly Nautilus) to be used for teaching participants how to log core after viewing the outcrops. The instructors were Andy Pulham and Lee Krystinik, two of my favorite people in the world. I was allowed to accompany the participants on many of these field trips and learn about the history of the formations after I set out the cores for viewing. I ate dinner with everyone and got to meet some very interesting people from all over the world. After dinner we would sit by a bonfire and share stories. The very best part of the trip was I was getting paid for doing something I enjoyed so much!
When I retire, I will miss the fun, intelligent people I have known from the UGS; and those who have come to visit us at the Utah Core Research Center where I spent most of my time. Thanks for the memories!
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Doug Sprinkel – Senior Geologist, Geologic Mapping Program, 1986–2019

Doug Sprinkel and Tom Chidsey at Covenant oil field during the Utah Geological Association’s 2007 field trip to central Utah.
I started at the UGS in 1986 and saw several changes in my 34 years there. The UGS changed locations from a building in University of Utah Research Park to an office building on Foothill Drive, and finally to the Department of Natural Resources (DNR) campus on North Temple. It was a little sad to leave Research Park but settling at the DNR campus was a great move for many reasons. The biggest changes were the creation of the Geologic Mapping Program initially led by the late Hellmut Doelling and then by Grant Willis; eventually I became a part of the Mapping Program. I believe that not only did the Geologic Mapping Program change the UGS in a positive way, but the systematic mapping of Utah was helpful to other government agencies, industry, and the citizens of Utah.
My favorite memory was that during my tenure as Deputy Director, I attended a meeting with the UGS Administration and the Lt. Governor. The Lt. Governor had arrived at the UGS and was already in the conference room. Everyone filtered in and sat down. I was the last person to enter the room. Everyone was wearing their “Sunday Best” for the meeting, but I had on my usual attire—a western shirt with pearl buttons, Levis, cowboy boots, and a belt buckle adorned with turquoise. I was in my mid-thirties, so I had longish dark hair and a big dark beard. As the meeting began, the Lt. Governor pointed to me and said that I was the only person in the room that he imagined a geologist would look like.
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Dave Tabet – Senior Scientist/Program Manager, Energy & Minerals Program, 1992–2016
Surprisingly for a desert state, it wasn’t until 1994 that the UGS established a groundwater section, even though in the time before I arrived, the UGS had investigated numerous water issues to assist with Utah’s water resource management. The 1990s and 2000s were an era of great technological change in practicing geology and disseminating geologic information. The internet first opened to the public in 1991 and entered widespread use in 1993–94, when websites for everyday use became available, including at the UGS. In 1991, electronic mail was a relatively new feature for DOS and Windows platforms, while by 1992, the ability to attach files to emails allowed inexpensive and more rapid communication and data sharing. Clients worldwide eventually no longer needed to visit the UGS offices to access its data, but they often came to consult the talented UGS staff. In the early 1990s, Esri, a geographic information system (GIS) software company, released ArcView, a desktop solution for geologic users to map and view data. ArcView was soon adopted as the standard by the State of Utah; this eliminated the need for drafting equipment in geologists’ offices and made for much quicker edits and updates of maps and databases. Esri’s 1999 release of ArcGIS replaced ArcView, and this update led the UGS to phase out cartographers in favor of GIS analysts for map publication. The rapid evolution in the methods and standards of digital record keeping and data display changed the way the UGS created, analyzed and presented the results of geologic investigations to its clients in academia, government, industry, and the general public. During my UGS tenure, the Energy and Minerals Program diligently made its various legacy and new databases, resource maps, and geologic models available to the public on the UGS website or in digital publications. The UGS also collaborated with agencies such as the Utah Division of Oil, Gas and Mining, the U.S. Geological Survey, Bureau of Land Management, and Bureau of Mines to preserve and convert paper well records, analytical data, and maps to provide easily accessible digital databases and models of Utah’s energy and mineral occurrences for use in resource management. Drone technology, which was quite new when I left the UGS in 2016, now allows greater access and a new vantage for rapidly collecting information in remote areas and those with difficult terrain. All through my career with the UGS it was a pleasure and honor to collaborate with talented, hard-working, and innovative colleagues who made the challenging work both fun and productive.
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Roger Bon – Project Geologist, Energy & Minerals Program, 1989–2010

Craig Morgan, Tom Chidsey, and Roger Bon hiking in Grand Teton National Park during the 2005 AAPG Rocky Mountain Section meeting in Jackson, Wyoming.
I joined the UGS in the fall of 1989, following many years working in the mining industry, and I retired in the fall of 2010. Those 20+ years at the Survey was a time of rapid growth and activity within the Energy & Minerals Program of which I was a part of. I was hired to be the Industry Outreach geologist, which quickly expanded to include the technology transfer requirement of the numerous energy-related research grants the Survey was awarded over that 20-year period. In addition, I worked with the state mineral producers and the U.S. Geological Survey (USGS) to write an annual Mineral Activity Summary. The thing I remember most over all those years was the camaraderie I enjoyed not only within the Energy & Minerals Program, but the entire Survey staff, USGS personnel, and the Utah mining community. It was a great experience and a happy ending to my professional career.
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Sandy Eldredge – Senior Scientist/Program Manager, Geologic Information & Outreach Program, 1981–2014

Bill Case, Chris Wilkerson, Mark Milligan, and Sandy Eldredge receive the 2007 Crawford Award in recognition of their combined work on UGS Public Information Guide PI-87.
What changed the most? Information dissemination during the 1990s. The UGS’s publications on Utah’s geology have been intended mainly for scientists and technical users. By the 1990s, the UGS realized that it needed to focus on disseminating its information to a much wider audience in a non-technical format that is easily understandable and useful to a lay person. To carry out this effort, the UGS established the Geologic Extension Service, later renamed the Geologic Information and Outreach Program (GIO).
The GIO program answers public inquiries and uses the more common inquiries to prioritize a variety of non-technical publications. Then GIO worked with other UGS programs, other state agencies, educational institutions, and federal funding partners to produce translated publications (typically in the form of topical pamphlets, brochures, and maps) and distribute them at conferences, locally sponsored events, and classrooms. In addition, a partnership with other state agencies provided a variety of services to help the public, news media, professional organizations, and teachers. Due to demand from teachers and educational institutions, the UGS then joined in a cooperative “Education Outreach Program,” which has grown exponentially and has become a critical service provided by GIO. These efforts provided high-quality products and programs, which greatly facilitated information dissemination, and were a very rewarding and enjoyable part of my work at UGS.
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Mark Milligan – Senior Scientist/Program Manager, Geologic Information & Outreach Program, 1997–present

Sandy Eldredge, Mark Milligan, and Jim Davis explain Basin and Range extension on the 2007 Administrative Professionals Geologic Field Trip.
When I started at the UGS in 1997 a regular part of my job was answering letters, the kind that came in a stamped envelope! I can’t recall the last letter GIO received. Not even inmates send letters any longer. Another major evolution we’ve experienced is in the way we distribute published information to the public. When I started print was king. Now our website has amazing interactive story maps and applications. We also have a strong social media following. Looking forward we hope to reach an even larger and more diverse audience with more video content. People are exposed to information and learn in multiple different ways, and the future of Geologic Information and Outreach is bright.
I have many great memories of working at the UGS, one that stands out is of sounds on an early morning field trip stop in Cedar Breaks National Monument. The area was full of standing skeleton trees killed by the spruce beetle epidemic. A storm the previous night covered the deadwood with a rind of ice. As the sun began to melt the limbs, chunks of ice would break off and ricochet down, ringing the limbs as it fell. It sounded like giant xylophones.
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Kent D. Brown – Senior GIS Analyst/Photogrammetrist, Geologic Mapping Program, 1983–2022

The UGS Mapping Program staff (current and former) pose for a photo at Kent Brown’s retirement party in 2022. Back row from left to right: Mike Ross, Basia Matyjasik, Subigya Shah, Mike Hylland, Stefan Kirby, Zach Anderson, Keilee Higgs, Starr Soliz, Rosemary Fasselin, and Don Clark. Front row left to right: Doug Sprinkel Buck Ehler, Hellmut Doelling, Grant Willis, and Kent Brown.
I began my career at the UGS as a cartographer in June of 1983. We had no computers or software to assist us. My job was creating geologic maps using skills that are archaic by today’s standards. Some maps were drawn by hand on mylar film using pens and ink and with hand-lettering. For most maps we used a technique called “scribing,” which was hand-engraving geologic lines on an orange-painted polyester material (Scribecoat) that served as a negative for reproducing geologic maps. By the late 1990s, we acquired computers and many generations of mapping software that completely replaced all of those old manual techniques for doing this work. Today, the GIS software we use for map creation is very powerful and sophisticated, and for me, over my 39-year career at the UGS, it was akin to living through the industrial revolution of geologic map creation!
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Hugh Hurlow – Senior Scientist/Program Manager, Groundwater & Wetlands Program, 1995–present

Stefan Kirby, Paul Inkenbrandt, Lucy Jordan, Hugh Hurlow, Janae Wallace, and Mike Lowe receive the 2015 Crawford Award in recognition of their combined work on UGS Bulletin 135.
The greatest changes I’ve seen have come in the past 5 years along with a tremendous increase in emphasis on groundwater and all water resources statewide. Driven by these larger forces, the size, prominence, and emphasis of the Groundwater & Wetlands Program have changed and increased very rapidly due to increases in funding and changing technology. Along with these changes, we have added really great colleagues that are bright, intelligent, and want their job to have larger significance to positively contribute to the community.
Memories: I’ll give you a good one and a less good one and one that doesn’t exactly answer the question. First, presenting an overview of our Snake Valley hydrogeology and groundwater monitoring project in the Baker, Nevada, town hall, to so many of the local residents who we had worked with and gotten to know, was very gratifying. That was a long, very difficult project and being able to show photos of the various incidents and people involved, as well as our scientific results, and thank the residents directly, was wonderful. Less good was after I damaged some expensive equipment due to rushing to leave the work site, both Mike Lowe [Groundwater Program Manager] and Rick Allis [UGS Director] were very patient and understanding when I thought that I would certainly be fired. Last and most important, there have been many, many wonderful moments out doing fieldwork with my fabulous colleagues that may not stand out as specific incidents or stories but collectively are perhaps the main reason I have stayed at UGS for so long.
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Janae Wallace – Senior Scientist, Groundwater & Wetlands Program, 1996–present

Groundwater geologists attending a Moab Area Watershed Partnership meeting in Moab, Utah, September 2023. From top to bottom: Paul Inkenbrant, Erin Brinkman, Kate Baustian, Kathryn Ladig, and Janae Wallace.
In my time spent at the UGS, I’ve watched the evolution of female geoscientists blossom. In 1995, three full-time female geologists worked at the UGS. Twenty-eight years later, the UGS staff consists of at least 25 women geoscientists. Though Genevieve Atwood led the Survey as the Director and State Geologist and Kimm Harty held steady as Deputy Director for many years, the glass ceiling breakthrough of the first female senior geologist then senior scientist at the UGS didn’t happen until 2011 and 2020, respectively. I love my job and am grateful to have been part of this evolution!
Fond memory: During the 2002 Winter Olympics, the Governor required all Wasatch Front state employees to follow a restricted work schedule from 6 a.m. to 2 p.m. As an avid bicycle commuter, the UGS director allowed me to work my regular hours since my cycling route didn’t interfere with local traffic. Having the Department of Natural Resources building to myself during afternoon hours was a prelude to COVID-19 restricted days of being the only occupant (or one of few) in the building!
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Don DeBlieux – Assistant State Paleontologist, Geologic Mapping & Paleontology Program, 2001–present

Don DeBlieux with student interns excavating and field jacketing an iguanodont fossil at the base of the Cedar Mountain Formation, southeast of Green River, Utah
I have been with the UGS for 22 years. It has been a fantastic place to work. My colleagues at the Survey are smart, talented, and passionate about what they do. For me it has been a dream job—to do paleontology in a place with one of the greatest fossil records on Earth. I have spent a few years of my UGS career camped out in the deserts of Utah looking for and digging up fossils. I have been lucky enough to work in just about every National Park and Monument in the state. Our paleontology group has collaborated with scientists from all over the world and we’ve done some remarkable science that has increased our understanding of Utah’s geology and life on our planet in deep time. Our work has documented the phenomenal fossil resources found on our public lands and supported the management and protection of this priceless fossil heritage. They say it’s only work if you’d rather be somewhere else, so I guess I haven’t worked at all!
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Greg McDonald – Senior Geologist, Geologic Hazards Program, 1998–present

Greg McDonald and Christopher DuRoss present evidence for a large, prehistoric earthquake on the Wasatch fault at the Santaquin trench site, summer 2005.
When asked what has changed the most since I started at UGS 26 years ago, the first thing that came to mind is how changing technology has continued to evolve and affect the way we work. My early fault studies included collecting topographic fault scarp profiles that would often involve two geologists, a pocket transit or Abney level, a measuring tape, and the better part of a day to collect a few transects. That didn’t include office time needed to build a spreadsheet for plotting the data. We can now make profiles in the office using a digital elevation model in mere seconds. Gridding fault trenches with string levels and plumb bobs evolved to using electronic survey transits. We mapped trench walls by hand on paper, which required a certain artistic ability to represent the lithologic and faulting relations. We can now log on three-dimensional, georeferenced digital models made from photos taken of an entire trench. Responding to landslide emergencies used to require a boots-on-the-ground approach, where now we can use a drone to more safely assess an actively-moving landslide or rockfall-producing cliff face. Early in my career, landslide movement monitoring evolved from using wooden stakes and measuring tapes, to electronic survey total stations, to survey-grade GPS equipment. We now have a lidar-equipped drone and can measure absolute movement of an entire landslide surface even if it is vegetated. Technological advances have allowed us to more efficiently and safely investigate and evaluate geologic hazards.
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Lori Steadman – Cartographer/GIS Analyst, Geologic Information & Outreach Program, 1991–present

Lori Steadman at a light table creating a geologic map by hand using the tools and techniques that have been replaced by computers and mapping software.
The entrance of the digital age was the biggest change for me in the 32 years I’ve worked at the Survey. When I first started, we made our maps, illustrations, figures, and photos by hand. We had a darkroom that contained a processor for making negatives, a wash table, vacuum frame, exposure lamp, and a large camera. This is where we made all our scribe coats, peels, color proofs, sticky back type, photos for publications, and most importantly, our four final negatives (black, cyan, magenta and yellow) that we sent to the printer to make the map. I enjoyed doing maps by hand, there were a lot of different things I got to do. We scribed all our lines, made peels for all our colors, set all the type, and many other things that went into making a map. With the digital age, I’ve had to learn so many different versions of software, I don’t know how I’ve kept up. Sitting in front of a computer screen made it easier but not as much fun.
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Martha Hayden – Paleontology Assistant, Geologic Mapping & Paleontology Program 1979–Present
Things have changed considerably since I started working for the first State Paleontologist in 1979. The paleontology program had only been created a couple of years earlier when paleontological resources were added to the State Antiquities laws that protect archaeological and other cultural resources. We were therefore a part of the Antiquities Section at the Utah Division of State History (Utah State Historical Society). Our program was there for over 15 years, until it was transferred to the Utah Geological Survey in 1995. Our paleo laws still mirror the antiquities laws, but they have allowed us to expand the scope of our mission to preserve and protect Utah’s fossil resources.
The biggest change, however, is technology. We did have computers when I began my career with the State—Wang Word Processors—but we had no internet, email, or websites. In place of the databases and GIS software that are vital tools for my work today, we had a card catalog and paper maps. Access to data and the ability to reach more people has radically improved our ability to manage paleontological resources and educate the public about protecting fossil resources.