Harry Hammond Hess (1906-1969) was an Americangeologist. He is best known for his theories on sea floor spreading, specifically work on relationships between island arcs, seafloor gravity anomalies, and peridotite, suggesting that the convection of the earth's mantle was the driving force behind this process. A geologist is a contributor to the science of geology. ... Seafloor spreading is a part of the theory of plate tectonics. ... An island arc is a type of archipelago formed by plate tectonics as one oceanic tectonic plate subducts under another and produces magma. ... Gravity anomalies are widely used in geodesy and geophysics. ... Peridotite Peridotite is a dense, coarse grained ultrabasic rock, consisting mainly of the minerals olivine and pyroxene. ...
This work provided a conceptual base for the development of the science of plate tectonics. What is science? There are different theories of what science is. ... Plate tectonics (from the Greek word for one who constructs, τεκτων, tekton) is a theory of geology developed to explain the phenomenon of continental drift, and is currently the theory accepted by the vast majority of scientists working in this area. ...
Hess was also involved in the Mohole project (1957 - 1966), an investigation onto the feasibility and techniques of deep sea drilling. Project Mohole was an ambitious attempt to drill through the Earths crust into the Mohorovicic discontinuity. ... 1957 was a common year starting on Tuesday (link will take you to calendar). ... 1966 was a common year starting on Saturday (the link is to a full 1966 calendar). ... The Deep Sea Drilling Program (DSDP) was an ocean drilling project running from 1968 to 1983. ...
Harry Hammond Hess was born in New York City on May 24, 1906, and suffered a fatal heart attack in Woods Hole, Massachusetts, on August 25, 1969, while chairing a meeting of the Space Science Board of the National Academy of Sciences.
Hess was awarded the GSA Penrose Medal in 1966, an honorary doctorate degree by Yale University in 1969, and a posthumous Distinguished Public Service Award by the National Aeronautics and Space Administration.
Hess' doctoral dissertation and two of his papers (published in 1941 and 1960) are considered classics in the study of peridotite complexes.
HarryHess (1906-1969) in his Navy uniform as Captain of the assault transport Cape Johnson during World War II.
Harry Hammond Hess, a professor of geology at Princeton University, was very influential in setting the stage for the emerging plate-tectonics theory in the early 1960s.
In 1962, Hess was well aware that solid evidence was still lacking to test his hypothesis and to convince a more receptive but still skeptical scientific community.
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