DISCUSSION OF 'THE CHALK OUTLIER AT BALLYDEENLEA, CO. KERRY: A STORY OF DISCOVERY' BY GORDON L. HERRIES DAVIES (2011)

Abstract

DISCUSSION OF 'THE CHALK OUTLIER AT BALLYDEENLEA, CO. KERRY: A STORY OF DISCOVERY' BY GORDON L. HERRIES DAVIES (2011) PETER WALSH In Volume 29 of the Irish Journal of Earth Sciences, geology of the Chalk outlier. The meeting was brief, Professor Gordon Herries Davies paints a fascinat- lasting only an hour or so. O'Meara was accom ing picture of the events which led to my 1960 panied by his GSI colleague, Francis Synge, and recognition of the white limestone outlier at they explained that meeting me was a detour from Ballydeenlea, Co. Kerry, as Cretaceous Chalk, other business which the Survey had elsewhere in Although I am credited as having provided 'full Munster that day. To the best of my recollection, and generous co-operation' in the preparation of the O'Meara told me that, certainly, he had mapped the paper, I nevertheless feel it necessary to add to this chalk pit in 1942 but had not then identified the rock as follows. as Chalk. In the ensuing conversation, he stated that The detail of the first half of the paper is based he had never seen the Chalk in Antrim, and had on an account, provided by me, of my role in the never actually visited Northern Ireland. I had no events which led to the recognition of the Chalk, subsequent dealings with him on any matter. Herries Davies is to be congratulated on making a An apology is due, therefore, to Professor fine summary of my much longer biography. The Herries Davies by me in respect that, in the notes second half of the paper concerns the role which the which I gave him in the early stages of our GSI officer, Michael O'Meara, played in mapping collaboration, I made no mention of my meeting the area in 1942 when searching for rock phosphate with O'Meara in 1960—in retrospect, it was simply in the local Namurian sediments, and whether or a question that he didn't ask and I didn't offer, not he recognised the chalk as Chalk eighteen years Herries Davies's analysis of the comments made before I did. Herries Davies makes the case that by D.V. Ager in his 1980 book The geology of O'Meara may have priority here, having changed Europe is taken as support for the notion that the original record when ordered to do so by the O'Meara may have recognised the Chalk in 1942 but then director, Douglas Bishopp, and then, at a later this was suppressed by office politics. Ager's sources date, re-inscribing it back to the original wording. for the comments may have included my own two In 2000, when I sent my biographical notes to publications about the Chalk (1960 and 1966) in Herries Davies, I mentioned that I could not recall which the record of a 'dirty white phosphatic whether or not I had ever met O'Meara (which was limestone' at Ballydeenlea is erroneously attributed true at the time). In fact, it was not until recently, on to a nineteenth-century surveyor. When Herries seeing the portrait of O'Meara in his office at Hume Davies interpreted Ager's comments as relating to Street, which was published in Herries Davies's 1995 a supposed Bishopp/O'Meara clash, this came as a book North from the Hook, that the floodgates of surprise, because I had never previously considered recollection opened and I realised that I had met that Ager was referring to anything other than O'Meara at Ballydeenlea a few weeks after the events in the nineteenth century; however, I deferred bulldozing which I supervised at the chalk pit in July to Herries Davies's vastly superior knowledge of 1960. The meeting was set up through the agency of GSI affairs. Certainly, it is well documented that Murrough O'Brien, the then GSI director, who I Joseph Beete Jukes (1811-69, GSI 1850-69) in kept informed of progress in trying to elucidate the particular but also Edward Hull (1829-1917, GSI Irish Journal of Earth Sciences 30 (2012), 59-60 © 2012 Royal Irish Academy doi: 10.3318/IJES.2012.30.59 59 60 Irish...