Physics of the Earth, 8: Terrestrial Magnetism and Electricity

Abstract

INTEREST in geophysics is widespread in the United States of America to a degree paralleled nowhere else. This still young community, now in the first flush of vigorous scientific maturity, is from practical motives actively exploring the hidden riches of its land; it is also energetically studying the land, the sea, and the air, from purely intellectual motives. One consequence is that America possesses, in the American Geophysical Union, the largest geophysical society in the world; this Union publishes an extensive and many-sided annual report, but not, as yet, any general geophysical journal. America is, however, the home of the only existing journal devoted solely to terrestrial magnetism and electricity; and the only research institution which pursues all branches of this department of geophysics, from a world-wide point of view, is also American. It is therefore fitting that the volume under review, which is probably the largest general work ever published on the subject, should come to us from across the Atlantic. It will give a valuable stimulus and help to the study of the earth's magnetism and electricity, publications on which have hitherto been rather inaccessible to workers in other fields. The volume is one of a series of reports on geophysics prepared under the auspices of the U.S. National Research Council, with which the American Geophysical Union is associated. Physics of the Earth, 8: Terrestrial Magnetism and Electricity Edited by J. A. Fleming. Contributors: J. Bartels, L. V. Berkner, J. A. Fleming, O. H. Gish, H. D. Harradon, C. A. Heiland, E. O. Hulburt, H. F. Johnston, H. E. McComb, A. G. McNish, W. J. Rooney, B. F. J. Schonland, O. W. Torreson, L. Vegard. Pp. xii + 794. (New York and London: McGraw-Hill Book Company, Inc., 1939.) 52s. 6d.