Yorkshire Geological Society Research Articles

Dr Dorothy Helen Rayner FGS (1912–2003): vertebrate palaeontologist and academic

Abstract Dorothy Rayner was one of the first women to be appointed to a tenured academic post in any English university geology department, joining the Geology Department of the University of Leeds in 1939 and serving for 38 years to her retirement in 1977. She had two very important early influences in her life. The first was her family, with its tradition through several generations of doctors, scientists, engineers, mathematicians, radical politics and social activism. The other was her earlier education, particularly her 7 years at the very influential Bedales School, the first of what were to become known in the twentieth century as ‘progressive’ schools. After gaining a First at Girton College in the Cambridge Natural Sciences Tripos, she undertook ground-breaking research on the taxonomy and neural systems of Jurassic fishes, for which she was awarded a Cambridge PhD in 1938, soon after which she was appointed Assistant Lecturer in Geology at Leeds. In addition to an always very heavy teaching load, she continued with a broad range of research, including further work on fossil vertebrates, and the stratigraphy of first the north of England and then the whole of the British Isles. She was also an outstanding Editor, and then President, of the Yorkshire Geological Society.

Peter Crichton Robinson (1936–2019)

Peter Robinson was born in York on 15 January 1936, grew up in Scarborough and attended the Graham Sea Training School. But rather than going to sea afterwards he took a series of local jobs while developing his lifelong interest in geology and natural history. By 1954 he had become a National Park Voluntary Warden, and in 1957 he joined both the Yorkshire Geological Society and the Botanical Society of the British Isles. He began his geological career in 1957 as a junior laboratory technician in the former Geology Department of Hull University. At that time, it was a very small department and, together with Mike Holiday, Peter provided the whole range of technical support required. There, together with then research student John Catt, he developed a new technique for preparing thin sections of clays. This was published in Geological Magazine in 1961. His helpfulness and enthusiasm were already apparent and remained characteristics of Peter throughout his life. His contribution to the department and university extended far beyond his technical role – he took the students’ Harker Geological Society on day excursions to the Yorkshire coast, and was always happy to help them with practical queries. He helped members of the botany department in the field, showing the link between geology and floral distributions in the North Yorks Moors, and he was already building up an important collection of local fossils that he continued to add to for the rest of his career. Peter was very generous …

The Proceedings of the Yorkshire Geological Society and its contribution to the study of the Chalk Group of northern England

Papers devoted to chalk-related topics have varied in frequency since the foundation of a geological society in Yorkshire. There have been contributions from vicars, corn merchants, a wallpaper manufacturer, a corset maker and a car salesman, as well as academics and professional geologists. Many early ideas have become established. Indeed, the concept of a Chalk Group Northern Province was suggested by the Reverend J.F. Blake as early as 1878. The keen observation and painstaking recording of other early workers such as Lamplugh on Flamborough Head were continued in the late twentieth century by, for example, Whitham and Mitchell, and the advent of modern technology enabled new dimensions of study. Following a ‘dark age’ of very few contributions, a 1978 publication, though short, finally proposed an accepted lithostratigraphy for the northern chalk that is distinct from that of the south, and in so doing became what might be considered a milestone paper. This ‘renaissance’ bloomed into a ‘golden age’; North Sea activities, advanced technology and a rekindling of interest in chalk stratigraphy and palaeontology all contributed to the publication of a spate of papers. Exactly 50% of all papers and over 50% of all authors involved were published between 1987 and the present day.

The contribution of publications of the Yorkshire Geological Society to the understanding of the geological development of the Carboniferous Pennine Basin, northern England

The Carboniferous rocks of the Pennine Basin form the topographical spine of the region between the Scottish Border and the Peak District. They provided many of the mineral resources that fuelled the Industrial Revolution and the growth of the great northern English cities. The description of these resources was very much a focus of early papers in the Proceedings , but they went beyond the assessment of their economic importance, providing striking early insights into our understanding of deep time when the Bible still had a strong control on scientific thinking. Over a 180 year history of publication, the Proceedings and Occasional Publications contain an unparalleled description of the rocks of the Pennine Basin of Carboniferous deposition, and they continue to provide great insight into what have been intensively studied successions but of which much still remains to be learned. This review considers the relevance of these publications to our understanding of the sedimentology of Carboniferous strata, the geometries of Carboniferous basins, how these basins constrained the formation of reefs and controlled the movement of rivers and deltas in the process of eventual infill of these basins, and how sea-level variations influenced the development of cyclical successions, the hallmark of much of the Carboniferous succession.

Dr Harold Garnar Reading (1924–2019)

Dr Harold Reading, who died on 13th October 2019 at the age of 95, was a pioneering sedimentologist of international renown, with strong links to the geology of the Pennines. He was a member of the Yorkshire Geological Society for 62 years, only cancelling his subscription in early 2019, when his eyesight failed. He will be best remembered for his ground-breaking textbook ‘Sedimentary Environments and Facies’. Harold was born in Kent in 1924 and was educated in the Wirral and in Hertfordshire. His formal education was curtailed by the war and, at the age of eighteen, Harold joined the Indian Army, travelling by ship via South Africa and serving in a cavalry regiment in the northwest of pre-partition India until 1947. The experiences of this exciting time had a lasting influence on Harold's international understanding and perspective. On returning to post-war Britain, Harold obtained a place at Oxford University to read Forestry, which included an option to take Geology as a subsidiary subject. This course was …

Erratum for ‘The Chalk Group (Upper Cretaceous) of the Northern Province, eastern England – a review’, Proceedings of the Yorkshire Geological Society , 62, 153–177

Errors were found in Figures 2, 17 and 19. The correct figures are as follows. Fig. 2. Lithostratigraphic …

The Chalk of the Northern Province: a synopsis

The thematic set of papers in this issue of the Proceedings , ‘The Chalk of the Northern Province’, arose from a symposium of the same name at the University of Hull, 10–13 September 2015. The meeting was organized jointly by the Hull Geological Society, the Yorkshire Geological Society and the Department of Geography and Earth Sciences at the University of Hull, and was supported by the Stratigraphy Commission of the Geological Society of London. The seven papers published herein represent a cross-section of the presentations enjoyed by attendees. In a broad review, Mitchell evaluates the litho- and biostratigraphy of the Chalk in the Northern Province. Six formations are recognized, although the Rowe Formation (Campanian) is hidden by drift. Unlike the Southern Province, where the Chalk rests on the Gault Clay Formation, that of the Northern Province sits on the Hunstanton Formation (=Red Chalk). The Chalk of the Northern Province is also less flint-rich and is harder with more stylolites than that of the Southern Province. Its deposition was controlled by a series of structural highs. Particular attention is paid to the internationally important sequence at Speeton with …

Christopher John Wood (18 August 1939–27 January 2016): Palaeontologist and ‘owl’ of the Cretaceous

Chris Wood enhanced the world of Cretaceous research for more than 50 years. His British Geological Survey work helped develop the lithostratigraphy and biostratigraphy used to build the framework for investigating and then remapping the Chalk in England and Northern Ireland. In recognition of his work on the English Northern Province Chalk of the Lincolnshire and Yorkshire Wolds, the Yorkshire Geological Society presented him their most prestigious award, the John Phillips Medal, in 2015. His knowledge of the Chalk was also sought and applied to many engineering projects including the Channel Tunnel. In the international arena his palaeontological studies, in conjunction with the many European colleagues he corresponded with, contributed greatly to defining Cretaceous Stage and Substage concepts using a wide range of faunal indices which he also applied to the British successions. Having taught himself German he developed a lifelong working relationship with German colleagues, especially Gundolf Ernst and his research students in Berlin. Latterly, his special focus was on inoceramid bivalve fossils, working closely with Polish colleagues, in recognition of their abundance in the Upper Cretaceous and potential use as substage indices. His final years were marked by reviewing and editing papers for the journals Acta Geologica Polonica and Cretaceous Research.

Editorial: Introduction to papers in this part

Every six months or so, I seek out a cover photograph that reflects the topic of a paper in the forthcoming part of the Proceedings . This part is no exception, although the cover photograph relates to not one, but two papers. The person featured on the cover will be familiar to many members of the Yorkshire Geological Society, and to many other geologists worldwide with whom he worked.

New perspectives on the globally important Ediacaran fossil discoveries in Charnwood Forest, UK: prequel to

Summary The study of latest Neoproterozoic fossils that comprise the Ediacara biota is a relatively new frontier of palaeontology. That it started when it did is due, in no small measure, to the discovery of macrofossils in Charnwood Forest in 1957, and their description in a paper to the Proceedings of the Yorkshire Geological Society by Trevor Ford in 1958. There is a prequel to this, however. We reveal newly found correspondence showing that as long ago as 1848 enterprising naturalists had seen these macrofossils and recognized them as such. The subsequent rejection of those finds by others mirrors the experiences of geologists elsewhere in the world, and is attributed to a previously received wisdom that macrofossils only occurred in Cambrian or younger strata.

A Review of Large-Scale Man-Made River and Stream Diversions in the Humberhead Region

Geological evidence shows that many Humberhead rivers and streams have been widely diverted artificially from their original natural courses, initiated about 10,600±1,100 years ago. Unfortunately, geology cannot date these course changes. Some such courses already existed by the 1570s, being shown on Saxton’s relevant county maps. No dates of their construction are recorded but some idea of their antiquity can be gleaned from the earliest references to their existence. Certain diverted courses pre-date the 1086 Domesday Survey (one being mentioned in a charter of 959). They suggest a Roman origin, possibly as part of an inland waterways system (and locally for building-stone transport). Other diverted courses, post-Domesday but pre-Saxton, may have been constructed at varying times and for more diverse purposes such as bulk transport (e.g. of building stone and peat), drainage, powering watermills and marking boundaries. The more recent major man-made diversions, those resulting from the Vermuyden Drainage and Wentworth Judgement in the 1620s and 1630s, are well documented in historical texts and maps, so only a short summary is included here.‘for here we may read the last page of the earth’s story, where geology merges into history’ H.Franklin Parsons. 1878. The alluvial strata of the lower Ouse valley. Proceedings of the Yorkshire Geological and Polytechnic Society, volume 6, p. 214.

Obituary: George Anthony Lobjoit Johnson 1925–2009

Dr. G. A. L. (Tony) Johnson died on 9th April 2009. Tony was a much-valued member of staff of the Department of Geology in Durham University from 1954 onwards and will be remembered for the unstinted friendship and support he gave to students. More generally, his support of geological, natural history, conservation and educational interests in Northern England has been widely appreciated, perhaps especially so by members of the Yorkshire Geological Society. Tony was born on 5th September 1925 in the parish of Langley Marish, Buckinghamshire, and was the second of three brothers. His father was a farm manager and company director; his mother came from the Lobjoit family of well-known market gardeners. In 1945, he entered King’s College, Newcastle-upon-Tyne (then part of Durham University) to read Geology, graduating in 1949 with First class honours. He stayed on as a research student to investigate the Lower Carboniferous rocks along a central section of the Roman Wall near to Housesteads (Ph.D. awarded in 1953). He was appointed Lecturer in Geology at the University of Wales, Cardiff, in 1952, where he remained for two years.

Landslide geomorphology: An argument for recognition, with examples from New Zealand

The role and significance that have been ascribed to landsliding within geomorphology were examined with respect to some of the influential historical concepts of landform evolution. Landsliding was almost completely ignored as a geomorphic process in the earliest models of landform evolution. While there has been a growing acknowledgement of landsliding as a hillslope process capable of performing significant erosion and transportation, it has received only sparse recognition as a formative process in its own right. Notable exceptions are the rarely referenced model of relief development of Skempton, A.W., 1953. Soil mechanics in relation to geology. Proceedings of the Yorkshire Geological Society 29 (3), 33–62 Pt.1 and the reply of Selby, M.J., 1974. Dominant geomorphic events in landform evolution. Bulletin International Association of Engineering Geology 9, 85–89 to the frequency–magnitude findings of Wolman, M.G., Miller, J.P., 1960. Magnitude and frequency of forces in geomorphic processes. Journal of Geology 68 (1), 54–74. Together, these two contributions provide a sound basis of geomechanical theory and ample empirical evidence to indicate that landslides have the potential to control landform evolution. It is proposed that landslide geomorphology systems exist, within which landslides dominate form and process by governing the mechanisms, rhythm, and pace of geomorphic change, in time and space. A review of New Zealand terrain suggests that these criteria are met in six distinctive landslide geomorphology systems. Each of these can be characterised not only by the landslide regime but also by the fundamental pre-conditions of tectonic setting and geology. It is argued that the existence of such systems and the complex interrelations involved require the recognition of a landslide geomorphology in its own right.

Two hundred years of engineering geology

On 31 March 2007, a meeting entitled ‘Engineering Geology Through the Centuries’ was held at Keyworth in Nottingham. The meeting was convened jointly by the Engineering Group of the Geological Society of London (GSL) and the Yorkshire Geological Society, and formed part of the celebration of the bicentenary of the GSL. The meeting focused on the lives and achievements of a number of British engineering geologists who have made outstanding contributions to their profession and to science. The meeting formed part of the Society's ‘Local Heroes’ initiative for the bicentenary. The set of papers in this issue of the Quaternary Journal of Engineering Geology and Hydrogeology celebrates the contribution over the last 200 years by scientists and practitioners who have influenced the development of engineering geology or whose work has been particularly important to related aspects of human history. In addition to papers on the individuals discussed at the meeting, papers are included that discuss the development of engineering geology, historically and in the context of education and training. Engineering geology has been an important scientific sub-discipline for as long as people have sought to build and construct their living environment. If nothing else, people soon learnt where buildings could be built safely and where poor foundation conditions or the presence of geohazards meant that unacceptable risks were present. However, engineering geology came to greater prominence with the flowering of geology as a major science in the early 19th century, a time that saw the founding of the GSL in 1807. Of course, there have been many other influential engineering geologists in addition to those discussed in this collection of papers and the paper by Turner addresses some of these, as do accounts such as that on North America by Kiersch (1991). For the Keyworth meeting, the editors set out …

Provenance of late Carboniferous sandstones in the Pennine Basin (UK) from combined heavy mineral, garnet geochemistry and palaeocurrent studies

Analyses of heavy mineral assemblages, garnet geochemistry and palaeocurrent directions may each independently provide useful information on the provenance of sandstones, but when such datasets are combined the number of options on the location of possible source areas can be greatly reduced. Also, variations in heavy mineral signatures through a stratigraphical section can be explained in terms of switching between source areas, rather than due to unroofing events in a single source area, if palaeocurrent directions change at the appropriate levels. Likewise, seemingly random changes in transport direction indicated by palaeocurrent variations through a short stratigraphical section can be shown by the heavy mineral data to be systematic and related to shifts between source areas. Illustrations of the mutual constraints provided by such combined datasets are drawn from late Carboniferous successions of the Pennine Basin, northern England, where the contributions of detritus from several distinct source terrains and sediment pathways are well documented [Hallsworth, C.R., Morton, A.C., Claoué-Long, J., Fanning, C.M., 2000. Carboniferous sand provenance in the Pennine Basin, UK: constraints from heavy mineral and detrital zircon age data. Sedimentary Geology 137, 147–185; Chisholm, J.I., Hallsworth, C.R., 2005. Provenance of Upper Carboniferous sandstones in east Derbyshire: role of the Wales–Brabant High. Proceedings of the Yorkshire Geological Society 55, 209–233]. Examples are given of how mineralogically distinct and geographically separated provenances can be identified, how variations in heavy mineral suites can be used to identify whether variations in palaeoflow represent variations in provenance, and how localised mixing/recycling in incised channels can be inferred. The final example defines the regional extent of the widespread northerly-derived fluvial Yeadonian sandstones and provides evidence for the mixing of more local sediment supplies at the basin margins.

Society Proceedings, 2001

‘The Yorkshire Geological Society’ is a registered charity (No. 220014) whose objective is to promote and record the results of research in geology and its allied sciences, more especially in Yorkshire, by holding meetings for the reading of original papers and the delivery of public lectures and by field meetings. The General Secretariat is at 19, Thorngate, Barnard Castle, DL12 8QB. The charity correspondent is at Church Garth, North Newbald, East Yorks, Y043 4SX. The Society's main agents are: The Society's governing document is the ‘ Rules of the Societyl ’, last amended on 11th November 1995.

Chapter 18 Tertiary uplift

Abstract It is one thing to tell the story of the idea about how the rocks of the lake District were formed, but what happened to them after they came into being? In this chapter, I shall say something about this important issue. One might think that the mountains that we see in the Central Fells have been there ever since the Ordovician, and we are simply observing their eroded remnants. In a sense this is true. The volcanologists do think that we are able to examine, in the field, the eroded interiors of volcanoes. Are we able to do so because erosion has proceeded to such an extent that their very 'guts' are now visible? Presumably that is so, but why, then, are the 'guts' 'up in the air' for our inspection? Uplift can be expected because of the buoyancy of the underlying granites, but is that the whole story? And, presuming there was substantial uplift at some stage, when did that uplift occur, and are there causes other than isostatic forces? These issues will be considered in the present chapter, which covers the geological history of the Lakes subsequent to the 'big crunch', which is thought to have occurred in the Devonian, through to the glacial epoch of the Pleistocene. A review of matters relating to the presumed former sedimentary cover of Lakeland and the techniques for estimating its thickness has been given by Douglas Holliday in his Presidential Address to the Yorkshire Geological Society at York on 5

Recent advances in the understanding of the geology of west Cumbria: II. Convenors’ review

In October 1993, the Yorkshire Geological Society held a full-day meeting with the title ‘Advances in west Cumbrian geology resulting from the Nirex investigations around Sellafield’ (Holliday & Rees 1994). The meeting presented results from the, then ongoing, geoscience investigations by United Kingdom Nirex Limited (Nirex) into whether the Sellafield area in west Cumbria could be suitable as a repository of intermediate and some low level radioactive waste. The presentations at the meeting, and other related papers, formed the subject of a thematic part of the Society’s Proceedings (Vol. 50, part 1). Since then several significant events relevant to the Nirex investigations have taken place (Kelling & Knill 1997). In December 1994, Cumbria County Council rejected Nirex’s application to construct an underground research laboratory, a Rock Characterization Facility (RCF), within the concealed rocks of the Borrowdale Volcanic Group (BVG), about 2.5 km inland of Sellafield, beneath Longlands Farm, near Gosforth. As a result of Nirex’s appeal against this decision, a Public Inquiry was held in Cleator Moor, between September 1995 and February 1996. In March 1997, after consideration of the Inquiry Inspector’s report, the Secretary of State for the Environment rejected Nirex’s appeal against the County Council’s decision. Nirex decided not to appeal against this decision, and the Sellafield investigations have been wound down. Since 1993, the geoscientific investigations at Sellafield advanced significantly and, prior to the Secretary of State’s decision, a second meeting devoted to the geology of west Cumbria was arranged by the Society in order to allow ...

An overview and update of the site characterization studies at Sellafield

SUMMARY Nirex is responsible for providing and managing facilities for the safe disposal of intermediate-level and certain low-level radioactive waste. In 1991 Nirex chose an area near Sellafield, west Cumbria as the focus for further investigations, following preliminary geological investigations undertaken there and at Dounreay in Scotland from 1989. The Nirex Science Programme aimed to assess the suitability, or otherwise, of the Sellafield site as the host for a repository. Such an assessment included the requirement to develop an understanding of the geological and hydrogeological characteristics of the area. The background to the selection of the Sellafield area for site characterization for a potential radioactive waste repository and the early results from Nirex’s site investigations at Sellafield were reported to the Yorkshire Geological Society in October 1994. We present an update of the site characterization activities undertaken at Sellafield since then together with an overview of the advances in geological and hydrogeological understanding of the site resulting from those investigations.

New developments in the Late Carboniferous geology of the central Pennines, northern England: a review

SUMMARY This paper provides an overview of recent work on the Silesian geology of the central Pennines, northern England, and acts as an introduction to the thematic set of papers presented in this issue of the Proceedings. The thematic set includes a paper derived from the Yorkshire Geological Society field meeting to Bradford, held on 16 and 17 September 1995 ( Waters et al. this volume). The remaining papers stem from talks presented at the general meeting of the Yorkshire Geological Society, held at Huddersfield University on 7 October 1995.