Rhodes Whitmore Fairbridge (21 May 1914 – 8 November 2006) was an Australian

geologist A geologist is a scientist who studies the solid, liquid, and gaseous matter that constitutes Earth and other terrestrial planets, as well as the processes that shape them. Geologists usually study geology, earth science, or geophysics, althou ...

and expert on

climate change In common usage, climate change describes global warming—the ongoing increase in global average temperature—and its effects on Earth's climate system. Climate change in a broader sense also includes previous long-term changes to E ...

. His father was

Kingsley Fairbridge Kingsley Ogilvie Fairbridge (5 May 1885 – 19 July 1924) was the founder of a child migration, child emigration scheme from Britain to British Empire, its colonies and the Fairbridge Schools. His life work was the founding of the "Society for t ...

. Born in

Pinjarra, Western Australia Pinjarra is a town in the Peel region of Western Australia along the South Western Highway, from the state capital, Perth and south-east of the coastal city of Mandurah. Its local government area is the Shire of Murray. At the 2016 census, P ...

, Fairbridge graduated from Queen's University in

Ontario Ontario ( ; ) is one of the thirteen provinces and territories of Canada.Ontario is located in the geographic eastern half of Canada, but it has historically and politically been considered to be part of Central Canada. Located in Central Ca ...

and earned his

master's degree A master's degree (from Latin ) is an academic degree awarded by universities or colleges upon completion of a course of study demonstrating mastery or a high-order overview of a specific field of study or area of professional practice.

from

Oxford Oxford () is a city in England. It is the county town and only city of Oxfordshire. In 2020, its population was estimated at 151,584. It is north-west of London, south-east of Birmingham and north-east of Bristol. The city is home to the ...

. In 1941, he earned a

doctorate A doctorate (from Latin ''docere'', "to teach"), doctor's degree (from Latin ''doctor'', "teacher"), or doctoral degree is an academic degree awarded by universities and some other educational institutions, derived from the ancient formalism ''l ...

in geology from the

University of Western Australia The University of Western Australia (UWA) is a public research university in the Australian state of Western Australia. The university's main campus is in Perth, the state capital, with a secondary campus in Albany, Western Australia, Albany an ...

. He taught at

Columbia University Columbia University (also known as Columbia, and officially as Columbia University in the City of New York) is a private research university in New York City. Established in 1754 as King's College on the grounds of Trinity Church in Manhatt ...

from 1955 until his 1982 retirement. While there, he was supervising editor for the '' Encyclopedia of Earth Sciences''. In the early 1960s, he developed the so-called "Fairbridge Curve",15 October 2003 Classification of Coasts. ''Journal of Coastal Research'' pp. 155–165 a record of changes in

sea level Mean sea level (MSL, often shortened to sea level) is an average surface level of one or more among Earth's coastal bodies of water from which heights such as elevation may be measured. The global MSL is a type of vertical datuma standardised g ...

s over the last 10,000 years.The “Solar Jerk”, The King-Hele Cycle, and the Challenge to Climate Science
/ref> In the 1980s Fairbridge wrote about climate's impact on the long-term evolution of

shields A shield is a piece of personal armour held in the hand, which may or may not be strapped to the wrist or forearm. Shields are used to intercept specific attacks, whether from close-ranged weaponry or projectiles such as arrows, by means of a ...

and

peneplain 390px, Sketch of a hypothetical peneplain formation after an orogeny. In geomorphology and geology, a peneplain is a low-relief plain formed by protracted erosion. This is the definition in the broadest of terms, albeit with frequency the usage ...

s. Fairbridge died in 2006 in

Amagansett, New York Amagansett is a census-designated place that roughly corresponds to the hamlet by the same name in the Town of East Hampton in Suffolk County, New York, United States, on the South Shore of Long Island. As of the 2010 United States Census, ...

of a

brain tumor A brain tumor occurs when abnormal cells form within the brain. There are two main types of tumors: malignant tumors and benign (non-cancerous) tumors. These can be further classified as primary tumors, which start within the brain, and seconda ...

.Pearce, Jeremy ( 27 November 2006). Rhodes W. Fairbridge, 92, Early Expert on Climate Change, Dies. ''

New York Times ''The New York Times'' (''the Times'', ''NYT'', or the Gray Lady) is a daily newspaper based in New York City with a worldwide readership reported in 2020 to comprise a declining 840,000 paid print subscribers, and a growing 6 million paid d ...

Works

* ''The Encyclopedia of Oceanography'' edited (Reinhold Pub. Co., 1966) * ''The Encyclopedia of Geochemistry and Environmental Sciences'' edited (Reinhold Pub. Corp., 1967) * ''The Encyclopedia of Geomorphology'' edited (Reinhold Book Corp., c1968) * ''Climate : History, Periodicity, and Predictability'' (Van Nostrand Reinhold, c1987) * ''The Encyclopedia of Climatology'' edited with John E. Oliver (Van Nostrand Reinhold, c1987) * ''The Physiographic Regions of Australia'' co-written with J. Gentilli (University of Western Australia, 19--) * *

References

1914 births 2006 deaths Australian geomorphologists 20th-century Australian geologists Australian academics 20th-century Australian non-fiction writers Deaths from brain cancer in the United States People from Pinjarra, Western Australia University of Western Australia alumni Columbia University faculty {{Australia-scientist-stub