Erratics to discuss geology pioneer
Joseph Pardee, the first to suggest the existence of Glacial Lake Missoula, will be the subject of a presentation at the Wenatchee Valley Erratics meeting Feb. 13.
WENATCHEE — The Wenatchee Valley Erratics Chapter of the Ice Age Floods Institute will host a talk on a pioneer in the geology of the Columbia Basin, according to an announcement from the organization.
Geologist Bill Burgel, coming from Portland, will talk about Lake Missoula and Joseph T. Pardee, according ot the announcement. Pardee was a U.S. Geological Survey field geologist whose expertise was in western Montana, where he was raised. He was the first to recognize, around 1910, the features of a vast, ancient Glacial Lake Missoula. In the 1920s, working independently of Pardee, Harlan Bretz had determined from field evidence, that only an extraordinarily huge flood, or floods, could have carved out the channeled scablands in eastern Washington, and the dry coulees associated with them. Bretz did not know the source of the water, but in 1925 Pardee suggested to Bretz that the draining of a glacial lake could account for the magnitude of water flows needed to create the scablands and coulees.
The presentation is part of the chapter’s meeting Feb. 13. The meeting will take place live at 7 p.m. at the Wenatchee Valley Museum and Cultural Center, 127 S. Mission, Wenatchee, and will also be available via Zoom link at https://bit.ly/459Qyic.
More information is available from Erratics Chapter President Brent Cunderla at cunderla@nwi.net or 509-860-6067.