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Who is regarded as the founder of U.S. geology?

Born in Scotland, the American William Maclure (1763-1840) is considered the founder of geology in the United States. Geology is the science concerned with the structure, origin, and history of the physical Earth.

From 1803 to 1807 Maclure was a member of a commission set up to settle land disputes between the United States and France. In 1809, Maclure made a geographical chart of the United States in which the land areas were categorized by rock types. He revised and enlarged this map in 1817. Maclure also wrote the first English-language articles and books on United States geology.

Sources: Dictionary of Scientific Biography, vol. 8, pp. 615-17; Encyclopedic Dictionary of Science, 155.

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