JOHN STRONG NEWBERRY. 397 



Dr. Newberry was pre-eminently the pioneer in the geology of 

 the Far West. Intellectually thoroughly equipped in general 

 geology, in palaeontology, and paleobotany he first of all saw 

 and interpreted the underlying facts in that great synopsis of the 

 history of our continent. The more elaborate later surveys of the 

 Basin of the Colorado should not overshadow the priority of his 

 wonderful descriptions and illustrations of the great Canons, and 

 of his correct interpretation of their mode of formation. 



His most important contributions to geological literature are in 

 paleobotany and in ichthyic palaeontology. 



In his description of the fossil plants brought from China by 

 the writer, he was the first to recognize the Jura-Triassic age of an 

 important part of the great coal-producing formation of Asia. 



His work in paleobotany extended from the Devonian to the 

 Tertiary; and he was the dominant authority as regards the fossil 

 fishes of American palaeozoic and mesozoic times. His more impor- 

 tant and larger works on these subjects are "Fossil Fishes and 

 Fossil Plants of the Triassic Rocks of New Jersey and the Con- 

 necticut Valley"; "The Palaeozoic Fishes of North America," 

 published in 1889 by the United States Geological Survey as 

 Monograph XIV.; and two unpublished memoirs, "The Flora of 

 the Amboy Clays," and "The Later Extinct Flora of North 

 America." His work on the remarkable Devonian Fishes, includ- 

 ing the Dinichthys, is printed in Volumes I. and II. of the Reports 

 of the Ohio Survey. He also wrote the Reports on Fossil Fishes 

 for the Illinois Geological Survey. 



Dr. Newberry was a geologist in the broadest sense. He kept 

 himself fully abreast with the progress of the science. He was 

 too broadly interested to become really great in any special depart- 

 ment. Had he devoted all his energies to either one of his favorite 

 departments, he could easily have attained the first rank. His 

 death emphasizes the fact that the geologists of this order are 

 passing away, to be replaced by specialists. Such men, who, with- 

 out being specialists, have full general knowledge in all depart- 

 ments, — an education founded upon all the underlying sciences 

 and nurtured by investigation in many directions, — will soon be 

 wanting, to the great loss of the science. 



Science had for him no dry facts : all were parts of a history. 

 No one could listen to his lectures or to his conversations on geo- 

 logical subjects, without realizing that he had in his mind a picture 

 in which he saw Nature at her work, and plants and animals as 



