398 WILLIAM PETIT TROWBRIDGE. 



living entities, in their appropriate environment. While his de- 

 livery in speaking was not free from a certain mannerism, he held 

 his audience and imbued it with the interest which he felt for his 

 subject. 



He was ever ready to leave his work, to give freely his time to 

 all visitors, and advice to those who sought it; and this trait 

 endears his memory to the many pupils and others who profited by 

 his kindness. 



He was one of that very small group of American Professors who 

 feel it to be both a duty and a pleasure to maintain a close personal 

 relation with their students, imparting to them an influence that 

 is more far-reaching than their lectures. 



1893. Raphael Pumpelly. 



WILLIAM PETIT TROWBRIDGE. 



William Petit Trowbridge was born at Strawberry Hill, near 

 Birmingham, Oakland Couuty, Michigan, May 25, 1828. He died 

 suddenly of heart trouble on August 12, 1892. He was married on 

 April 21, 1857, at Savannah, Georgia, to Miss Lucy Parkman. His 

 wife, three sons, and three daughters survive him. 



He graduated at the head of his class from the United States Mili- 

 tary Academy at West Point in 1848, and during his last year there 

 he acted as Assistant Professor of Chemistry, although he was only 

 nineteen years old. After graduation he became Second Lieutenant of 

 the Engineer Corps, and was ordered to West Point as assistant in the 

 Astronomical Observatory, where he served two years, till 1850. He 

 was then ordered, at his own request, to duty on the Coast Survey, 

 where he remained until 1856, winning his first lieutenancy in 1854. 

 His work on the Coast Survey was as follows. He worked at first 

 upon the triangulation of the coast of Maine, which was placed in his 

 charge in 1852; he also worked along the Appomattox River below 

 Petersburg, and the James River below Richmond, in Virginia, and a 

 part of the time along the Pacific slope; this last occupying him from 

 1853 to 1856. While in Virginia, he urged the importance of con- 

 structing the Dutch Gap Canal, which was actually accomplished 

 during the civil war. 



His work on the Pacific slope was tidal and magnetic as well as 

 geodetic, and covered a length of coast of over 1,300 miles. His 

 tidal gauges recorded the earthquake waves emanating from Simoda, 

 Japan, December 23, 1854, two months before information of the oc- 



