Hyfler/Rosner
2004-04-08 03:33:31 UTC
San Jose Mercury News (California)
April 7, 2004 Wednesday MO1 EDITION
HEADLINE: Jerry Eaton, pioneering earthquake scientist;
HE DEVISED TACTICS FOR MONITORING TINIEST MOVEMENTS UNDER
THE EARTH
Big earthquakes get all the attention. But the tiniest
quakes -- the ones you can't even feel -- are of enormous
value. They warn of impending volcanic eruptions and show
scientists where faults are hidden.
Jerry P. Eaton realized this before anyone else. And as a
scientist, inventor and skillful tinkerer, he put that
insight to practical use.
When he died Friday at age 77 at his home in Los Altos, he
left a legacy of tools for monitoring volcanoes and keeping
track of the thousands of small earthquakes that rattle
California every year. It's information that researchers use
to forecast the size and timing of major quakes and
understand the hidden workings of the Earth.
''For us, he's really the father of the modern study of
earthquakes,'' said William Ellsworth, chief scientist for
the earthquake hazards team at the U.S. Geological Survey in
Menlo Park. ''His vision was that we have to understand how
faults work, and to do this we have to go to the faults.''
David Oppenheimer, a seismologist with the USGS, said,
''When Jerry started he was really a pioneer. He's one of
these people who made a fundamental difference in the
earthquake field.''
Born in 1926 on a Central Valley farm, Mr. Eaton moved with
his family to Woodland, near Sacramento, at the age of 5.
The nation was in the grip of the Depression, and his father
eked out a living drilling wells. His mother, a former
schoolteacher, grew vegetables to feed the family.
''They just worked awfully hard,'' recalled his wife of 57
years, Nancy Eaton. ''They made everything go with wire and
simple tools'' -- setting an example of determination and
ingenuity that their son would follow.
Mr. Eaton and his wife met as students at the University of
California-Berkeley. She was studying zoology; he eventually
earned a doctorate in geophysics. ''We were both kind of shy
people, and we just fit perfectly,'' she recalled.
In 1953 he began a long career with the USGS at the Hawaiian
Volcano Observatory. There he invented a new tool, called
the tiltmeter, to measure the bulging and sagging of Kilauea
Volcano. He also installed a much better network of
instruments to measure the tremors that shook the volcano.
Since components were expensive, he designed and built many
of them himself with the help of a machinist.
With the information they gleaned, Mr. Eaton and a colleague
were able to describe the inner workings of the volcano in
great detail. The model they created is still used to
forecast eruptions.
Mr. Eaton went on to work at the USGS offices in Denver and
Menlo Park. There he led the development of the dense
network of earthquake sensors used to define and understand
the San Andreas Fault system.
In the 1960s, he wrote the first computer program for
pinpointing the locations of earthquakes.
When a moderate earthquake hit the San Andreas Fault near
Parkfield in 1966, Mr. Eaton already had one seismometer in
the area, and he rushed to put out portable instruments to
record the aftershocks. This lead to a breakthrough in
scientific thinking: ''He showed that the rupture of the San
Andreas Fault produced the earthquakes, not the other way
around,'' Ellsworth said.
Mr. Eaton held several leadership positions in the USGS,
including chief of the office of earthquake research and
crustal studies and chief of the seismology branch. He
played a key role in defining the National Earthquake
Hazards Reduction Program and was the past president of the
Seismological Society of America.
Mr. Eaton formally retired from the survey in 1996 and had
battled cancer for most of the past decade, but he continued
to go to work every day to keep tabs on earthquake activity,
stopping only a few days before he died.
His daughter Marian Eaton of Los Altos said she was always
amazed by the way her father's mind worked and by his wealth
of real-world, practical knowledge. ''He was tremendously
curious about everything,'' she said. ''He never forgot
anything about anything he read, from science to world
affairs to historical things.''
Although he liked to work in his vegetable garden, she said,
''He didn't have a lot of hobbies, because he loved his work
so much. He went over every day to read earthquakes, to feel
the pulse of the Earth.''
Jerry P. Eaton
Born:Dec. 11, 1926, Central Valley.
Died:April 2, 2004, Los Altos.
Survived by:Wife, Nancy Eaton; children, Marian Eaton of Los
Altos, Jeffrey Eaton of Eugene, Ore., Dana Foss of Dixon and
Carol Britt of Vacaville; brother, James Eaton of Morgan
Hill; granddaughter, Lindsay Kelly of Dixon; and
great-grandson, Dylan Kelly of Dixon.
April 7, 2004 Wednesday MO1 EDITION
HEADLINE: Jerry Eaton, pioneering earthquake scientist;
HE DEVISED TACTICS FOR MONITORING TINIEST MOVEMENTS UNDER
THE EARTH
Big earthquakes get all the attention. But the tiniest
quakes -- the ones you can't even feel -- are of enormous
value. They warn of impending volcanic eruptions and show
scientists where faults are hidden.
Jerry P. Eaton realized this before anyone else. And as a
scientist, inventor and skillful tinkerer, he put that
insight to practical use.
When he died Friday at age 77 at his home in Los Altos, he
left a legacy of tools for monitoring volcanoes and keeping
track of the thousands of small earthquakes that rattle
California every year. It's information that researchers use
to forecast the size and timing of major quakes and
understand the hidden workings of the Earth.
''For us, he's really the father of the modern study of
earthquakes,'' said William Ellsworth, chief scientist for
the earthquake hazards team at the U.S. Geological Survey in
Menlo Park. ''His vision was that we have to understand how
faults work, and to do this we have to go to the faults.''
David Oppenheimer, a seismologist with the USGS, said,
''When Jerry started he was really a pioneer. He's one of
these people who made a fundamental difference in the
earthquake field.''
Born in 1926 on a Central Valley farm, Mr. Eaton moved with
his family to Woodland, near Sacramento, at the age of 5.
The nation was in the grip of the Depression, and his father
eked out a living drilling wells. His mother, a former
schoolteacher, grew vegetables to feed the family.
''They just worked awfully hard,'' recalled his wife of 57
years, Nancy Eaton. ''They made everything go with wire and
simple tools'' -- setting an example of determination and
ingenuity that their son would follow.
Mr. Eaton and his wife met as students at the University of
California-Berkeley. She was studying zoology; he eventually
earned a doctorate in geophysics. ''We were both kind of shy
people, and we just fit perfectly,'' she recalled.
In 1953 he began a long career with the USGS at the Hawaiian
Volcano Observatory. There he invented a new tool, called
the tiltmeter, to measure the bulging and sagging of Kilauea
Volcano. He also installed a much better network of
instruments to measure the tremors that shook the volcano.
Since components were expensive, he designed and built many
of them himself with the help of a machinist.
With the information they gleaned, Mr. Eaton and a colleague
were able to describe the inner workings of the volcano in
great detail. The model they created is still used to
forecast eruptions.
Mr. Eaton went on to work at the USGS offices in Denver and
Menlo Park. There he led the development of the dense
network of earthquake sensors used to define and understand
the San Andreas Fault system.
In the 1960s, he wrote the first computer program for
pinpointing the locations of earthquakes.
When a moderate earthquake hit the San Andreas Fault near
Parkfield in 1966, Mr. Eaton already had one seismometer in
the area, and he rushed to put out portable instruments to
record the aftershocks. This lead to a breakthrough in
scientific thinking: ''He showed that the rupture of the San
Andreas Fault produced the earthquakes, not the other way
around,'' Ellsworth said.
Mr. Eaton held several leadership positions in the USGS,
including chief of the office of earthquake research and
crustal studies and chief of the seismology branch. He
played a key role in defining the National Earthquake
Hazards Reduction Program and was the past president of the
Seismological Society of America.
Mr. Eaton formally retired from the survey in 1996 and had
battled cancer for most of the past decade, but he continued
to go to work every day to keep tabs on earthquake activity,
stopping only a few days before he died.
His daughter Marian Eaton of Los Altos said she was always
amazed by the way her father's mind worked and by his wealth
of real-world, practical knowledge. ''He was tremendously
curious about everything,'' she said. ''He never forgot
anything about anything he read, from science to world
affairs to historical things.''
Although he liked to work in his vegetable garden, she said,
''He didn't have a lot of hobbies, because he loved his work
so much. He went over every day to read earthquakes, to feel
the pulse of the Earth.''
Jerry P. Eaton
Born:Dec. 11, 1926, Central Valley.
Died:April 2, 2004, Los Altos.
Survived by:Wife, Nancy Eaton; children, Marian Eaton of Los
Altos, Jeffrey Eaton of Eugene, Ore., Dana Foss of Dixon and
Carol Britt of Vacaville; brother, James Eaton of Morgan
Hill; granddaughter, Lindsay Kelly of Dixon; and
great-grandson, Dylan Kelly of Dixon.