By Dr. David W. Barber
I was riding my bicycle along West Clark Drive in Corpus Christi, Texas, when my career as a geoscientist began. I lost control and crashed, knocking myself out when my head hit the concrete. My sister, Ann, a year younger and in second grade, saw my accident and ran home to get Mom. By the time she got out the door, she found me walking my bicycle home, dazed but otherwise unhurt. However, my sister, always a dramatist, had seen me knocked out and had reported me dead. Mom took me to the doctor.
Concussion protocol in those days, 1952, called for keeping the victim awake but under observation. We returned home in time for my Dad’s return from work as an exploration geologist for Stanolind Oil and Gas. He had been alerted to the results of my accident and the need to keep me up for observation so he had brought home with him some of the well logs he was working on as he searched south Texas for undiscovered petroleum reserves.
Geologists have multiple tools that assist them in their search for oil and gas reserves. Direct observations include the topography of the surface, the nature and distribution of the rocks on the surface, and the nature of the rocks penetrated by a drill bit that come up to the surface during the drilling of a well or are brought to the surface intact by coring operations. Remote sensing tools include wellbore measurements of the properties of the rocks and fluids encountered by a well, seismic cross sections produced by recording and analyzing sound waves that are generated on the surface by explosions, travel through the earth by reflection and refraction, and then are received by arrays of sensors back on the surface, and gravity surveys which measure variations in the Earth’s gravitational field. 
The well logs Dad brought home were electric logs which measured electrical properties of the formations encountered and the fluids they contained. His purpose was to correlate these wells already drilled with each other to determine formation tops, thickness of sediments encountered, fluids  contained and if any sections were missing due to faulting. To capture my attention and keep me awake, he taught me this part of his trade. In the middle of the living room floor, he showed me how to lay out two logs side by side, find how they fit together by matching the graphs of the resistivity (or conductivity) and the spontaneous potential of the wellbores, how to determine any productive horizons, how to record changes in thickness, and then how to find missing sections to discover faults and the amount of their offsets. Describing this process using words may make it seem hard, but the practical experience of doing it under his guidance made it easy. I never forgot the visual lesson I learned that night as a second grader bouncing back from a concussion.
Nowadays, we can use well log interpretation software to interpret well logs but nothing is like the memory of being taught by a Geologist in your own family. Growing up with a geologist as a father gave me many opportunities to see and appreciate the geology of our world. In third grade, my family moved to Houston, Texas. In Corpus we could go to the sandy beaches of Padre Island; in Houston we could go to Galveston Island which is much less sandy. What made the difference? He could explain the influence of the Mississippi River delta and the long shore currents that swept the muds from there westward to Galveston. He could take us to High Island on the coast near Galveston which was the top of a salt dome pushing up the coastline from below creating a haven for hummingbirds and other migrant birds flying up from the Yucatan peninsula far to the south as part of their migratory pattern. Even traveling along the highways, he would point out the small ridge we crossed that had been the edge of the Gulf of Mexico at one time. Under his tutelage, what looked common or ordinary became another mystery to understand and explain.
Harry Chapin’s song, “Cats in the Cradle”, describes poignantly the sad results of a father who has neglected his son while pursuing his own career; his grown up son has become just like his Dad, too busy to have time to spend with him. Although my father spent long hours pursuing his own dreams, he also took time to share his passions with me. His fascination and love for geoscience became a part of me. I expressed that passion in my own way, some similar aspects, some different, but the driving force to understand and explain the hidden secrets of the Earth (and beyond) remains the same. I hope to share the exciting adventures I have experienced as a geoscientist probing the mysteries of our planet with others, just like my Dad did with me.

Items