Memorial to Harold 1931-1991 I. G. GROSSMAN Yardley, Pennsylvania Harold Meisler, a career hydrogeologist with the U.S. Geo- logical Survey, died on March 6,1991. Early on, he worked in the west, but his chief venue was the northeast and east-central United States, where his contributions to stratigraphy, hydrogeology, and modeling were distinguished by their excellence. He was bom in New York City on February 7, 1931, the second of two children, both boys. His parents had emi- grated from Europe; his father, a veteran of World War I, from Austria, and his mother from Romania. Harold grew up in the Bronx where he attended DeWitt Clinton High School. His love of nature and adventure were evident early in life and he liked to go hiking and exploring in undeveloped parts of the city. In 1952, he received a B.S. degree in geology from City College of New York (as it was then called). In the same year he met Sylvia Meisner. Shortly thereafter, he left to pursue graduate study at the University of Michigan. A brief hiatus ensued, but there was no erosion interval, for they proceeded to strike up a correspondence. Harold received his M.S. degree in geology in 1953, and he married Sylvia on April 11,1954. Harold had been drafted into the Army a few months before the wedding. He was assigned to the Beach Erosion Board, Corps of Engineers, stationed at Fort Myers, Virginia. His duties involved studies of shoreline features. Following completion of his service, he embarked on a training program with Carter Oil Company for field work with a seismic crew at Rock Springs, Wyoming. He stayed long enough, less than a year, to decide that this was not what he wanted. He then accepted a position with the United States Geological Survey, where he was to spend the rest of his professional career. In 1956-1957, he was hydrogeologistwith the Idaho District of the Survey, stationed in Boise. He studied the occurrence of groundwater in the basalt aquifers of the Snake River Plain in the Bonanza Lake area, Idaho. In 1957 he was trans- ferred to the Pennsylvania District of the Survey, headquartered in Harrisburg, where, for the next decade, he worked on a variety of geologic and hydrogeologic projects. These included studies of the subsurface Coastal Plain sediments, the Stockton Formation in Montgomery County, and the carbonate rocks of the Lebanon Valley and the Lancaster quadrangle. In 1967 he was promoted to assistant district chief of the New Jersey District, headquartered in Trenton. His duties included the planning and implementation of water studies and ground-water modeling. Despite his administrative load, he managed to revise and complete five overdue (so- called “old dog”) reports on as many counties extending along the New Jersey Coastal Plain. He also found time to construct a ground-water computer model of a Pleistocene valley-fill aquifer. In 1975 Harold was promoted to district chief. This entailed supervision of a major state- federal cooperative program for the collection and interpretation of surface-water, ground-water, and quality-of-water data. A pleasant and exotic interruption of these responsibilities was a four- week assignment in Sri Lanka. Here he studied the hydrogeology of the Jaffna Peninsula, evalu- ated seawater intrusion, and planned a Sri Lankan program of hydrogeologic data collection and analysis. En route home, he stopped to visit in India. This whetted his previous fascination with the country. He also made a short stop in Israel. 97
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Memorial to Harold 1931-1991I. G. GROSSMAN
Yardley, Pennsylvania
Harold Meisler, a career hydrogeologist with the U.S. Geological Survey, died on March 6,1991.
Early on, he worked in the west, but his chief venue was the northeast and east-central United States, where his contributions to stratigraphy, hydrogeology, and modeling were distinguished by their excellence.
He was bom in New York City on February 7, 1931, the second of two children, both boys. His parents had emigrated from Europe; his father, a veteran of World War I, from Austria, and his mother from Romania. Harold grew up in the Bronx where he attended DeWitt Clinton High School.His love of nature and adventure were evident early in life and he liked to go hiking and exploring in undeveloped parts of the city. In 1952, he received a B.S. degree in geology from City College of New York (as it was then called).
In the same year he met Sylvia Meisner. Shortly thereafter, he left to pursue graduate study at the University of Michigan. A brief hiatus ensued, but there was no erosion interval, for they proceeded to strike up a correspondence. Harold received his M.S. degree in geology in 1953, and he married Sylvia on April 11,1954.
Harold had been drafted into the Army a few months before the wedding. He was assigned to the Beach Erosion Board, Corps of Engineers, stationed at Fort Myers, Virginia. His duties involved studies of shoreline features. Following completion of his service, he embarked on a training program with Carter Oil Company for field work with a seismic crew at Rock Springs, Wyoming. He stayed long enough, less than a year, to decide that this was not what he wanted.
He then accepted a position with the United States Geological Survey, where he was to spend the rest of his professional career. In 1956-1957, he was hydrogeologist with the IdahoDistrict of the Survey, stationed in Boise. He studied the occurrence of ground water in thebasalt aquifers of the Snake River Plain in the Bonanza Lake area, Idaho. In 1957 he was transferred to the Pennsylvania District of the Survey, headquartered in Harrisburg, where, for the next decade, he worked on a variety of geologic and hydrogeologic projects. These included studies of the subsurface Coastal Plain sediments, the Stockton Formation in Montgomery County, and the carbonate rocks of the Lebanon Valley and the Lancaster quadrangle.
In 1967 he was promoted to assistant district chief of the New Jersey District, headquartered in Trenton. His duties included the planning and implementation of water studies and ground-water modeling. Despite his administrative load, he managed to revise and complete five overdue (so- called “old dog”) reports on as many counties extending along the New Jersey Coastal Plain. He also found time to construct a ground-water computer model of a Pleistocene valley-fill aquifer.
In 1975 Harold was promoted to district chief. This entailed supervision of a major state- federal cooperative program for the collection and interpretation of surface-water, ground-water, and quality-of-water data. A pleasant and exotic interruption of these responsibilities was a four- week assignment in Sri Lanka. Here he studied the hydrogeology of the Jaffna Peninsula, evaluated seawater intrusion, and planned a Sri Lankan program of hydrogeologic data collection and analysis. En route home, he stopped to visit in India. This whetted his previous fascination with the country. He also made a short stop in Israel.
97
98 THE GEOLOGICAL SOCIETY OF AMERICAHarold preferred scientific and technical pursuits to administrative duties. This prompted
him to volunteer in 1979 to head the eastern section of a new Survey program of regional aquifer studies. His new assignment covered the Atlantic Coastal Plain, extending from New York to North Carolina. A team of 15 hydrologists working under his direction divided the coastal subsurface units into ten regional aquifers and nine confining units. His team also developed one regional and four statewide multi-aquifer computer models.
Harold’s friends and co-workers in the Survey found him to be a dedicated and enthusiastic scientist with insight and imagination, a kind and honest man who not only taught but encouraged the young people who worked with him. He was the author or coauthor of about 30 scientific and technical reports and papers. He was a Fellow of the Geological Society of America, but he was not by nature a “joiner” and sought few other professional or honorific memberships.
He was a man of broad interests— nature, hiking, cycling, jogging, music appreciation, art collecting, and studying history and world cultures. Harold built up a sizable personal library of art books, which he studied in depth. Once, when a colleague acquired a reproduction of a Hindu painting, he coaxed Harold into a learned ad lib explanation of the convoluted Tantric symbolism. Harold also learned to mat and frame paintings.
As the years passed, he continued to take long walks in bucolic areas. Occasionally he would go to Five Mile Woods, a relict mini-forest in Lower Makefield Township located on the Fall Line only a few miles from his home. He also enjoyed hiking in the New Jersey Pine Barrens and High Point State Park. He also took long motorcycle rides through the countryside.
Harold had planned to retire from the Survey in May or June of 1986, and had already accepted the offer of a position with a state agency, the New Jersey Geological Survey, when he learned that he had lung cancer. Surgery disclosed that it had metastasized. He abandoned any thought of postretirement work and resolved to enjoy his remaining time as much as possible.
After completing a series of radiation treatments, he traveled to India on a six-week trip. He wandered about the subcontinent, steeping himself in Indian culture, and spent some time in Nepal. He also took three summer trips out west by motorcycle, camping out much of the time. These were interspersed with several other trips by car during colder months. In addition, he and Sylvia took a few trips together to areas of special interest, primarily in the southwest. Harold arranged their itineraries so that they could drive to as many points of interest as possible.
Their last big trip was in August 1990, when they flew to Johannesburg, South Africa, for their son’s wedding. Harold had mapped out an ambitious sightseeing trip across the country. Following the nuptials, he drove from Johannesburg to Capetown. He climbed a mountain at the Cape of Good Hope and then, with Sylvia, returned to Johannesburg via a different route. Although he was already feeling the effects of his advancing illness, he pushed himself to remain as active as possible.
During the last few months of his life, when it became difficult or impossible to leave home, Harold spent a great deal of time painting with gouache (opaque water color).
He is survived by his widow, Sylvia; a daughter, Rachel Zirlin, a speech pathologist in Birmingham, Michigan; and a son, Andrew, who is studying clinical psychology at Brown University in Providence, Rhode Island; a grandchild, Jacqueline, daughter of Rachel and her husband, Bob. Andrew and his wife Lesley became parents of Jordanna, a second, posthumous grandchild, in November 1991.
In 1986, Harold’s doctors did not expect him to live more than a year or two. He surprised them by living five years, and living them fully. For those extra, eventful years, and for his exemplary life, all of us, his family, his colleagues and friends, are most grateful.
ACKNOWLEDGMENTSI am indebted to Sylvia Meisler for much personal information and for help in preparing
this article, and also to Henry Trapp.
MEMORIAL TO HAROLD MEISLER 99SELECTED BIBLIOGRAPHY OF H. MEISLER
1958 Preliminary report on ground water in the Bonanza Lake area, Power and Blaine Counties, Idaho: U.S. Geological Survey Open-File Report, 32 p.
1960 (with Lockwood, W. N.) Illinoisan outwash in southeastern Pennsylvania: U.S. Geological Survey Bulletin 1121-B, 9 p.
1961 (and Longwill, S. M.) Ground-water resources of Olmsted Air Force Base, Middletown, Pennsylvania: U.S. Geological Survey Water-Supply Paper 1539-H, p. H1-H34.
------ (with Greenman, D. W., Rima, D. R., and Lockwood, W. N.) Ground-water resources ofthe Coastal Plain area of southeastern Pennsylvania: Pennsylvania Geological Survey 4th series Bulletin W -13,375 p.
1962 (with Rima, D. R., and Longwill, S. M.) Geology and hydrology of the Stockton Formation in southeastern Pennsylvania: Pennsylvania Geological Survey Bulletin W-14,111 p.
------ A theory on the vertical distribution of porosity in carbonate rocks—A study in dynamicequilibrium: U.S. Geological Survey Open-File Report, 32 p.
------ Origin of erosional surfaces in the Lebanon Valley, Pennsylvania: Geological Society ofAmerica Bulletin, v. 73, p. 1071-1082.
1963 Hydrogeology of the carbonate rocks of the Lebanon Valley, Pennsylvania: Pennsylvania Geological Survey Bulletin W-18, 81 p.
1967 (and Becher, A. E.) Hydrogeologic significance of calcuim-magnesium ratios in ground water from carbonate rocks in the Lancaster quadrangle, southeastern Pennsylvania: U.S. Geological Survey Professional Paper 575-C, p. C232-C235.
1968 (and Becher, A. E.) Carbonate rocks of Cambrian and Ordovician age in the Lancaster quadrangle, Pennsylvania: U.S. Geological Survey Bulletin 1254-G, 14 p.
------ (with Clark, G. A., Rhodehamel, E. C., and Gill, H. E.) Summary of ground-waterresources of Atlantic County, New Jersey: New Jersey Department of Conservation and Economic Development, Division of Water Policy and Supply, Water Resources Circular 18,53 p.
1970 (with Becher, A. E.) High-calcium limestone deposits in Lancaster County, southeastern Pennsylvania: U.S. Geological Survey Professional Paper 700-B, p. B102-B104.
------ (and Becher, A. E.) Hydrogeology of the carbonate rocks of the Lancaster 15-minutequadrangle, Pennsylvania: Pennsylvania Geological Survey 4th series Bulletin W-26,149 p.
1972 Effects o f the storms on ground-water levels, in Floods of August and September 1971 in New Jersey: New Jersey Department of Environmental Protection, Division of Water Resources Special Report 37, p. 185-196.
1976 Computer simulation model of the Pleistocene valley-fill aquifer in southwestern Essex and southeastern Morris Counties, New Jersey: U.S. Geological Survey Water Resources Investigation Report 76-25,70 p.
1977 Summary of ground-water conditions in the Jaffna Peninsula, Republic of Sri Lanka: U.S. Geological Survey Open-File Report 77-558,47 p.
1978 Problems in water-supply development in the New Jersey Pine Barrens region— And a possible solution, in Sinton, J. W., ed., Natural and cultural resources of the New Jersey Pine Barrens: Proceedings, First Annual Research Conference, Atlantic City, New Jersey, p. 11-25.
1980 Plan of study for the northern Atlantic Coastal Plain regional aquifer system analysis: U.S. Geological Survey Water Resources Investigation Report 80-16, 27 p.
1981 (and Leahy, P. P., and Trapp, Henry, Jr.) Simulation of the multiple aquifer system of the
100 THE GEOLOGICAL SOCIETY OF AMERICAnorthern Atlantic Coastal Plain, North Carolina to New York: Geological Society of America Abstracts with Programs, v. 13, no. 7, p. 509.
1981 Preliminary delineation of salty ground water in the northern Atlantic Coastal Plain: U.S.Geological Survey Open-File Report 81-71,39 p.
1984 (with Trapp, Henry, Jr., Knobel, L. L., and Leahy, P. P.) Test well DO-CE 88 at Cambridge, Maryland: U.S. Geological Survey Water-Supply Paper 2229,48 p.
------ (and Leahy, P. P., and Knobel, L. L.) Effect of sea-level changes on saltwater-freshwaterrelations in the northern Atlantic Coastal Plain: U.S. Geological Survey Water-Supply Paper 2255,28 p.
1986 Saltwater-freshwater relations: Northern Atlantic Coastal Plain regional aquifer system, in Sun, R. J., ed., Regional aquifer system analysis program of the U.S. Geological Survey— Summary of projects, 1979-1984: U.S. Geological Survey Circular 1002, p. 176-185.
1988 (and others) Region 22, Atlantic and eastern Gulf Coastal Plain, in Back, W., Seaber,P. R., and Rosenshein, J. S., eds., Hydrogeology: Boulder, Colorado, Geological Society of America, The Geology of North America, v. 0-2, p. 209-218.
1989 The occurrence and geochemistry of salty ground water in the northern Atlantic Coastal Plain: U.S. Geological Survey Professional Paper 1404-D, p. D1-D51.
Printed in U.S.A. on Recycled Paper 11/91
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