Citation by Gregory Dumond, on behalf of fellow nominators Emily M. Peterman, Kevin H. Mahan Christopher Daniel, Jeffrey R. Webber, and Sean P. Regan
Insightful understanding of the tectonic evolution of continents requires deep appreciation for the interactions between deformation, magmatism, and metamorphism. Success in this realm of study demands detailed field work at multiple scales in combination with painstaking integration of multiple disciplines and analytical techniques. Professor Michael L. Williams at the University of Massachusetts has been an innovative and passionate leader of this workflow since his early studies of the classic Precambrian basement of the American Southwest in the mid-1980s. Since that time, Mike’s work has helped to transform our understanding of the structure, petrology, tectonics, and geophysics of the American Southwest, the Rocky Mountains, the Adirondack Highlands, the New England Appalachians, and the vast exposures of exhumed lower continental crust in the Athabasca granulite terrane in the Canadian Shield. Mike’s work has produced fundamental contributions to our understanding of syntectonic metamorphism and melting, fabric development, crustal evolution, and monazite petrochronology. His work revolutionized electron probe microanalysis and “reaction dating”, and he has carefully demonstrated how these data can be used to answer first order questions about the micro- to plate-scale evolution of continents from the Precambrian to the Paleozoic. Mike’s intuitive ability to integrate detailed field observations with innovative applications of microstructural and chemical analysis has resolved fundamental problems in poly-deformed terranes.
As Mike would have it, the processes recorded in deeply exhumed mountain belts are best understood by correlating insights across multiple scales while always asking “What do we know?” and “How well do we know it?” With infectious enthusiasm, persistence, and over 40 graduate students and postdocs, Mike illuminated spectacular syn-tectonic metamorphic reactions in high-grade tectonites that permitted direct constraints on the evolution of orogens, the production of long-lived crustal roots, the ubiquitous occurrence of strain partitioning and reactivation at all scales, and the impact of partial melting on those processes. Mike’s passion for research is matched by his dedication to teaching and service at all levels. At UMass, he taught legendary Structural Geology, Tectonics, and Field Methods classes.
At the national level, Mike convened numerous workshops and led the Earthscope 10-year Plan Committee. Internationally, Mike and his close colleagues have led the community forward with their innovative work on monazite petrochronology for over twenty-five years. Mike, it is an incredible and humble honor to congratulate you on this well-deserved career contribution award!
Response from Mike Williams
I am awed, humbled, and entirely honored to receive this award. I receive it on behalf of all of my collaborators, post-docs, graduate students, and undergraduate students who have made my career an exciting, rewarding adventure. Thanks especially to Greg Dumond who, I know, shepherded this nomination and to his fellow nominators: Emily Peterman, Kevin Mahan, Chris Daniel, Sean Regan, and Jeff Webber.
In thinking about a response to this honor, I reread Terry Pavlis’ inspiring words from last year’s award. In his advice for young geoscientists, Terry emphasized collaboration and field work, and for me, those two things have really been one. Every one of my long-term projects has to one degree or another involved field work and wonderful collaborations. Sam Bowring and Karl Karlstrom in the Southwest, Simon Hanmer in the Canadian Shield, Emily Peterman in Greece, Tim Grover in the Adirondacks, so many colleagues in New England, and of course Mike Jercinovic for the monazite/ultrachron project. I have learned so much and grown so much through these collaborations and they have made me a better teacher, a better researcher, a better administrator, and most of all, they have made my career so much more enjoyable.
I was thinking of a story that I have told too many times. Once (or more than once) in the Grand Canyon Karl Karlstrom and I were debating the significance of an early foliation. We went around and around and after a while, realized that we had completely changed sides and I was arguing his point, and he was arguing mine. There is something to that: the realizing that the model that seemed so irrefutable is actually not so complete, and what seemed so obvious to me is not so obvious to a colleague. And then, because that colleague has been right about so many things, we search together for a better model and new data to test it.
So many of these revelations have come in the field. I think it is because of the complexity, but also the perfection, of the rocks that belies the simple model, and demands the perspective of every subfield of geology. A great colleague who can bring diverse perspective in a positive way is the most wonderful thing.
Thinking back, the colleagueship that I value so much extends to all of my students. Sometime early in their graduate careers, each student transitioned from student to colleague, and mutual learning began. The transition commonly happened in the field where there is time and space for drawing sketches, scratching your head, and wondering what it all could mean. I appreciate every one of those students who are also colleagues, friends, and mentors to me.
If I have any advice worth taking, it is to find great colleagues and hang onto them. And head into the field whenever you can, perhaps on a one-day field trip, or summer-long research, or at least a trip to a great rock in the laboratory. The rocks, the landscape, the Earth is the ultimate model. It’s not just because a colleague can help your career, or help get funding, or even because studying tectonics requires the perspective of every discipline, all of which are true. It is because colleagueship makes every aspect of research and teaching, and academic life better.
In this time when everything seems more uncertain and more challenging, colleagues who are also friends are more critical than ever. Thank you to the SG&T community and to all of my treasured students, colleagues, and friends.