When a geologist loves old rocks *and* old books

Showing you around my vintage geology book collection

My vintage geology book collection started in college, when a friend of mine (also a geology major) told me about a huge used book sale in Ithaca that she went to almost every year. On a random Tuesday evening after class, we made the 1.5 hour drive to Ithaca from our small college town on Lake Ontario and spent the evening in a warehouse of endless books. When I say vintage, by the way, that’s kind of just my fancy way of saying “old”. I don’t know the rules for when you’re allowed to call something vintage (I think it has to be at least 50 years old?), but that’s just what we’re gonna call them.

We each went home with our own huge box of (mostly geology) books. When I got home I stacked all the old geology books on top of each other to see how tall it would be.

From there on, my interest grew and after college my collection expanded even more. I started actively looking for vintage geology and science books when I would visit used bookstores and my favorite hometown vintage and antique shops. By the time I moved into my current house, I had a huge stack of them, and now they take up a good chunk of the small bookcase I keep my nature and science books in. Let’s go on a little tour of a few, shall we?

P.S. Thank you to my follower, Brittany, for the idea for today’s newsletter!

💎 Golden Guide to Minerals, Gems, and Rocks

by Zim, Shaffer, and Pelman, 1957

At some point, I started specifically looking for books in the Golden Nature Guide series. So far I have the Golden Guides to seashells and botany, in addition to this geology one. I’m pretty sure I found this one at one of the antique shops in my area of New York.

I love how everything is illustrated instead of photos. Don’t get me wrong, I love photos, but something about hand drawn rocks and minerals is just so beautiful. It reminds me of being in my petrology class and staying up late in the science building drawing the 40+ rocks we were assigned to observe and identify. Except my drawings were never as good as these… 😅

🗺️ Principles of Geology, Fourth Edition

by Gilluly, Waters, and Woodford, 1975

Next up is an actual geology textbook. This one, unlike the Golden Guide, was made for geology students actively studying it instead of just perusing it for fun. Because of this, there’s a lot more advanced topics in here, with more detailed drawings and diagrams. I like how these ones are also hand drawn (the first edition of the textbook came out in 1951 and the copy I have is from 1975). There’s also some beautiful black and white photography. This is one of the books I found at that huge book sale with my friend in Ithaca. 📚

I’m obsessed with the cover on this one. Something about topographic maps is so satisfying to see as part of a design. I’m working on re-branding right now for Geo Beck, and topographic lines are an element I’m hoping to include in the designs because I love them so much.

🌎 The Geological Evolution of North America: A Regional Approach to Historical Geology

by Clark and Stearn, 1960

Another geology textbook! I gravitated towards this one right away because, well, I live in North America and there’s a lot of information in here about the geology of the Northeastern US. I also love how one of the previous owners was not shy about underlining, writing notes, etc. It’s so fun to look through it and see what they found interesting or important enough to highlight or write their thoughts about in the margins. I wonder if this person went on to have a long geology career, and if so, what they accomplished and learned during it. 🤔

Another thing I find fascinating about this book is how many things are similar or pretty much the same to what I learned when I was getting my geology degree - and how vastly different some things are at the same time. The most notable difference you’ll find between this textbook and one from a present day geology classroom is the Theory of Plate Tectonics! The Theory of Plate Tectonics began to gain acceptance in the scientific community in the late 60s, so in this book they talk about the outdated Geosynclinal Theory instead.

In 2022, I got to be a part of this Google Doodle that celebrated the life and work of Marie Tharp, who was a huge catalyst in the wide acceptance of this theory. I made a YouTube video going into more depth about her story, and in it I mention this change in geology textbooks during this pivotal time in history.

Bonus: The Pocket Guide to Science by Popular Science Monthly

by Dr. R.E. Humphries, 1924

I’m calling this one a bonus because it’s not strictly a geology book - but I just had to include it because it’s one of my favorite old science books I have. My mom found this for me at a local antique shop we like going to together, and gave it to me for Christmas a couple years ago. It has a bunch of science-related questions people had at the time and it is so fun to look through. It’s amazing to see how far science has come in the past 100 years. I made a YouTube video about this book a while ago, so you can go check that out if you’re curious about the kinds of questions that are in it! Some of my vintage book collection gets a little shoutout in this video too. 🤓

✏️ Join me in the comments!

Please answer any/all questions in the comments, or just add your own thoughts.

1. Do you have any vintage/antique science books? What are they?

2. Do you also collect something very specific? Another old thing I like to collect are vintage post cards.

3. Are you currently reading anything (doesn’t have to be geology related)? I’m currently listening to Blake Crouch’s Recursion on audiobook because I loved his book Dark Matter and wanted to dive into more of his books! Highly recommend using the Libby app through your local library, I listen to so many audiobooks for free 🤩