Ronald Kinnison DeFord, age 92, Professor Emeritus
of Geological Sciences, died May 7, 1994. Ronald joined the University
as a Professor in 1948, and he was Graduate Advisor in the Department
from 1949 to 1967. He supervised 19 Ph.D. dissertations and 126 masters
theses. After nominal retirement in 1972 and appointment to Professor
Emeritus, he continued as the faculty supervisor of Technical Sessions,
a course required of all graduate students in Geological Sciences, until
1987. He then retired in fact at the age of 85, partly because of the
afflictions of Parkinson's Disease. Ronald's influence on the Department
and University was immense, as a teacher, a leader, and a colleague.
Ronald was born in San Diego, California, on January
22, 1902, the son of George Washington DeFord and Amelie Stenger DeFord.
In 1921, DeFord earned an Engineer of Mines degree from Colorado School
of Mines in Golden, Colorado, and in 1922 he received his Master of
Science degree in Geology from that school. His thesis topic was the
Tertiary History of the Front Range. In 1924, Midwest Refining Company
employed him and assigned him as resident geologist to a then fairly
remote station at Roswell, New Mexico. Five years later he drove the
stake that marked the location for the discovery well for Hobbs Field,
one of the major oil fields of North America. In 1933, he was stationed
in Midland, Texas, with Argo Oil Corporation. He lived in Midland until
1948, when he accepted an appointment as Professor of Geology at The
University of Texas at Austin.
The Professor, as he was known to all, was first
and foremost a teacher. Immediately after receiving his masters degree,
he served as an instructor on a geology field trip. Then he took temporary
jobs, including one as a laborer at a smelter, as he sought academic
opportunities. His first classroom assignment after graduation was as
an instructor of chemistry at the Colorado School of Mines from 1923
to 1924. The breadth of his intellectual interests was documented by
his 1923 application for a Rhodes Scholarship at Oxford in English Language
and Literature. Though he did not receive the scholarship, his next
teaching assignment was as an instructor and then as Assistant Professor
of English at the Colorado School of Mines from 1931 to 1933. When he
became Graduate Advisor in our Department, he encouraged all students
to acquire an adequate foundation not only in geology, but also in mathematics,
physics, chemistry, English, and foreign language. For instance, he
requested that all graduate students in Geological Sciences complete
a course in thermodynamics as part of the curriculum for a Ph.D. degree.
His interests and skills in English usage were always evident when he
edited student manuscripts. Among the memorable courses he taught were
undergraduate classes in physical geology and graduate courses in Geology
of Fluids and Advanced General Geology. Vigorous discussions with students
were hallmarks of his teaching. In the early 1960's, he occasionally
taught a course in geology for aspiring teachers in the College of Education.
The final week was a debate of evolution versus the Bible; Professor
DeFord brought his big red brassbound Bible to class and made future
teachers defend evolution as he defended the Bible. He used the same
family Bible in a different sense at the start of the first day of class
in physical geology. He looked out at the class solemnly, introduced
himself, and read a few verses from Genesis. He then closed the book,
turned to the class, and said, "I hope that by the end of this semester
you will realize that all of that is not true."
One of his enduring contributions to teaching and
to the Department was in his leadership of the graduate course called
Technical Sessions, a one-credit-hour course meeting twice each week.
In that course, each graduate student has been required to make at least
one formal presentation of research results to an audience of students,
faculty, and others. DeFord used the course to teach clear, effective
speaking, and graduates of the Department have often attributed their
successes in lecture presentations to the high standards he so ably
imparted. Each student speaker was also required to prepare copies of
an abstract for all in attendance, after that abstract had been discussed
with and edited and approved by DeFord. A volume of abstracts of talks
for the last nine years of Ronald's leadership was compiled and presented
to him in 1986, and a copy is kept by the Geology Library as a resource
and a record of the science he influenced. All have warm memories of
the style in which he presided over the course.
Many of his teaching contributions came during supervision
of graduate students doing field work in west Texas, New Mexico, Arizona,
and Chihuahua, Mexico. Almost all of the nearly 150 graduate students
who received degrees under his supervision based at least part of their
research upon careful field studies of an area in one of these regions.
Stories of his abilities, enthusiasm, and insights under sometimes trying
conditions are legion. Even in 1960, when Ronald was 58, his young students
couldn't understand how this "old man" could walk their legs off all
summer long. Little did they know that starting in the middle of the
month of April, if one drove out along Mount Bonnell Road west of Mt.
Barker, one would see Ronald's jeep parked, and he would be running
up and down the hills getting in shape so that he could out-do those
young "kids" when they met him in Trans-Pecos Texas or northeastern
Chihuahua. He also learned enough Spanish to be understood and to understand
during the Chihuahua excursions. He organized field trips for students
and faculty into northern Mexico in conjunction with Pemex geologists,
and he taught participants both geology and other useful things, such
as how to stop leaks in a car radiator in the midst of an empty desert.
(He took an egg, separated the white from the yolk, dropped the yolk
into a soup pot, dropped the white into the car's radiator while it
was hot and running, and coagulation of the egg white stopped little
leaks.) He was a stickler for promptness on field trips, and students
recall long highway drives with no rest stops, to make certain to be
at the appointed places at the appointed times.
The importance of his contributions to the educations
and lives of these students has been shown in part by the enthusiastic
response when the Ronald K. DeFord Field Scholarship Fund was established
in the Geology Foundation of the University in 1972. In the first three
years of its existence, 48 former graduate students contributed to the
fund, and before Ronald's death, the endowment had grown to a balance
of over $170,000 contributed by more than 180 donors.
Ronald participated in more than a dozen scientific
societies and received special recognition from many of them. His awards
included the Individual Merit Award Medal from Colorado School of Mines
in 1963, election to the Permian Basin Hall of Fame in Midland in 1975,
and honorary life membership of the American Association of Petroleum
Geologists. He was a former president and a life member of The West
Texas Geological Society, and that society cosponsored a symposium in
his honor in 1970. He was awarded the title of "Professor Extraordinario"
by La Universidad Nacional Autonoma de Mexico in 1968. He was a founding
member of the Chancellor's Council of The University of Texas and a
member of the President's Councils at both The University of Texas and
the Colorado School of Mines. He was also a Life Member of the UT Ex-Student's
Association and The Eyes of Texas Society.
DeFord was also a great patron of the Arts and a
supporter of many civic organizations. He was a founding member of the
Midland Community Theatre and was voted Life Member by the Board of
Governors in 1970. He was elected to the Knights of the Symphony in
Austin and was proclaimed King Brio VI in 1971. He was a founding member
of the Austin Lyric Opera, and he was an avid supporter of Laguna Gloria
Art Museum, several Chamber Music groups, The Festival-Institute at
Round Top, and the local Gilbert & Sullivan Society. He will be
remembered also for his love of ballroom dancing, and although many
geology faculty took years of ballroom dance classes to emulate him,
none could match his style, particularly in the waltz.
DeFord is survived by his wife of 17 years, Marion
Wier Rich DeFord, and his four step-children: Nell Hill Gillespie of
Beverly Hills, California; John Hill DeFord of Tulsa, Oklahoma; Stephen
Geoffrey Rich of Phoenix, Arizona; and Lisa Rich Beck of Austin. In
addition, he is survived by his mother-in-law, Mabel Wier of Austin,
and by his sister-in-law and brother-in-law, Marjorie and John Eason
of Georgetown, Texas. He was preceded in death by his sister, Estella.
His first wife, Amma (Mary Amma Spence), died in 1976; she accompanied
Ronald for many summer field seasons, living with him in primitive conditions
in the west and participating in field trips.
<signed>
Robert M. Berdahl,
President
The University of Texas at Austin
<signed>
H. Paul Kelley, Secretary
The General Faculty
This Memorial Resolution was prepared
by a special committee consisting of Professor Douglas Smith (Chair),
Professor Emeritus William R. Muehlberger, and Professor Emeritus Keith
Young.
