Geologist: A Rocks Star!

“I continue trying to convey to all I meet how wonderful and complex Earth is and the many ways it influences our lives and how we influence it,” she said in an interview. “This should be a part of everyone’s understanding.”

GEOLOGIST

A ‘geologist’ is a scientist – sometimes called a ‘geoscientist’- who studies the solid, liquid, and gaseous matter that constitutes Earth and other terrestrial planets, as well as the processes that shape them. Geologists usually take academic courses involving geology, earth science, or geophysics, although backgrounds in physics, chemistry, biology, and other sciences are useful. Field research (a/k/a field work) is an important component of geology, although many subdisciplines also utilize laboratory and digitalized computer work. 

Geologists work in the energy and mining sectors of the economy, searching for natural resources such as petroleum, natural gas, precious and base metals. They are also in the forefront of preventing and mitigating damage from natural hazards and disasters such as earthquakes, volcanoes, tsunamis, and landslides. Their studies are used to warn the general public of the occurrence of these events. 

Geologists are also important contributors to climate change discussions. 

FAMILY BACKGROUND

Maria Luisa Crawford (MLC) was born in the U.S. of Hispanic ethnicity. Her parents had recently emigrated from Guatemala, where MLC frequently visited her extended family. 

CHILDHOOD

MLC loved being outdoors as a child, spending many hours enjoying nature. She became especially interested in Guatemala’s volcanoes: how they were formed, why they periodically erupted and what happens during a volcanic eruption. 

EDUCATION – ONE COLLEGE COURSE CHANGED HER CAREER PATH

A smart and dedicated academic student, MLC had mastered half a dozen different languages by the time she graduated from high school at age 15. Her early academic achievements earned admission to a prestigious college: Bryn Mawr (in suburban Philadelphia, PA) where her original plan was to major in languages. But wanting to fill out her courses schedule with at least one non-language class and mindful of her childhood interest in volcanoes, MLC opted to take one class in introductory geology. 

She loved it. Inspired by her early fascination with volcanoes and her first geology course, MLC switched her ‘major’ and eventually earned a Bachelor of Science degree in geology. 

Wanting to expand her studies in geology, MLC applied for a Fulbright Fellowship, which was awarded to her, enabling the continuation of her education at the University of Oslo in Norway, before returning to the U.S. to earn first a Master’s degree and then a Doctorate in geology at the University of California, Berkeley. 

SHE TRAVELED THE WORLD AND BECAME A GEOLOGY EXPERT

For several decades, MLC fashioned a career in geology by coordinating college level teaching (and its related employment income) with periodic grants from scientific organizations where she lectured on geology (including the Philadelphia Geological Society) once receiving a $320,000 MacArthur Foundation Fellowship to continue her geology studies. 

MLC traveled the globe to conduct her research, often accompanied by fellow scientists and students from the college classes she was teaching. Destinations included mountains they climbed in Alaska, Canada, and Eastern Pennsylvania to gather samples and map the folds of the rock formations. 

She and her students and mostly male colleagues studied metamorphic petrology: how, why, and when some rocks transform from one type into another, over time. She helped create an international geoinformation system to share new data. Another project involved studying moon rocks. 

MLC became an expert in the use of electron beam micro-analysis used to examine the rocks. 

She wrote dozens of scholarly papers and articles about plate tectonics, continental collisions, and related topics. 

In a 1993 article within the Philadelphia Inquirer newspaper, MLC was described as “fluent in rock” for her ability to “look at a rock, see how it’s shaped, study the content, and determine how old it is, how hot it was, and how deeply it had been buried in the earth.”

While based at Bryn Mawr College as a Professor of Geology, MLC inspired students and colleagues, serving as department chair and curator of the college’s mineral collection, and helping to create the environmental studies program.

MLC served on editorial boards for publications, advisory boards for universities and committees for the National Science Foundation, Geological Society of America, and other geology related groups. 

CAREER SATISFACTION

MLC won Bryn Mawr’s McPherson Award for faculty excellence and was named a Top Lifetime Educator by the International Association of Top Professionals. She was also honored by the Woodrow Wilson National Fellowship Foundation, the Association for Women Geoscientists and by the Crawford Field Camp Scholarship Fund for female geoscientists. 

Artist Henry Richardson was so inspired as a student by MLC’s energy and critical thinking that he designed a spiral, 8 foot tall, 800-pound glass sculpture in her honor. In a video about the sculpture’s creation, he called her “a brilliant scientist” and “true pioneer as a woman.”

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This career story is based on several sources including an obituary written by Gary Miles, published by The Philadelphia Inquirer on November 22, 2023, plus internet research, specifically Wikipedia.