National Anthropological Archives

Guide to the Richard L. Hay papers, 1953-2005

Summary

Collection ID:
NAA.2008-09
Creators:
Hay, Richard L. (Richard LeRoy), 1926-
Leakey, L. S. B. (Louis Seymour Bazett), 1903-1972
Leakey, Mary D. (Mary Douglas), 1913-1996
Dates:
1953-2005
Languages:
English
.
Physical Description:
15.97 Linear feet
(13 document boxes, 3 flat boxes, 8 card file boxes, and 1 oversized box) plus 1 CD-RW and 1 map folder
Repository:
Richard LeRoy Hay was a geologist, known for his contributions to sedimentary petrography and archaeological geology. This collection contains field notebooks, maps, photographs, data, and documentation of geological specimens he collected, primarily in Africa, but also in the United States, Europe, and Asia. He was known for his work with Mary Leakey, in which he provided the geological framework for Olduvai Gorge and Laetoli in Tanzania.

Scope and Contents

Scope and Contents
This collection comprises the professional papers of Richard LeRoy Hay. Among his papers are his correspondence with Mary D. and Louis S. B. Leakey and his research at Olduvai Gorge and Laetoli, consisting of his field notebooks, maps, photographs, data, and documentation of geological specimens he collected. Also in the collection is his research at other sites in East Africa, including Kerimasi and Oldoinyo Lengai in Tanzania and Rusinga Island in Kenya. To a lesser extent (although still a significant amount) in the collection is the documentation of Hay's research in the United States. Present are field notebooks and photographs from his research in Amargosa, Nevada which served as a geologic analog for Olduvai. Also in the collection are field notebooks spanning from 1958 to 2004 containing his notes on his research in Oregon, Hawaii, Wyoming, California, New Mexico, Colorado, Arizona, Wisconsin, and other regions in the country. Mixed in are notes from his research in other countries including Pakistan, Scotland, and France. The collection includes his field notebooks from his service in the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, during which he spent some time in Japan. There are no notes from his work as a geologist for the U.S. Geological Survey.
Please note that the contents of the collection and the language and terminology used reflect the context and culture of the time of its creation. As an historical document, its contents may be at odds with contemporary views and terminology and considered offensive today. The information within this collection does not reflect the views of the Smithsonian Institution or National Anthropological Archives, but is available in its original form to facilitate research.

Arrangement

Arrangement
This collection is organized into 8 series: (1) Correspondence with Louis and Mary Leakey, 1961-1970, 1988-1996; (2) East Africa Research, 1958-2005; (3) Non-East Africa Research, 1953-2004; (4) Sample Descriptions, 1956-2001; (5) Specimen Sample Lists, 1959-1998; (6) Publications, 1959-2004; (7) Photographs, 1957-1972, 1989-2001; (8) Fieldwork Tools, undated

Biographical Note

Biographical Note
Richard LeRoy Hay was a geologist, known for his contributions to sedimentary petrography and archaeological geology. He worked closely with Mary Leakey for more than thirty years and provided the geological framework for Olduvai Gorge and Laetoli in Tanzania.
Hay was born on April 29, 1926 in Goshen, Indiana. He attended Ursinus College briefly (1944-45) before transferring to Northwestern University, where he received his B.S. (1946) and M.S. (1948) in geology. In 1952, he earned his Ph.D. in geology from Princeton University and served in the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers (1952-54).
After leaving the army, Hay worked as a geologist for the U.S. Geological Survey (1954-1955) and in 1955 began his academic career at Louisiana State University, Baton Rouge (1955-57). In 1957 he accepted a position at University of California, Berkeley and remained there until his retirement in 1983. From 1983 to 1997, Hay was Ralph E. Grim Professor of Geology at University of Illinois, Urbana Champaign, and later had an appointment as adjunct professor at the University of Arizona, Tucson (1998-2006).
Hay made his first trip to Olduvai Gorge in 1962 and continued to research and publish numerous articles on Olduvai for the next four decades. His most significant publication was his monograph,
Geology of the Olduvai Gorge
(1976), in which he provided a detailed study of the geologic history of Olduvai, placing hominid remains and other archaeological findings at the site in a paleogeographic context. Also significant was his geological analysis of tuff at Laetoli bearing early hominid footprints; he coauthored with Mary Leakey "Pliocene Footprints in the Laetolil Beds at Laetoli, Northern Tanzania" (1979) and "The Fossil Footprints of Laetoli" (1982).
In addition to Olduvai Gorge and Laetoli, Hay conducted geological fieldwork at Oldoinyo Lengai, Ngorongoro caldera, and Kerimasi volcano in Tanzania, as well as Rusinga Island, Lake Magadi, Amboseli, and Mount Suswa in Kenya. He also worked at several sites in the United States, including the John Day region of Oregon, the Green River formation in Wyoming, Amargosa Desert in Nevada, and Searles Lake in California. Additionally, he worked in west-central Wisconsin where he discovered the replacement of uppermost Precambrian and Cambrian-Ordovician rocks by low-temperature potassium-feldspar.
During his lifetime, Hay received many honors for his accomplishments in geology. He was a Fellow of the Geological Society of America, American Association for the Advancement of Science, and California Academy of Sciences. He was awarded the Geological Society of America's Kirk Bryan Award in 1978 and the Rip Rapp Archeological Geology Award in 2000. In 2001, he received the Leakey Foundation's Leakey Prize, awarded for intellectual achievement in the field of human evolution. Posthumously, a memorial was held for Hay at the GSA annual meeting in 2007.
Hay died at the age of 79 on February 10, 2006.
Sources Consulted
Ashley, Gail and Enrique Merino. "Memorial to Richard Leroy Hay (1926-2006)."
Geological Society of America Memorials
, 35 (2006): 39-43.
"Curriculum vitae and letter." Series 2. East Africa Research. Richard L. Hay papers, National Anthropological Archives, Smithsonian Institution.
Chronology
1926
Born April 29 in Goshen, Indiana
1946
Earns B.S. in geology from Northwestern University
1948
Earns M.S. in geology from Northwestern University
1952
Earns Ph.D. in geology from Princeton University
1952-1954
Serves in U.S. Army Corps of Engineers
1954-1955
Geologist for the U.S. Geological Survey
1955-1957
Assistant Professor at Louisiana State University, Baton Rouge
1957-1983
Professor at University of California, Berkeley
1962
First visit to Olduvai Gorge in Tanzania
1978
Awarded Kirk Bryan Award by Geological Society of America
1983-1997
Ralph E. Grim Professor of Geology, University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign
1998-2006
Adjunct Professor at University of Arizona, Tucson
2000
Awarded Rip Rapp Archeological Geology Award by Geological Society of America
2001
Awarded Leakey Prize by the Leakey Foundation
2006
Died at the age of 79 on February 10
Selected Bibliography
1963
Hay, Richard L. and John Stark. "Geology and Petrography of Volcanic Rocks of the Truk Islands, East Caroline Islands." U.S. Geological Survey Professional Paper 409, U.S. Government Printing Office, Washington, D.C., 1963.
Hay, Richard L. "Stratigraphy of Beds I through IV, Olduvai Gorge, Tanganyika."
Science
139, no. 3557 (1963): 829–833.
Hay, Richard L. "Zeolitic Weathering in Olduvai Gorge, Tanganyika."
Geological Society of America Bulletin
74, no. 10 (1963): 1281-1286.
Hay, Richard L. "Stratigraphy and Zeolitic Diagenesis of the John Day Formation of Oregon."
University of California Publications in Geological Sciences
42, no. 5 (1963): 199-262.
1966
Hay, Richard L. "Zeolites and Zeolitic Reactions in Sedimentary Rocks." Geological Society of America Special Paper 85, Geological Society of America, New York, 1966.
1968
Hay, Richard L. and A. Iijima. "Analcime Composition in Tuffs on the Green River formation of Wyoming."
American Mineralogist
53 (January-February 1968): 184-200.
Hay, Richard L. "Petrology of Palagonite Tuffs of Koko Craters on Oahu, Hawaii."
Contributions to Mineralogy and Petrology
17, no. 2 (1968): 141-154.
1970
Hay, Richard L. "Silicate Reactions in Three Lithofacies of a Semiarid Basin, Olduvai Gorge, Tanzania."
Mineralogical Society of America
Special Paper 3 (1970): 237-255.
1972
Hay, Richard L. and G.H. Curtis. "Further Geologic Studies and K-Ar Dating of Olduvai Gorge and Ngorongoro Crater." In
Calibration of Human Evolution
, edited by W.W. Bishop and J.A. Miller, 289-301. Edinburgh: Scottish Academic Press, 1972.
1973
Hay, Richard L. "Lithofacies and Environments of Bed I, Olduvai Gorge, Tanzania."
Quaternary Research
3 (1973): 541-560.
1976
Hay, Richard L.
Geology of the Olduvai Gorge
. Los Angeles: University of California Press, 1976.
1978
Hay, Richard L. and R.K. Stoessell. "Geochemical Origin of Sepiolite and Kerolite at Amboseli, Kenya."
Contributions to Mineralogy and Petrology
65 (1978): 255-267.
1979
Hay, Richard L. and M.D. Leakey. "Pliocene footprints in the Laetolil beds at Laetoli, Northern Tanzania."
Nature
278 (1979): 317-323.
1982
Hay, Richard L. and M.D. Leakey. "The Fossil Footprints of Laetoli."
Scientific American
246 (1982): 50-57.
1983
Hay, Richard L. "Natrocarbonatite Tephra of Kerimasi Volcano, Tanzania."
Geology
11, no. 10 (1983): 599-602.
1984
Hay, Richard L., H. Bowman, F.H. Stross, F. Asaro, R.F. Heizer, and H.V. Micel. "The Northern Colossus of Memnon: New Slants."
Archaeometry
26 (1984), 218-229.
1986
Hay, Richard L., R.E. Pexton, T.T. Teague, and T.K. Kyser. "Spring-related Carbonate Rocks, Mg Clays, and Associated Minerals in Pliocene Deposits of the Amargosa Desert, Nevada and California."
Geological Society of America Bulletin
97, no. 12(1986): 1488-1503.
1988
Hay, Richard L., F.H. Stross, F. Asaro, H.R. Bowman, and H.V. Michel. "Sources of the Quartzite of Some Ancient Egyptian Sculptures."
Archaeometry
30, no. 1 (1988): 109-119.
1989
Hay, Richard L. "Holocene Carbonatite-Nephelinite Tephra Deposits of Oldoinyo Lengai, Tanzania."
Journal of Volcanology and Geothermal Research
37, no. 1 (1989): 77-91.
1991
Hay, Richard L., S.G. Guldman, J.C. Matthews, R.H. Lander, M.E. Duffin, and T.K. Kyser. "Clay Mineral Diagnesis in Core KM-3 of Searles Lake, California."
Clays and Clay Minerals
39, no. 1 (1991): 84-96.
1993
Hay, Richard L. and R.H. Lander. "Hydrogeologic Control on Zeolitic Diagenesis of the White River Sequence."
Geological Society of America Bulletin
105, no. 3 (1993): 361-376.
1999
Hay, Richard L., D.B. Finkelstein, and S.P. Altaner. "Origin and Diagenesis of Lacustrine Sediments, Upper Oligocene Creede Formation, Southwestern Colorado."
Geological Society of America Bulletin
111, no. 8 (1999): 1175-1191.
2001
Hay, Richard L. and T.K. Kyser. "Chemical Sedimentology and Paleoenvironmental History of Lake Olduvai, a Pliocene Lake in Northern Tanzania."
Geological Society of America Bulletin
113, no. 12 (2001): 1505-1521.
2003
Hay, Richard L., J. Liu, A. Deino, and T.K. Kyser. "Age and Origin of Authigenic K-feldspar in Uppermost Precambrian Rocks in the North American Midcontinent."
Geological Society of America Bulletin
115, no. 4 (2003): 422-433.

Administration

Author
Lorain Wang
Processing Information
The papers of Richard L. Hay were received partially organized. Most of the collection was packed and sent from Hay's home in Tucson after his death. A small portion of Hay's Olduvai photos, reprints of his publications, and X-ray diffraction data were sent to the archives later by his colleague Marie Jackson. The processing archivist kept existing groupings and arrangement and organized the collection into eight series. Original folder titles were retained with titles assigned by the archivist placed within square brackets. Oversized materials were separated and replaced with notes indicating original and new locations.
Processed by Lorain Wang, July 2009
Encoded by Jocelyn Baltz, July 2012
Provenance
These papers were donated to the National Anthropological Archives in January 2009 by Richard L. Hay's widow, Lynn Hay.

Using the Collection

Conditions Governing Use
Contact repository for terms of use.
Conditions Governing Access
CD-RW containing scans of maps of Angata, Endulen, and Ngorngoro is restricted due to preservation concerns.
Preferred Citation
Richard L. Hay papers, National Anthropological Archives, Smithsonian Institution

Related Materials
Hay's collections of thin sections and geological specimens from Olduvai Gorge, Laetoli, Oldoinyo Lengai, and Kerimasi volcano are held by the Smithsonian Insitution's Human Origins Program.
For other materials at the National Anthropological Archives relating to Olduvai and Laetoli, please see the Louise Marie Robbins papers.

Keywords

Keywords table of terms and types.
Keyword Terms Keyword Types
Archaeological geology Topical Search Smithsonian Collections Search ArchiveGrid
Geology Topical Search Smithsonian Collections Search ArchiveGrid
Olduvai Gorge (Tanzania) Geographic Search Smithsonian Collections Search ArchiveGrid
Laetoli Site (Tanzania) Geographic Search Smithsonian Collections Search ArchiveGrid

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