Lamont Weekly Report – October 12, 2007

OFFICE OF THE DIRECTOR
P.O. Box 1000, 61 Route 9W Palisades, New York 10964

<>REPORT SUMMARY<>

- Letter from the Director
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<>LETTER FROM THE DIRECTOR

The official count at last Saturday's Open house was 4365. It was a
wonderful day, not only because of the gorgeous weather but also, as
always, because of the quality of the folks that came through wanting
to learn about our work. The interest was genuine and deep. Thank you
thank you to everyone who worked so hard to make this day such a
grand success.

The little ceremony to honor Joe Worzel (Doc Ewing's right hand in
the early days of Lamont), that was held in conjunction with the
Alumni meeting on Saturday, was extremely successful and we were very
pleased to see so many of Joe's family accompanying him on such a
happy day. Denny Hayes' speech in honor of Joe was a work of art - we
need to get Denny to let us publish that somehow.

We were able to entertain CU Senior Executive Vice President Robert
Kasdin on the Campus this afternoon - after a brief ceremony to
unveil our beautiful Recyclemania trophy we were able to give him a
demo of Wade McGillis' real time atmospheric CO2 monitoring system in
Harlem, and a tour of the Comer Building.

I was in DC briefly earlier this week, and among other things
attended NOAA's 200th birthday party - which was interesting because
I was sitting at a table with Bob White - NOAA's very first
administrator (and he is certainly not 200 years old!). Actually
they should have been celebrating Thomas Jefferson's establishment of
the Coast and Geodetic Survey (CGS) in 1807. CGS was subsumed into
NOAA. Vernon Ehlers, (the only Congressman with a science PhD) was
sitting at the same table - an interesting evening.

This coming Monday will be a very special day - we are hosting a
Symposium in honor of Marie Tharp - Pioneering Women in Science and
Discovery. It starts at 11am in the Monell auditorium - too many
great speakers to list here - please check out the program at
www.ldeo.columbia.edu/tharp/. The keynote speaker Rita Colwell will
be introduced at 4pm by CU Trustee Marilyn Laurie, and the reception
begins at 5pm. We anticipate many special guests, so we will be
reserving some seats... so come early.

And congratulations to everyone who contributed to the IPCC report
and shared in the honor of the Nobel prize for Peace. At long last
the world is waking to the significance of the challenges before us.
For folks of my generation - starting in the earth science research
business in the late sixties - it is amazing to contemplate the
meteoric growth in our understanding of the earth over the past 40
years. But perhaps most remarkable is the change in societies
comprehension of their relationship with the environment.

If the sun keeps shining and the wind keeps blowing I will have my
own personal relationship with the environment and go sailing this
weekend - it is getting close to the end of the season - have to
squeeze in a few more days of freedom before the darkness of winter
descends upon us.

Have a good one,


- Mike

PS Very pleased to see the announcement today of Susan Avery (CIRES
Colorado) as the new WHOI Director - she is very very good.

_________________________________

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