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WEBB, Robert Wallace (50733)

Birth

  • Born on November 02, 1909 in Los Angeles, Los Angeles Co., CA

Death

  • Died on May 04, 1984 in Mammoth Lakes, Mono Co., CA
  • Buried in Cremated

Marriages

Children

Notes

  • Occupation: University Geology Instructor
  • Obituary: Bob Webb was born in Los Angeles, California, November 2, 1909, attended public schools there, graduating from Hollywood High School in 1926. He entered the Southern Branch, University of California (now UCLA) in the fall of that year to major in Spanish. However, he soon fell under the influence of William J. Miller and changed his major to geology. He moved with the campus to Westwood in 1929, graduated in 1931, and for a brief time attended the University of Washington. In fall 1931 Bob began graduate study at the California Institute of Technology and received the M.S. degree in June 1932. During 1932 he also earned a general secondary teaching credential from the University of Southern California. From 1932 to 1937, Bob simultaneously taught at UCLA and worked toward his PhD at Cal Tech. The PhD was awarded in 1937, and he accepted a full time appointment at UCLA as Instructor in Geology.In those days, most UCLA undergraduate geology majors were expected to do a senior thesis, and it was Bob Webb who supervised most of those students. Although graduate studies in geology began at UCLA by 1940, and many of the faculty had begun to devote more and more of their time to research and graduate instruction, Bob believed in the fundamental importance of the undergraduate program and devoted his considerable energy to make it rigorous, soundly grounded, and up to date. Despite the fact that he supervised very few graduate students during his long academic career, he was convinced that a graduate program, once authorized, had to be a quality program, taught by faculty with strong and active research interests.During World War II, Bob became deeply involved in university administration and by 1945 headed the UCLA campus office of Veterans Affairs, and the University-wide office in 1947. It was chiefly in this capacity that his administrative talents became fully evident. In those days, the military services executed numerous agreements with the University in connection with the many training programs for officer candidates. On one occasion, a senior Army Office in charge of training programs in southwestern United States announced that students enrolled in the Army programs at UCLA would henceforth be expected to march between classes. Bob insisted that that was inappropriate at the University of California, and that the students at UCLA would do no such thing, irrespective of Army sponsorship. Bob kept then University President Robert Gordon Sproul informed, and President Sproul, for his part, pleased with Bob's forthrightness and understanding of University traditions, gave Bob his full support, and subsequent agreements with the Army included no provision for marching between classes. In his early days as a regular faculty member at UCLA, he was famed for being the only junior assistant professor to rise on the floor of the Academic Senate to question the judgment of President Sproul. Sproul, an open and forthright person himself, was quite intrigued by the young, outspoken professor, and the two became life-long friends. More and more of Bob's time was devoted to University administration during the war years and early post-war years when he was Associate Dean of the College of Letters & Science. Although he was prepared to give up his research endeavors, he found it a good deal more difficult to put administration ahead of teaching and undergraduate advising. He watched with interest the entry of the Santa Barbara campus into the University of California system in 1944 and inevitably became acquainted with C. Douglas Woodhouse who taught the entire slate of geology courses offered at Santa Barbara and who also served as campus Veterans Affairs Coordinator. Bob saw that Santa Barbara offered an attractive opportunity to limit his deepening involvement in administration while simultaneously permitting him to influence strongly the development of a new undergraduate major in geology in a University of California setting.Bob transferred to Santa Barbara in fall, 1948, despite attempts of his UCLA colleagues to dissuade him. They suggested that he was throwing away a bright future there, and that he was going to something of an academic backwater at Santa Barbara, a charge that had at least some merit at the time. Bob, however, foresaw that the opportunities far outweighed any risks and went ahead with the move, bringing with him the University-wide Office of Veterans Affairs, the first University-wide function to be located on the Santa Barbara campus. By the early 1950's, most of the veterans had come and gone, and the extensive administrative structure serving them was no longer needed by the University. Instead of resuming full-time teaching at this time, Bob took a leave of absence in 1952-53 and served as Executive Secretary, Division of Geology and Geography, National Research Council, and later Executive Director of the American Geological Institute during its formative days. These appointments were important and influential positions in Washington, D.C. and could easily have been a permanent career change for Bob, as many of his colleagues at Santa Barbara expected. But those who knew him best believed that his deep interest in undergraduate teaching as well as his hopes for establishing the geology major would bring him back to Santa Barbara. He returned in the fall of 1953 to prepare for the campus move to the new Goleta site in the summer of 1954, the second time he experienced a campus move. Bob played a central role in developing the geology major in 1954, and the first students were graduated in 1956. By 1960 the Physical Sciences Department (Chemistry, Physics, Geology) under Bob's interim chairmanship, was divided into three new departments. Bob held numerous Academic Senate positions both at UCLA and later at UCSB. Among those were Vice-Chairman of the Faculty, Chairman of the Committee on Reinstatement, and member of the Committee on Educational Policy. Bob's belief in the University of California system was evident by his pride in being able to say that his mother graduated from Berkeley near the turn of the century, that he himself graduated from UCLA, and that all three of his sons graduated from UCSB. He was very proud that all of his sons earned PhDs and chose education as their careers. Although the science of geology was of great importance to Bob, and he faithfully kept up with its latest developments through professional meetings and leading journals, his own research, which dealt mainly with the mineralogy of California and the geomorphology of the southern Sierra Nevada, was gradually phased out about 20 years before his retirement. During the last 30 years of his life, he published a number of abstracts and short papers on geologic education, and in 1976 he and long-time colleague Robert M. Norris published Geology of California to fill a need in California's colleges and universities. Bob's principal contributions to the science took a different and rather unusual form for a faculty member in a strong research university. His influence was on geologists more than on geology. His influence was so strong, irrespective of context, that many successful geologists today regard themselves as one of Bob's students, even though they may have taken only freshman geology or sophomore mineralogy from him. Even graduate students who matriculated at other institutions would come under his influence because of a chance meeting in the hallway, on a field trip, or because another faculty member or student referred them to Bob in order to have him solve some bureaucratic problem. Whatever the reason, Bob had a direct impact on them as persons and on geological science through these students by instilling attitudes of professional honesty, objectivity, and ethics. He was the first to open new worlds to many of them as they encountered him in freshman geology perhaps when majoring in chemistry, mathematics or engineering. By this means Bob recruited many students for lifelong careers in geology. He opened the eyes of many to the appreciation of their physical environment. In research universities like UCLA and later UCSB, it is intriguing to find that former graduates, when returning for a visit, always inquire first about Bob Webb even though the last course many had with him was sophomore mineralogy. Even many of the former graduate students, with whom nearly all Bob's contacts were quite informal, would seek out Bob for a personal chat after transacting the business that brought them to campus. It is difficult to exaggerate the enormous importance of Bob Webb to the thousands of students who entered his office, met him on a field trip, or sat in his classroom. Hundreds made life-long career decisions during conversations with him during these encounters. Hundreds of others were influenced in lesser ways, but nearly all remember their contacts with vividness and appreciation. As for professional activity, Bob was elected Fellow of the Geological Society of America in 1942. Although membership in that society was important to him, it was the National Association of Geology Teachers (NAGT), particularly the Far Western Section of which he was a founding member that received the major part of his professional attention. That the Far Western Section of NAGT is one of its strongest and most active sections is due chiefly to the efforts of Bob Webb. Although he served once as its president and several times rescued the section from near collapse, he preferred to work as a member of the Executive Committee and as section Historian encouraging, prodding, cajoling others to serve in leadership positions. It was his inspiration that caused the section to develop and publish a long series of field guides, the sales of which have provided financial stability for the section as well as an important resource for teachers throughout California. He watched over section by-laws, proposing changes as needed, standardized and codified the duties of the officers, and urged the leaders of the section to plan meetings and activities from five or even ten years in advance.In 1973 the National Association, in recognition of his long career as an unusually effective teacher of geology and his work with the Far Western Section, conferred on him the Neil Miner Award, the highest award that society can confer for excellence in teaching. The Far Western Section, also in 1973, established the "Robert Wallace Webb Award" in his honor "for meritorious service to the section and sustained interest in effective Earth science teaching". Bob Webb was the first winner of this award. Bob regularly taught the introductory courses in geology and mineralogy as well as the geology of California. He is survived by his wife of 51 years, Evelyn Elaine Webb, three sons, R. Ian A. Webb of Saratoga, Leland F. Webb of Bakersfield and Donald G. Webb of Reno, Nevada, a brother, Irving D. Webb of London, England, and by five grandchildren.
  • Honors: PHD in Geology

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