Newell, Norman D(ennis) 1909–2005

OBITUARY NOTICE—See index for CA sketch: Born January 27, 1909, in Chicago, IL; died April 18, 2005, in Leonia, NJ. Paleontologist, geologist, educator, museum curator, and author. Newell was known for his studies of fossils that contributed to his and other scientists' theories about the role of mass extinction in evolution. A graduate of the University of Kansas, where he earned a B.S. in 1929 and a master's degree in 1931, he completed his Ph.D. in geology at Yale University in 1933. Newell then embarked on an academic career, teaching geology at the University of Kansas in the mid-1930s and at the University of Wisconsin at Madison until 1945. He then joined Columbia University faculty and the American Museum of Natural History, where he was a curator of invertebrate paleontology. He retired from both positions in 1977. Newell performed field research that took him from the tops of the Andes Mountains to the bottom of the ocean floor, and was particularly interested in bivalve species such as mollusks. His studies of fossil records and how certain species and groups of species died out helped him form his ideas about mass extinctions. Over the course of Earth's history, there have been several mass extinctions caused by changes in the environment. Some changes, such as those that led to vast die-outs 245 million years ago, were caused by alterations in Earth's geology; others, such as the extinction of dinosaurs sixty-five million years ago, may have been caused by violent events. Newell's study of more recent history led him to conclude that a current mass extinction is being caused by human activities that add too much carbon dioxide to the atmosphere. He wrote about this in his book Mass Extinctions: Illusions or Realities? (1982).

Another topic of interest to Newell was the creationism-versus-evolution debate. He favored evolution, and wrote down his arguments for scientific reasoning in Creation and Evolution: Myth or Reality? (1982) and Why Scientists Believe in Evolution (1984). Besides these popular works meant for general readers, Newell published many scholarly books concerning geology, coral reefs, invertebrates, and evolution. A former president of the Paleontological Society and the Society for the Study of Evolution, Newell was honored with numerous awards and prizes, including the Verrill Medal from Yale and the Gold Medal of Achievement in Science from the American Museum of Natural History.

OBITUARIES AND OTHER SOURCES:

PERIODICALS

Chicago Tribune, April 24, 2005, section 4, p. 11.

New York Times, April 23, 2005, p. A28.

Washington Post, April 30, 2005, p. B7.