Joseph P. Iddings

Joseph Paxson Iddings (January 21, 1857 – September 8, 1920) was an American geologist and a petrologist. The National Academies Press called Iddings "an outstanding leader of petrology". The New York Times called him "a distinguished petrologist". Iddings was a member of the National Academy of Sciences, a member of the Geological Society of London, the American Philosophical Society, a fellow of the Geological Society of America, a member of the Scientific Society of Christiania, an honorary member of the Société française de Mineralogie, an honorary curator of petrology in the U.S. National Museum. Yale University established Iddings Scholarship for Graduate Studies.

The mineral iddingsite was named after him. Son of a wholesaler in Philadelphia. He received a master's degree from Yale College in 1877. Then he studied analytical chemistry at the University. Later, he transferred to Columbia University where he studied Geology under Professor John S. Newberry. He spent 1879-1880 at the University of Heidelberg, where he conducted petrographic research under the direction of Karl Rosenbush.

From July 1880 he worked in the Geological survey of the United States.

Since 1892 he has lectured at the University of Chicago, where a Department of Petrology, the first of its kind in the world, was created especially for him. In 1908, he left the University and retired to his country house in Maryland, conducting his own research. He died unmarried and childless in 1920 from chronic nephritis.

Further reading

Yoder, Jr., H.S. (1970–1980). "Iddings, Joseph Paxson". Dictionary of Scientific Biography. Vol. 7. New York: Charles Scribner's Sons. pp. 5–6. ISBN 978-0-684-10114-9.