Vetlesen Prize

Columbia University’s second $25 000 Vetlesen Prize, awarded by the University’s trustees for “outstanding achievement in the sciences resulting in a clearer understanding of the earth, its history or relation to the universe”, was presented jointly on January 25 to Sir Harold Jeffreys of the University of Cambridge and Felix A. Vening Meinesz of the University of Utrecht. Sir Harold, a fellow of the Royal Society and winner of its Royal Medal in 1948, was cited for his long record of achievement in the study of the earth sciences. In 1952 he was named to receive the Bowie Medal of the American Geophysical Union. Professor Meinesz was honored for his contributions to geodesy, geophysics, and geology, which include some of the first gravity measurements taken at sea. The Vetlesen Prize was first awarded two years ago to Maurice Ewing, director of Columbia’s Lamont Geophysical Laboratory.

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