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19 September 2016
Geopoetry: a short recounting of Virginia’s long history
…And now for something completely different! This past weekend, my family gathered in Capon Springs, West Virginia, to celebrate my mother’s 70th birthday. She asked for an unusual birthday gift – an original poem from each member of the family. Writing poetry isn’t something most of us do, but my mom was an English teacher in her career, and poetry is important to her. Collectively, we acquiesced and set our …
2 March 2016
The Invention of Nature: Alexander von Humboldt’s New World, by Andrea Wulf
This is the second Andrea Wulf book I’ve read in the past month. It’s a biography of a great naturalist and popularizer of science and travel writing, who at the same time is largely forgotten in the modern English speaking world. Alexander von Humboldt’s intellectual impact is vast, Wulf argues, leading to everything from Darwin’s wanderlust (and thus, to the observations that led to the idea of descent with modification …
12 May 2014
How About Never — Is Never Good For You? by Bob Mankoff
My friend Joe Cancellare knows that I like cartoons, and that I even draw a few cartoons myself. He surprised me a couple weeks ago with a gift of a book – a new memoir by New Yorker cartoon editor Bob Mankoff. This was a real treat – it explores (a) the idea of how cartoons work (or don’t), (b) Mankoff’s own journey as a cartoonist, entrepreneur, and eventual editor, …
5 February 2014
The Story of Earth, by Robert Hazen
Callan reviews Bob Hazen’s latest book, “The Story of Earth,” a history of our planet that emphasizes the coevolution of minerals and life.
18 January 2014
Annotating some Zion cross-bedding
A photo of the iconic dune cross-beds at Zion National Park gets the Bentley Annotation treatment, and comes out looking like a stained glass window. Take a look at both photos and see if you can answer the question, “Which way was the wind blowing?”
4 December 2013
The Smithsonian Castle and the Seneca Quarry, by Garrett Peck
The Smithsonian Castle is one of the most striking buildings on the National Mall in Washington, DC. One reason for this is its distinctive architecture, but a second reason is its color: a bright, deep red. This color comes from the rock from which the Castle constructed: the Triassic-aged “Seneca Sandstone,” a part of the formation technically known as the Manassas Sandstone. It is overlain by the Balls Bluff Siltstone, …
5 September 2013
Strained stylolites at Foamhenge
One thing that’s 100% worth doing if you find yourself visiting Natural Bridge, Virginia, is to pop in for a visit at Foamhenge, an art installation a few miles away. Foamhenge is a full-scale replica of Stonehenge, made of styrofoam (covered in gray latex paint). It’s a few years old now, so it’s begun to weather a bit: You’ll notice that classic orange soil and that there are also outcrops …
19 August 2013
Monday macrobug: Saddleback caterpillars
My neighbor, the artist Diane Artz Furlong, photographed these extraordinary caterpillars in her garden last week. With her permission, I’m reposting the photos here… Diane writes that, Just when I thought I was done with the Japanese beetle onslaught (not!) I find these guys on my rose bush. I would never have found them, though, had I not brushed my hand up against them. They sting! Quite painfully, too. They …
2 June 2013
Sidewalk geologic timescales
Saw this educational graffiti on the campus of Carleton College a few weeks ago: Seems like a great way to get students to grasp the relative spans of geologic time.
Callan Bentley is Associate Professor of Geology at Piedmont Virginia Community College in Charlottesville, Virginia. He is a Fellow of the Geological Society of America. For his work on this blog, the National Association of Geoscience Teachers recognized him with the James Shea Award. He has also won the Outstanding Faculty Award from the State Council on Higher Education in Virginia, and the Biggs Award for Excellence in Geoscience Teaching from the Geoscience Education Division of the Geological Society of America. In previous years, Callan served as a contributing editor at EARTH magazine, President of the Geological Society of Washington and President the Geo2YC division of NAGT.