Berkeley Geography has been the academic home of many prominent and influential geographers for whom the age of their time did not provide a medium for a lasting public memorial. This is not true for the following, all professors of high regard and all who left us before we were ready see them go:
Orman Granger, 1934–2023
Orman Granger was one of the first tenured black faculty members in the department. His research focused on climate change, sea level rise and its impact on island states, as well as characterizing the El Nino effect on weather patterns in the western US.
Paul Groth, 1949–2022
Paul Groth was a welcoming presence and a compelling teacher. His research focused on the history and form of cultural landscape and the meaning of ordinary built environments (epitomized by his work on residential hotels and workers' houses), with a particular investment in the Bay Area.
Roger Byrne, 1940–2018
Roger Byrne was an exceptionally engaged teacher and advisor. His research and teaching interests spanned broad biogeographic topics including complex human-environment interactions, late Quaternary climate change, and origins of agriculture.
Allan Pred, 1936–2007
Allan Pred left an indelible stamp on the Geography Department marked by his devotion to wide-open inquiry, critical thought, and a passion for truth and human freedom.
Douglas R. Powell, 1920–2006
Powell is remembered with the Douglas R. Powell Fund for Field Geography.
Bernard Q. Nietschmann, 1941–2000
“If you’re interested in cultural diversity, you have to be interested in biological diversity, because nature is the scaffolding of culture—it’s why people are the way they are,” Nietschmann said in a 1992 Audubon magazine article.
James J. Parsons, 1915–1997
Jim and Betty made Geography at Berkeley a home, not just a department.
David Hooson, 1926–2008
Professor Hooson’s specialty was the former Soviet Union, and he made many forays into the region for research and collaboration with colleagues on the other side of the Iron Curtain; always open-minded, he was the exceptional Soviet specialist who was not a Cold Warrior.