Anita Harris
Anita Harris
Anita Harris
1937–2014
Anita G. Fishman Epstein Harris pioneered the use of conodonts—tiny, tooth-like fossils that belonged to eel-like animals—to interpret the history of rock burial.
“Rocks remember. . . . Rocks are the record of events that took place at the time they formed. They are books. They have a different vocabulary, a different alphabet, but you learn how to read them.”
— Anita Harris (ca. 1982) to John McPhee (as quoted in McPhee 1998)
Anita, Franklin Mountains, Texas. Source: Photo courtesy of Nancy Stamm.
Anita grew up in Brooklyn, New York, and graduated from Brooklyn College. Looking back on her time there later in life, she described the challenges of teaching geology in the city:
“It’s a totally artificial environment. Cockroaches, rats, human beings, and pigeons are all that survive. At Brooklyn College, my instructors had difficulty relating geology to the lives of people in this artificial world. In the winter, maybe you froze your [butt] off waiting for the subway. Maybe that was a way to begin discussing glaciation. In the city, let me tell you, no one knows from geology.”
— Anita Harris (ca. 1982) to John McPhee (as quoted in McPhee 1998)
After earning her master’s degree from Indiana University, she worked as a geological mapper with the USGS. She married geologist Jack B. Epstein (1935–2020) in 1958, and they had a daughter.
In the 1960s, Anita and Jack enrolled in a doctoral program at The Ohio State University. While there, Anita noticed that the same types of conodonts were often different colors when they came from different places (learn more about conodonts here). She noticed that darker conodonts were found in rocks that were buried more deeply and exposed to more heat. This was important because the right amount of heating can transform buried organic matter into fossil fuels. Thus, she suspected that conodonts might serve as temperature gauges for rocks.
Conodont elements that have been experimentally subjected to different amounts of heat. Source: Fig. 4 in Epstein et al. (1977) USGS Professional Paper 995.
After earning their Ph.D.s, Anita and Jack returned to the USGS. Anita took a job as a map editor. She had no laboratory at first but continued to study conodont color. Finally, when an administrator in the USGS Oil and Gas section recognized the potential importance of her work, Anita was given access to a lab. In 1977, Anita, Jack, and Leonard D. Harris published a seminal work on the relationship between conodont color and heat exposure of buried rock.
Left: The conodont color alteration index (CAI) developed by Epstein et al. (1977). Right: Example of how the natural color of conodont elements corresponds with their depth of burial, and therefore degree of heating. Source: Figures 5 and 10 from Epstein et al. (1977) USGS Professional Paper 995 .
During the 1970s, Anita moved from map editing to research, and she married Leonard Harris (1925–1982). Her work began to draw attention from beyond the world of petroleum geology. She was featured on the 1980s television show 3-2-1 Contact, a science show for kids. Perhaps most famously, she was featured in the John McPhee book In Suspect Terrain (published in 1983). In Suspect Terrain was later included in McPhee’s single-volume book about the geology of the United States, Annals of the Former World (1998).
Anita had a long and significant research career, primarily in biostratigraphy. She had high standards for herself. Her daughter said:
“When she had a hard time proving herself, she used strong, vulgar language. She was very competitive and whatever she did, it had to be the best or she was not happy.”
— Laura Neustater (as quoted in Saucier 2015)
Anita was awarded the U.S. Department of the Interior Meritorious Service Award in the early 1980s. She was the youngest scientist and first woman to win the Pander Society Medal for conodont research in 1991. She retired from the USGS in 1999, although she remained active in research as a USGS geologist emerita through 2008.
Anita died in 2014. She was awarded the American Association of Petroleum Geologists Harrison Schmitt Award posthumously in 2015.
Conodonts
Conodonts are tooth-like fossils that came from tiny, eel-like, jawless vertebrates. Each conodont animal had many tooth-like conodont elements. These elements often became separated from each other after death. Through studying well-preserved specimens, scientists have figured out what the arrangement of the full set of conodont elements—which are together called a conodont apparatus—looked like in many different conodont species.
Conodonts lived during the Paleozoic Era (about 541 to 252 million years ago) and the Triassic Period (about 252 to 201 million years ago), the oldest period of the Mesozoic Era. These small fossils are useful for determining the age and geological history of the rocks in which they are found. Conodonts progressively change color from light amber to black, then to white, as they are exposed to more heat during burial. Therefore, they are useful for interpreting the tectonic history of rocks.
Reconstructions of conodont animals, which were eel-like jawless vertebrates. Illustration by Alana McGillis.
Model of a conodont apparatus (Ozarkodinida, about 350 million years old). The apparatus was made of a series of tooth-like structures that are often found separated from one another. Model data by Andrey V. Zhuravlev (Sketchfab), printed by SUNY Genseo 3-D printing lab. Paleontological Research Institution.
Selected works by Anita (Epstein) Harris
Epstein, A.G., J.B. Epstein, and L.D. Harris. 1977. Conodont color alteration—an index to organic metamorphism. USGS Professional Paper 995, 27 pp. Link
Harris, A.G. 1979. Conodont color alteration, an organo-mineral metamorphic index, and its application to Appalachian Basin Geology. SEPM Special Publication 26: 3–16.
Harris, A.G., N.R. Stamm, D.J. Weary, J.E. Repetski, R.G. Stamm, and R.A. Parker. 1994. Conodont color alteration index (CAI) map and conodont-based age determinations for the Winchester 30’ x 60’ Quadrangle and adjacent area, Virginia, West Virginia, and Maryland. Link
Biographical references & further reading
Anonymous. 1982. Leonard D. Harris, 57, a structural geologist. The New York Times, Aug. 1, 1982, p. 32. Link
McPhee, J. 1998. Annals of the former world. Farrar, Straus, and Giroux, New York.
Orndorff, R.C., and D.J. Weary. 2020. Memorial to Jack B. Epstein (1935–2020). Link
Orndorff, R.C., D.J. Weary, and P.T. Lyttle. 2020. Memorial to Jack B. Epstein (1935–2020). Geological Society of America Memorials 49: 51–53. Link
Repetski, J., and J. Dumoulin. 2018. Anita G. Harris, researcher and role model. In D.J. Over and C.M. Henderson, eds. Conodont studies dedicated to the careers and contributions of Anita Harris, Glenn Merrill, Carl Rexroad, Walter Sweet, and Bruce Wardlaw. Bulletins of American Paleontology 395–396: 7–11. Link
Saucier, H. 2015. Anita Harris: Color her world, with love. American Association of Petroleum Geologists Explorer, May 2015: 38–42. Link
Sweet, W. 2014. Celebrating Anita Harris. The Ohio State University School of Earth Sciences News Notes, August 2014. Link