William 'Strata' Smith
Plaque unveiled on Sunday 25th August 2002 by Lord Derwent the great-great grandson of Sir John Vanden Bempde Johnstone who employed William Smith as estate manager of Hackness Hall between 1828 and 1834.
I William Smith is known as the 'Father of English Geology' owing to his founding the science of stratigraphy by proving that j rock strata could be dated by the fossils they contained and for producing the first geological map of the British Isles, j Smith was born in 1769 in Churchill, Oxfordshire, the unedu-! cated son of a blacksmith. As a boy he was fascinated by fossils and, whilst working as a canal builder and mining and drainage engineer, this interest led to a more general obsession with what lay beneath the surface of the earth. This passion led to his great project of producing a detailed and meticulous geological map of Britain entitled ' A Delineation of the Strata of England and Wales with part of Scotland'. This he completed in 1815 after working almost single-handedly over a period of 15 years. Whilst in Scarborough, he helped in the design of the Rotunda Museum and suggested a circular design as best suited to displaying specimens. The Rotunda was opened in 1829 and was re-opened after restoration and refurbishment on May 9th 2008. In 1831, with an enlightened Adam Sedgwick in the chair, the Geological Society named him the 'Father of English Geology' and presented him with the first Wolaston Medal, made of gold with his name engraved on one side. William Smith died on 28th August 1839 at Northampton on his way to attend a meeting of the British Association.