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On the Trail of Professor Nick Rast,
Continued......
It was at this time that the University of New Brunswick (UNB) was seeking to strengthen its geology program so they recruited ProfessorRast who became Chair of the Department at UNB in 1971. A paper that brought Nick almost instantaneously to the attention of geologists internationally, and of great interest to me and other geologists interested in international correlations, was “TransAtlantic correlation of the Variscan-Appalachian orogeny” co-authored with Dick Grant, then a faculty member of the University of New Brunswick Department. It was published in the American Journal of Science.
Nick’s birthday is celebrated each year on June 20, at New River Beach, New Brunswick. Nick is dining here with Dick Grant, his co-author and close friend.
Fast-forwarding to a birthday party in 1987 we see one of Nick’s sturdy, former thesis students at UNB and Nick marching to the tune of the Dick Grant’s bagpipes from the Beach, where the lamb was roasted, to the site of the feast overlooking the bay.
An additional indicator of Professor Rast’s wide-ranging interests and accomplishments surfaced in 1973 in the form of an 855 page volume, Geology of the U.S.S.R., translated and edited by Rast from the Russian of D.V. Nalivkin’s book, This was the first comprehensive general account of the geology of the U.S.S.R. in English ever published. The great interest in tectonics in general and in the new hot topic of plate tectonics in the English speaking world helped make this volume featuring traditional tectonic interpretations, published by the University of Toronto, something of a best seller.
In 1972 Nick Rast accompanied Hank Williams on his famous Trans-Newfoundland Field Trip.
Twenty-four years later Nick and Hank, appearing not to have aged at all, confer at the Williams Conference to see if Hank got it right!
I first met Nick Rast during the summer of 1973 in the shadow of Mount Katahdin, in Patten, Maine. I happened to be visiting my mother and brother in my home town, Houlton, Maine. I heard that Dave Roy was going into the field with Bob Neuman to see fossiliferous Cambrian rocks so I decided that this was a good opportunity for me to examine them. When we arrived at the Shin Pond Motel Bob introduced us to Nick Rast, who by then we knew had joined the faculty of the University of New Brunswick. We also met his wife Diana and their two oldest children. Elizabeth and Alexander. So we got acquainted over a hearty breakfast of pancakes, bacon and eggs. The previous Fall I had seen Nick at a distance at the New England Intercollegiate Conference (NEIGC) Meeting where he had asked interesting questions and offered interesting alternative views to those of the speaker. We then went into the field where Nick pointed out evidence for a “tectonic slide,” a new perspective for me on an old kind of structural feature that Sir Edward Bailey had described some 65 years previously from the Highlands of Scotland.
That was an exhilarating day in the field because it helped give me “a new pair of eyes” for recognizing and analyzing some structures that were new to me. Although Nick is a few years younger than I, his personality was so much like that of my maternal grandfather, a youthful, hearty man with a jovial spirit, a “bigger than life” man who loved good stories and loved to laugh, but deep down was very serious. So I felt that I had known Nick all my life and that we needed no further introduction. What was most appealing to me was Nick’s willingness, even eagerness, to present interpretations of structures and to defend his position, and even to change his interpretation if the evidence warranted it—not a frequent occurrence, I can assure you.
I remember participating in a field trip in the late 1970’s examining an outcrop with Nick and a geologist from the US Geological Survey along the Trans-Canada Highway east of St. John, N.B. Nick’s interpretation was diametrically opposed to that of his American colleague. Both men, convinced that they had the correct interpretation, came to an impass which quickly escalated into a situation where more heat than light was being generated. The shouting match would be settled by a wager on the validity of their respective arguments and by vociferous mutual agreement would result in the loser eating his hat. I forget by whom and on what evidence that argument was ever settled. Over the years I came to have great respect for Nick’s culinary talents but to my knowledge, I don’t remember that he developed an acceptable recipe for “Irish Bog Hat Stew.”
In 1975 because of his expertise in structural geology and tectonics Nick was soon called on as a consultant during an early phase of the construction of the Lepreau Nuclear Power Station near Nick and Diana’s summer home at New River Beach, New Brunswick.