Meeting John Hardcastle [not in Timaru, in Lower Hutt]

 John Hardcastle, encountered on 19th January 1979, a warm summer day in Lower Hutt. The meeting took place in the library of the NZ Soil Bureau on Eastern Hutt Road, Taita, Lower Hutt NZ. Present JH, Jewel Davin, Ian Smalley.

That was a Friday, only three days before the start of the 49th ANZAAS Conference in Auckland, where there were more encounters: Jim Bowler, Jane Soons, Alan Pullar and various other noteables. Bowler was on site to kick start the Western Pacific Working Group of the INQUA Loess Commission- so it was an important meeting.  JH was there in spirit.

JH was revealed by the initial searches for material for BR28- the NZ Loess Bibliography. Up to 1979 he had been an obscure provincial scholar- after 1979 he was revealed as a significant loess thinker, one of the key investigators in NZ into matters loessic; in fact he became a world figure as the inventor of loess stratigraphy- the person who described loess as a 'register of climate change'.

John Hardcastle 1908.  Notes on the Geology of South Canterbury. Timaru Herald, Sophia Street Timaru 62p. New edition published as Loess Letter Supplement ns2 June 2014  Leicester University

Roger Fagg 2001  John Hardcastle (1847-1927)  -a gifted amateur.  Geological Society of New Zealand Historical Studies Group Newsletter 22, 21-25.

Roger Fagg  Ian Smalley  2019  Loess in New Zealand: Observations by Haast Hutton Hardcastle Wild and Speight  1878-1944.  Quaternary International 502A 173-178.

Roger Fagg  Ian Smalley  2018   'Hardcastle Hollows' in loess landforms: closed depressions in aeolian landscapes- in a geoheritage context.  Open Geosciences 10, 58-63.

JH  1899  Origin of the loess deposit of the Timaru plateau.  Transactions and proceedings of the New Zealand Institute 22, 406-414   [reprinted in Loess Letter 71 www.loessletter.msu.edu ] 

JH   1890  On the Timaru loess as a climate register.  ibid  23, 324-332  [reprinted in LL71]

Ian Smalley  1983   John Hardcastle on glacier motion and glacial loess.  Journal of Glaciology 29, 480-484  [reprinted in LL71]

Ian Smalley  Roger Fagg  2014   John Hardcastle looks at the Timaru loess; climate signals are observed, and fragipans.  Quaternary International 372, 51-57.

Ian Smalley  Ian Jefferson  Tom Dijkstra  Edward Derbyshire  2001.  Some major events in the development of the scientific study of loess.  Earth Science Reviews 54  5-18  [section on JH].

Christchurch Star 3 October 1890:

An ordinary meeting of the Philosophical Institute of Canterbury was held in the Public Library last evening. There was a moderate attendance, the President, Mr.J.T.Meeson, in the chair. .. The Secretary read a paper by Mr.J.Hardcastle of Timaru, on "The Loess of Timaru as a Climate Register". He stated his conclusion that the loess is a formation of wind-blown dust belonging to the second glacial period, and contains bands, which mark pauses in the process of deposition, which are interpreted as registers of considerable variation of climate within that period.