Geoscience Reference
In-Depth Information
Fig. 10.1. the statue of Louis Agassiz on the Zoology Building at Stanford was knocked
down by the earthquake of 1906; Humboldt, next to Agassiz, stayed put. http://commons
.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Agassiz_statue_Fn-32903.jpg.
on 24 April that McAdie “stayed by his post in the Mills building until the
structure caught fire and he was the last man to leave the building; he has
not stopped work. His instruments are destroyed, but the records of the last
sixty years are believed to be intact in the safe. He has been able, through the
cable station at the [Ocean] beach and through wireless messages sent from
Admiral Goodrich, to keep in constant communication with Washington,
and only three observations have been lost in thirty-six hours.” even more
remarkable were McAdie's personal observations of the earthquake. He be-
gan by noting that his “error” was “1 minute slow” according to the time
signals received at the Weather Bureau,
with which my watch has been compared for a number of years. the rate of
my watch was 5 seconds loss per day. . . . I would say perhaps that 6 or more
seconds may have elapsed between the act of waking, realizing, and looking
at the watch and making the entry. I remember distinctly getting the minute-
hand's position, previous to the most violent portion of the shock. the end
of the shock I did not get exactly, as I was watching the second hand and the
end came several seconds before I fully took in the fact that the motion had
