PROCESSING RECORD SCRIPPS INSTITUTION OF OCEANOGRAPHY ARCHIVES. Scripps Institution of Oceanography. Office of the Director (Sverdrup)

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1 Accession No.: PROCESSING RECORD SCRIPPS INSTITUTION OF OCEANOGRAPHY ARCHIVES Scripps Institution of Oceanography. Office of the Director (Sverdrup) SIO Office of the Director (Sverdrup) Records, PHYSICAL DESCRIPTION: 2 mss, 1 Lmss ARRANGEMENT: arranged in four series: biographical, lectures and manuscripts, correspondence, and subject files. DESCRIPTION: The collection documents the directorship of Harald Ulrik Sverdrup, including information on SIO administration, funding, war research, post-war projects, meteorological programs, Geological Society of America, arctic research, and snow-melt studies. The collection includes a biographical file on Sverdrup, correspondence, manuscripts of lectures, speeches and scientific papers, and seventeen subject files which contain data, observations, and research proposals and reports. The records in this collection comprise some, but not all, of the files generated by Harald Ulrik Sverdrup during the years of his directorship of the Scripps Institution of Oceanography, At the end of his term as director, the files measured at least seven cubic feet and included a substantial number of subject files. Some of the active files were apparently retained in the director's office by Sverdrup's successors. The inactive files were moved to the Director's House in 1948 and two secretaries, Frances Sparks Maloney and Christine Baldwin were directed to organize them and put them in storage. They found the file titles very disorganized and refoldered at least some files. At the end of their work, the files were placed in the attic of Ritter Hall together with other non-current files. They remained there until the 1960s when Helen Raitt transferred them to the SIO Library. The records in this collection consist largely of Sverdrup's correspondence files dated The collection includes a biographical file on Harald Sverdrup, four file folders of Sverdrup's lectures and manuscripts of scientific papers, and seventeen folders of subject files. The correspondence files include incoming and outgoing correspondence, memoranda, telegrams and a few bills and contracts documenting the administration of SIO. While most of this material was generated by Sverdrup, the files also include letters from director's office staff. This includes substantial amounts of material exchanged by Harald Sverdrup and University of California President Robert Gordon Sproul. There is a substantial amount of material exchanged between SIO and UCLA during the years that SIO reported administratively through UCLA. The majority of the correspondence documents the SIO budget. There is also correspondence documenting research at SIO, and especially research funding from the Geological Society of America.

2 Much of the correspondence concerns the design, purchase or construction of instruments and laboratory supplies. During the war years, the correspondence includes exchanges between Sverdrup and the Navy, the Army Air Force and other military branches about war research at SIO. The collection includes many letters exchanged by Sverdrup and Roger Revelle. The collection includes a few letters exchanged by Harald Sverdrup and Carl-Gustaf Rossby. While almost all of the correspondence is official in nature, there are some letters exchanged by Sverdrup with his Norwegian colleagues, notably Bjorn Helland-Hansen. The subject files include data, observations, memoranda and research reports and proposals. This series includes a few files documenting plans for arctic research, including a 1937 publication describing the Wilkins-Ellsworth Submarine Expedition (1931) annotated in pencil by Sverdrup. The series includes one folder on meteorological programs, This material concerns the training of military meteorologists and includes correspondence exchanged by Sverdrup with Carl-Gustaf Rossby. This folder also includes a syllabus developed by Rossby at the University of Chicago for the training of military meteorologists. The syllabus was used as the basis for military meteorology courses offered at the University of California and other American universities during the war years. The subject files include one folder entitled Post-War Projects which includes a number of memoranda written by Sverdrup and others about navy support of oceanographic research after the war. The subject files include several folders of data and observations connected with meteorology and oceanography. While the data and observations were compiled by Sverdrup during his years at SIO, they occasionally include material generated years earlier. The subject files include two folders documenting the proposed U.S. Weather Bureau Cooperative Snow Investigations Program which studied snow melt in connection with a study of the Columbia River basin. The collection includes several oversize charts and maps which have been separated from the original folder in which they were found, flattened are shelved in the SIO Archives Oversize Map Cases. Separation sheets have been placed in folders to indicate where oversize items have been removed. The original order of this collection has been lost. Archivist Elizabeth Shor reorganized the correspondence, arranging incoming correspondence alphabetically by correspondent and outgoing correspondence chronologically. Shor arranged the collection into four series: Biographical Series, Lectures and Manuscripts, Correspondence and Subject Files. Related Collections: The records of the Office of the Director (Sverdrup) were widely dispersed after Some active files remained in the office of the director where they were used by Sverdrup's successors, Carl Eckart and Roger Revelle. Sverdrup's file on the UCLA Institute of Geophysics was found among administrative records of the Institute of Geophysics and Planetary Physics (IGPP) at SIO in 1982 (Accession ). Records of the SIO Office of the Director (Revelle) include material dated from Sverdrup's administration. At least some of Sverdrup's subject files appear to have been integrated with the records of the SIO Subject Files. This collection includes files on SIO's budget, administration, students and staff during the Sverdrup years. Sverdrup's typescript annual reports to the President of the University of California were bound together with reports of other directors (Accession and ). Ruth Ragan gathered together the typescripts, letters and other material documenting the book, The Oceans: Their Physics, Chemistry and General Biology, and had these bound (Accession and Accession

3 82-25). The SIO Archives also holds a number of bound manuscripts and data generated by Sverdrup which were added over the years. These include a manuscript by Sverdrup and Richard Fleming entitled, The Waters Office the Coast of Southern California, March to July 1937 (Accession ), and Sverdrup and Munk, Typescript of Wind, Waves and Swell: A Basic Theory for Forecasting, 1943 (Accession 82-19). Sverdrup's interactions with University of California President Robert Gordon Sproul are documented in the Records of the Office of the President at Bancroft Library, University of California, Berkeley. The records of the UCLA Chancellor at UCLA Archives also includes material about the SIO during the Sverdrup years. Sverdrup's personal papers are at the Norsk Polarinstitutt in Oslo, Norway, but these include very little material documenting Sverdrup's years in the United States. The Fram Museum in Oslo holds original films of the Norwegian North Polar Expedition of These include images of Sverdrup, a member of the expedition. The SIO Archives holds videotape transfers of these films. The SIO Archives also holds a small collection of Sverdrup Family material, which includes a few photographs and a copy of the family genealogy, received from Harald Sverdrup's American cousin, George Sverdrup.

4 SIO OFFICE OF THE DIRECTOR (SVERDRUP) Records, Accession No Box Folder Folder Title BIOGRAPHICAL SERIES 1 1 Biographical File [ : Summaries, Tributes, Bibliography, Memorial Fund, Anniversary Volume, Bronze Bust] LECTURES AND MANUSCRIPTS SERIES 2-5 Arctic exploration Typed. Brief address in connection with Charter Day celebration, Typed. 2 copies [California climate prediction]. about Might not be by Sverdrup. Typed. Certain aspects of modern meteorology Summary of talk. Mimeo. Cloud forms over the North Atlantic and North Pacific in winter Typed. Comments on "The analysis of core samples from the standpoint of organic and physical determinations. By Sverdrup and R. R. Revelle Typed. Comments on the proposed cooperative program for meteorological upper air observations. Typed. The fluid problems of ocean circulation Typed. Forecasting sea, swell, and surf for amphibious operations Typed. Memorandum on post-war studies of oceanography of the surface layers Typed. New international. aspects of oceanography. Typed.

5 Box Folder Folder Title LECTURES AND MANUSCRIPTS SERIES (continued) On the modulus of decay of surface waves. Typed Pre-1936 Physical oceanography of the Polar Sea. Typed. Progress report to the Geological Society of America on work supported by Project Grant for the period ending December 3l, By Sverdrup and others. Typed. Report on the activity of the Scripps Institution of Oceanography, Biennium Submitted by Sverdrup. Typed. Research in geophysics Mimeo. Review of the present state of work within physical oceanography in Europe Mimeo. Scripps Institution of Oceanography Typed. Talk to alumni group. Second memorandum on wave periods and wave heights at La Jolla in relation to meteorological conditions over the North Pacific Ocean Typed. Six years in the Arctic. Typed. Speculations on horizontal diffusion in the ocean Typed. Study of the ecology of the Gulf of California. ca Research proposal. Typed. Turbulence in the atmosphere and in the ocean For IUGG. Typed. Wind, sea, and swell. Abstract Typed. WPA [Works Progress Administration] at the Scripps Institution of Oceanography of the University of Califomia Typed. CORRESPONDENCE SERIES 7 Private Memos

6 Box Folder Folder Title CORRESPONDENCE SERIES (continued) 1 8 Correspondence n.d , January-June , July-December , January-June , July-December 14 Letter for Fox, (Tongue in Cheek), , January-June , July-December , January-June , July-December , January-June , July-December , January-June , July-December , January-June , July-December , January-June , July-December , January-June , July-December

7 Box Folder Folder Title CORRESPONDENCE SERIES (continued) 2 12 Correspondence , January-June , July-October , November-December , November-December , January-March , April-May , June-August , September-December , January-December SUBJECT SERIES 3 5 Air Mass Modification Hours Hours 8 Atlantic Atlantic Observations [ ] 11 Arctic Institute of North America [1944, 1945] 12 Arctic Submarine Proposal [1937] 13 Misc. Average Wave Height, La Jolla L4 Misc. Meteorology Programs Misc. Meteorology Programs

8 Box Folder Folder Title SUBJECT SERIES (continued) 3 15 Misc. Ocean Currents & Surface Winds 16 Misc. Post-War Projects 17 AAAS [American Association for the Advancement of Science] Meeting Misc. Snow Survey [1944- ] (Folder 1) 19 Misc. Snow Survey [1944- ] (Folder 2) 20 Sverdrup Era - Misc. Data 21 Certificate of Appreciation from the US Navy for SIO s service supporting Naval Aviation in World War II, undated