We invite members to submit career or other hydrological news to share with our readers. Did you win an award? What do you love about your job? Are you retiring? What are you doing in retirement? Please send your text and photos to info@azhydrosoc.org to be included in future newsletters and the AHS website.
Gail Cordy, 2006 AHS Lifetime Achievement Award winner, has been volunteering as a docent at the new Alfie Norville Gem and Mineral Museum in downtown Tucson. “It is a gorgeous museum. I think many of my colleagues in AHS would enjoy it!” Gail recently shared information about the book launch of “Mineralogy of Arizona”, Fourth Edition, held at the museum.
Gail retired from the U.S. Geological Survey, Water Resources Division in 2006 after 22 years having worked on water-quality projects in Utah and Arizona. Prior to that time, she worked on earthquake hazards mapping for Nevada Bureau of Mines and Geology, siting studies for the CAP canal with the Bureau of Reclamation, and on a variety of projects with Dames & Moore in Phoenix.
Despite starting out in college to study social work, it was a general geology class that opened Gail’s eyes to the wonders of the earth and its rocks and minerals. A change of major to geology soon followed. Gail received her B.S. in geology from California State University at Sacramento in 1975 and her M.S. in geology from Arizona State University in 1978.
She was also fortunate to study geology for a year at the University of Dundee in Scotland, where the geology was much older (think “Old Red Sandstone”) than the rocks she’d seen in California. “The best part of that year abroad was the cultural experience, making friends from all over the world, and being introduced to the customs of Scotland including Scottish Country Dancing! Because of that experience, I have been dancing and teaching SCD for more than 46 years. It’s how I met my husband (teaching a dance class in Utah in 1993) and the rest is history!”
“I have to say that the highlight of my career was receiving the AHS Lifetime Achievement Award. To be recognized by my colleagues in AHS is a great honor. In retirement I am continuing to share my passion for rocks and minerals as a docent at the Gem and Mineral Museum. And I am still dancing!”