Rating: 
Summary: It's a decent read
Review: The Map That Changed the World is an informative read for geologist enthusiasts. It has the style of the Professor and the Madman but it deals with rocks instead of paper. I liked the way Winchester describes what it must have been like to live in the time of William Smith and the events of his life and his work. Before I had no found interest in geology, but after reading this I find it intriguing.
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Summary: On the Origin of Fossils
Review: THE MAP THAT CHANGED THE WORLD
Simon Winchester
ISBN 0-06-093180-9I took a couple of geology courses in college, and, among other things, learned that William Smith was the first to recognize the importance of stratigraphy for the study of the earth and that he bore the nickname "Strata Smith". But in this book Simon Winchester describes the historical context of William Smith's work in detail, with scholarship and wit. Works about the history of science are sometimes as revealing about culture as about science. Consider the nature of an English society in the seventeenth century which committed Smith to debtor's prison. Also, the influence of upper class gentlemen blocked Smith's admission to the newly organized Geological Society on the grounds that he was not the right sort. They then sought to take credit for his work themselves. Yet Smith lived at a time when science did not belong entirely to academicians or other organizations and could be advanced by the work of a single, persistent individual, such as himself. During Smith's early lifetime, a contradiction existed between scriptural interpretation of the earth's age and the fossil evidence that was being found across England. The Bishop of Usher had pronounced the age of the earth as 4004 years old, but people were finding a plethora of fossils that seemed to show otherwise. Slowly it was accepted through the work of Smith and others that the fossils represented extinct life from the different ages of the history of the earth. Smith determined that the existence of particular fossils in strata could be used to identify their relating to the surrounding strata. In Smith's lifetime, coal, a fossil fuel, provided most of the industrial energy of the day. It was locating coal deposits that first drove Smith's work although later he began to see the larger picture and to focus on the work that became the foundation of modern geology. Simon Winchester's writing flows smoothly and perceptively as he traces Smith's lifelong struggle to convey the message of his empirical observations and to receive credit for that work. Winchester also includes interesting asides, such as that one of the debtors prisons was called "The Clink", hence the origin of the expression about getting thrown in it. Although the subject of this book is one which I had already found interesting, Simon Winchester's book increased my interest. Winchester, a man who seems to enjoy his work, has demonstrated excellent and graceful writing skills here, and I look forward to reading some of his other books.
Rating: 
Summary: One man CAN change the world
Review: Few people can claim being one of the fathers of a science discipline, and while William Smith may not have been the first one to look at Geology, he certainly was one of the first to put the pieces together to show us what's under our feet. Winchester once again finds a fascinating, if unsung, person involved with creating a new collection of knowledge and relates the story. And of course, the path is never straight or easy for the hero, and neither was it for William Smith due to intrigue, deceit and lack of money. Winchester has the ability to take what on the surface would be a dull story and breathes new life into it, allowing us to understand and appreciate the work of Smith; how he took what was before our eyes and interpreted it to show what we couldn't see. It's a story of personal perseverance - Smith took on mapping the entire country himself, and to do it at the end of the 18th century. Great genius is often looked upon jealously, and not recognized in its time, and that is what Smith saw also. In later years he became lauded for his work, but at the time was obscure, derided and alone. This book is a nice look into a slice of history that we don't often see, or contemplate.
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Summary: The Principle Of Faunal Succession
Review: In the last unit of my semester earth science class at an Orange County, California high school, I frequently come face to face with fundamentalist Christian views of the geological time scale. I'm told that the scale is a fiction made up to support the theory of evolution. I explain to my students that the pattern of strata and fossils that guided [and still guide] the building of the geological time scale is very real and exists independently of the explanation of the pattern. I explain that people like William 'Strata' Smith and others who followed him established that the pattern exists years before Charles Darwin convinced the scientific world that evolution happened. I don't want to kill their faith, but I won't lie to them. Now Simon Winchester has given us a book that I can hand to my students and say, "here's how William Smith figured it all out." In The Map That Changed The World, Simon Winchester [in a very British and somewhat hyperbolic fashion] tells engagingly of the life of William 'Strata' Smith, surveyor, self-taught geologist, and maker of the first geologic map. I've known of Smith since my days as a student geologist [I can't recall that my professors ever mentioned the great map; their emphasis was always on Smith's discovery of the principle of faunal succession, or as Winchester writes in the book, "In his opinion, he wrote, all the rocks that had been laid down as sediments at a particular time in a particular place are laid down in a way that has much the same characteristics, and most particularly just the same fossils, and always appear in the same vertical order, in the same stratagraphical order, no matter where they are found."], but Winchester takes the story of Smith way beyond the brief tales of the canal digger who was fascinated by fossils that are told in the typical college class. Smith has become an even bigger hero of mine now that I know of his struggles with the class distinctions found in England in the early 1800's and that he was all too human enough to have a problem sticking to a budget. I read the paperback since my signed first printing of the hardback is too beautiful to handle [the dust jacket of the hardback folds out into the geologic map of England and Wales that Smith made]. My only complaint, and it's a teenie tiny one, is that Winchester's hyperbolic writing style sometimes comes very close to crossing the line from biography into hagiography. I highly recommend The Map That Changed The World to anybody with an interest in geology, paleontology, cartography, history, England in the 1800's, or the ups and downs of a fascinating life. Get the hardback for the jacket, but read the paperback and then donate it to your local junior high, high school, or public library.
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Summary: Under the landscape
Review: William Smith gained an insight into our planet's structure unseen by nearly all his contemporaries. Recognizing that bands of rock repeated their patterns across central England, he found he could forecast the location of likely mineral deposits. Winchester traces the course of Smith's career with easy style and immense feeling. This is no scholarly, pedantic exercise [although Winchester clearly has done his research], the author's too sympathetic with his subject for that. His empathy with Smith permeates nearly every page. The feelings are enhanced by the ammonite illustrations heading each chapter. One almost
regrets the publisher not giving them more space. Graphics space aside, Winchester's descriptive abilities imparts this tale of a man's troubled life at the beginning of the 19th Century with sincerity. Keeping the great map that resulted from Smith's work before us throughout the book, Winchester brings all the threads together with graceful ease. Smith wandered the British countryside, collecting fossils, data, building a picture of what lay under the surface soil. He linked outcrops, canal cuts through hills, assembled samples and studied patterns. The result, as Winchester urges, "changed the world." The map led to a more vivid image of the Earth's formation and geologic activity, setting the stage for Lyell and Darwin. That rocks displayed patterns was the basis for the concept of change over time - the earth wasn't static. There was a discernible continuity over the millennia. Smith, of course, had no concept of the span of time involved, as Winchester reminds us, but without the schema Smith developed, we might yet still see the Earth as static. Winchester avoids background description of Smith's era. This keeps this book within a reasonable size, but leaves Smith's working world a bit vague. It was, after all, the era of the Napoleonic wars. England was in social and political ferment. Natural science was burgeoning for numerous reasons, not the least of which was a strong rise in commercial and industrial endeavor. Smith's wife is characterized as a nymphomaniac, but the evidence for this is scanty. If her condition was publicly known it would have had strong impact on Smith's professional life. Was Smith's heavy debt load due as much to her as to his
inadvisable property investments? Winchester was unable to unearth the fiscal details of Smith's life. It's enough that between fiscal and marital problems, Winchester shows how the morals of the era allowed Smith's work to be plagiarized without recourse. The combination of events finally led him into exile in Northern England. Although belated, Smith's story has a reasonably happy conclusion. Winchester traces the redemption of Smith's reputation and the honours bestowed near the end of his life. The book is a stimulating read. Winchester isn't an arm-chair writer. He takes us along on his own journey across Britain, tracing Smith's path over the landscape. The book is, in effect, a second redemption of Smith, bringing him into the view of the modern world. Winchester shows us clearly how much work is involved in doing good science, especially with limited resources, erratic backing and an uncomprehending public. This book deserves the widest possible readership.
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Summary: Beautiful book on a forgotten hero
Review: What I really admire about Simon winchester is that he has found not one, but two fogotten heros of English history. The first book centering on a murderer who helped right the Oxford English Dictionary. This next book is on William Smith who founded the science of geology. His map of the foundations of Britain helped develop a science. Making good use of his extensive diary, Smith creates a wonderful biography of a great and forgotten man.
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Summary: Tells the story about the man that changed the world
Review: A masterful, felicitous tribute to Smith (1769-1839), the extraordinary ordinary Englishman who conceived, researched, and drew the world's first geological map. Winchester (The Professor and the Madman, 1998, etc.), who studied geology at Oxford, begins at one of the lowest points of Smith's life: August 21, 1819, the day he emerged from King's Bench Debtors' Prison, his life in disarray. It would be a dozen years before he returned to London to receive the honors he had earned for his most lonely and arduous task-constructing a geological map of England and Wales. As Winchester shows, Smith (an autodidact son of a blacksmith) was the most improbable of candidates to become a scientific giant. But he was equipped with a ferocious determination, an insatiable curiosity, an eagerness to muddy his boots and roughen his hands, and-of great importance-a rugged physical constitution that never failed him. He was born into an England whose churches taught (and whose parishioners believed) the Biblical account of a divine, six-day creation. He was also born into a strict class system that inhibited the acceptance of his work (for years he was denied membership in the Geological Society by the perfumed snobs who ran it-and who plagiarized his research). But he lived in a time that hungered for the skills he had mastered: drainage of farmland, construction of canals, and location of minerals. (He even discovered that the famous thermal springs of Bath had cooled because they were blocked by the bone of an ox.) One of his great insights was that fossils were the key to understanding geology: certain fossils exist only in certain strata. He amassed an enormous fossil collection that penury forced him to sell to the British Museum for a mere #500. He spent years traveling the English countryside, mapping the strata he had learned to identify in the coalmines and canals that had dirtied his clothes and enriched his imagination. A fluid, fascinating, emotional story of an unlikely genius who created a science. (60 illustrations)
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Summary: Solid Work of Scientific History
Review: The Map that Changed the World is a solid work of history reminiscent of the book "Longitude" -- it is a history of a man (in this case, William Smith) to whom the world owes a debt of gratitude about which it has largely forgotten. The book details how Smith's childhood fascination with stones and fossils led to his life's work -- a quixotic quest to map the geological strata of England. Smith largely invented the science of geology; and invented the concept of determining the age of a rock formation by identifying the fossils found within. The book also details the financial and personal difficulties Smith encounters on his quest as his singlemindedness leads him to bankruptcy prison and other, lesser scientists steal his ideas. Nevertheless, Smith's work is rediscovered when he is in his old age; he eventually enjoys the triumph of his life's work, and his sad and lonely quest is rewarded. The book is a great one to give to a young person of a scientific bent if they are interested in rocks or fossils. It does get a little detailed for the layman, and one could really use a chart to keep the various eons, epochs, and ages straight, but nevertheless, the book is an interesting one; a good book to bring to the beach in summer. The author also in troduces some autobiographical stories to tell us how he became interested in William Smith's work due to his own childhood experience with fossils; he clearly sees himself as a kindred spirit and commiserates with Smith's long journey.
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Summary: Geology Student's Review
Review: I did not read this, but listened to an unabridged version on tape. My father picked up it for a road trip back from Denver, CO to Austin, TX. This was the perfect compliment to the wonderful geology we saw on that trip. One of my complaints is with the numerous other people mentioned and the, at times too much, detail about how they fit into the story. Along those lines, the author mentioned many towns and hamlets that only someone from the south of England would know without a map. I am not sure if there are maps in the book, but the tape contained no such information. I think my father was lost at times when he got into heavier geology terms, a good explanation of the geologic time scale should have preceeded any talk of time periods. As for the positive, this book is wonderful at explaining how one man, not born of aristocracy, could see something so plain to anyone who has driven by a roadcut today. It also shows how classism ruined him, a theme that is all too familiar in science back in that time (and to some degree today). Every geology student or anyone interested in the history of science should read this book. William Smith definitely ranks up there with Galileo, Darwin, and all the other scientists who brought about tremendous paradigms in our view of how the world works.
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Summary: A geologist's review
Review: On one hand, the story of William Smith is an important one in the history of the ascendance of science over superstition. Since this is the only detailed account of Smith's life that I am aware of, it is an unique and worthy effort. Alas, while author Winchester states that he studied geology at college, he also commits...not errors, but unsatisfyingly incomplete explanations of matters geological. This book would have been much, much richer, written with the advice of a practicing geologist, to expand upon the "earthly" matters that Winchester appears to lack the knowledge to to explain properly. This might have produced not only a lesson in the history of geology but a better lesson in the principles of geology.
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