One Who Combed The Lands And The Oceans; Unveiling The Truth
Alfred L. Wegener, the pioneer of the Continental Drift Hypothesis was much more than the average academician. He was a meteorologist, geophysicist, and polar researcher all in one.
The first concept of continental drift first came to me as far back as 1910, when considering the map of the world, under the direct impression produced by the congruence of the coastlines on either side of the Atlantic. At first, I did not pay attention to the ideas because I regarded them as improbable. In the fall of 1911, I came quite accidentally upon a synoptic report in which I learned for the first time of palaeontological evidence for a former land bridge between Brazil and Africa. As a result, I undertook a cursory examination of relevant research in the fields of geology and paleontology, and this provided immediately such weighty corroboration that a conviction of the fundamental soundness of the idea took root in my mind.
~Alfred Lothar Wegener (1880–1930) in The Origins of Continents and Oceans (4th ed. 1929), trans. John Biram (1966)
Beginnings
Born on the first of November 1880 in Berlin, Alfred was the youngest of five children. His father, Richard Wegener, was a theologian (a person who specialized in the study of the nature of God and religious beliefs). Richard ran an orphanage. He also taught classical languages at the Berlinisches Gymnasium zum Grauen Kloster, renamed as Evangelisches Gymnasium zum Grauen Kloster, since 1963. It is one of the most prestigious and oldest grammar schools in Berlin. Alfred received his conventional education at grammar school in Berlin. Being exceptionally academically talented, his folks marked him for university education.
Higher Education
He studied Physics, Astronomy, and Meteorology in Germany and Austria. In the meantime, he worked as an assistant in the Urania astronomical observatory. In 1905, he received his doctorate degree in astronomy and joined the Aeronautisches Observatorium Lindenberg near Beeskow, a town in Brandenburg, Germany. There he worked as an assistant with his older brother, Kurt.
The Wegener Brothers Collective
Climatology and meteorology baffled the Wegener brothers. They experimented with weather balloons and pioneered their usage to track air masses. The brothers set a record for the longest continuous balloon flight of 52.5 hours, in a balloon contest in April 1906.
Meteorological Studies, The Denmark Expedition
Alfred used his knowledge of kites and tattered balloons to study the meteorological conditions of the Arctic climatic zone. He signed up as a member of the Denmark expedition. Consequently, he made his first trip to Greenland (the first of a total of four) in 1906.
Professorship In Marburg
Post the Denmark Expedition, in 1908 Alfred started his career as a professor in meteorology, applied astronomy, and cosmic physics at the University of Marburg. In 1910, he collectively grouped his lectures on meteorology, incorporating his expedition results into a textbook, Thermodynamik der Atmosphäre (Thermodynamics of the Atmosphere).
The Continental Drift Theory Proponent
While teaching scores of new minds, Alfred started putting together a hypothesis that could be an explanation for the mysterious coincidence of the continental boundary shape. A plausible explanation for the similarity of Atlantic continents' coastlines gripped his attention. They looked as if there had been a single mass once. He believed the continents were part of a whole Urkontinent (German for ‘primal continent’ analogous to the Greek Pangaea, meaning All-Lands or All-Earth) before breaking up and drifting to their current positions. In 1912 he put forward his idea of Continental Displacement or what we know as the Continental Drift. Three years later, he published the first version of his major work, Die Entstehung der Kontinente und Ozeane (The Origin of Continents and Oceans).
Continental Drift Hypothesis
Alfred presented certain dominant approaches to his hypothesis:
- The matching continental coastlines of the large landmasses showed the continents fitted together into a single mass like the pieces of a jigsaw puzzle.
- The geology, when mapped, revealed that cratons (large stable blocks of the earth’s crust forming the nucleus of a continent) and fragments of old fold mountain belts scattered in various continents were continuous from one to the other.
- Glacial erosions by rocks that are embedded in ice sheets exhibit a clear-cut direction of glacial movements. They indicate that ice flow originated from an eye. Thus, no continent’s movement would mean a continuous sheet of ice extending from the poles to the equator. But the truth contradicts the existence of a single sheet pushing the thought towards Continental Drift.
- The Fossils found on separate continents suggested that drift had occurred. If not, the other explanations for the same fossil existence would be: either the species evolved independently on separate continents and undergone the same changes (which would contradict Darwin’s theory of evolution which states that the evolution of a species is environment-based) or they must have swum through the oceans to the other places to colonize.
Scientific Legacy
The Continental Drift Hypothesis met extreme skepticism from many scientists, even though Alfred had a lot of evidence to support the theory. The proof of tectonic plate movement and Henry Hess’s seafloor spreading hypothesis in the 1960s vindicated Alfred Wegener’s continental drift theory. Thus, the scientific society posthumously recognized him as the founding father of one of the major scientific revolutions of the 20th century.
Personal Life And Last Moments
Alfred got married in 1913 to Else Köppen. She was the daughter of his mentor, the meteorologist Wladimir Köppen. The couple was blessed with three daughters. Alfred served his country as an infantry reserve officer during the First World War (1914). He passed away in November 1930 (at fifty years of age) because of an unexpected accident during his last expedition.
Honors
- The Alfred Wegener Institute for Polar and Marine Research in Bremerhaven, Germany, was established in 1980 on Wegener’s centenary.
- Asteroid 29227, Wegener (discovered on 29th February 1992 by Freimut Borngen in Germany).
- Moon crater, Wegener (a lunar impact crater, located in the Moon’s northern hemisphere, midway between the equator and the north pole.)
- Mars crater, Wegener (an impact crater in the Argyre quadrangle of Mars, at 64.6°S latitude and 4.0°W longitude; measuring approximately 68.5 kilometers in diameter).
