U.S. Geological Survey begins operations from new MP office

The U.S. Geological Survey has begun operations from its new headquarters in the Linfield Oaks subdivision of Menlo Park, David Gallagher, geologist-in-charge, announced today.

The Menlo Park office, one of four branches in the U.S., will serve the western states and Alaska. The other three centers are in Denver, Washington, and a mid-western site not yet chosen.

The two-story office building has some 120 employees, including 50 who were moved recently from the old Mint building in San Francisco, Gallagher said.

In a speech before the Menlo-Atherton Board of Realtors earlier this week, Gallagher outlined some of the jobs performed by the geological survey.

The principal purpose of much of the Survey’s work, he said, has been the acquisition and dissemination of knowledge concerning the geography, geology, mineral resources and water resources of the nation. The Survey has published at least 3,000 volumes of reports and 20,000 maps.

The Survey, he said is organized into five divisions--business administration, topographic, conservation, water resources, and geologic.

The topographic division, he said, is engaged in a program of mapping the entire U.S. in detail. Less than half of the U.S. has been mapped thus far by the Geological Survey

The water resource division determines and appraises the nation’s water resources.

"With the tremendous use of water that our modern civilization requires," Gallagher said, "it is necessary to maintain a running inventory of the nation’s water supply.

For this purpose, the water resources division maintains 6800 stream flow gauging stations and makes periodic measurements in more than 15,000 wells throughout the U.S.

The conservation division classifies federal land as to mineral and water resources, and supervises mineral recovery operations under leases, permits and licenses on government-owned land. This involves the handling of about 30,000 cases a year, Gallagher said.

The objectives of the geologic division are to investigate the geology, determine the geologic structure, prepare a geologic map and study and appraise the mineral resources of the nation.

Gallagher said the Menlo Park site was chosen because it is near a university (Stanford) and is served by excellent transportation facilities.

Palo Alto Times
March 4, 1954

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