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Biography: Baerbel Koesters Lucchitta, Scientist Emerita


Baerbel working in the field
(1963)
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Table of Contents

Biography


Baerbel at 24 years of age
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Baerbel Lucchitta was one of the first women in the field of Astrogeology. She mapped the Moon and helped to train the Apollo Astronauts. She practically owns Valles Marineris canyon on Mars, is a vigorous protagonist of glacial flow and other ice-related features on Mars, and was awarded the Geological Society of America, Planetary Geology Division, G.K. Gilbert Award in 1995. She is the only woman who holds a G.K. Gilbert award. Most of her early career, she had to fight the good-old-boy system. Baerbel is an important role model for women, as in the beginning of this relatively young field of science and for many years to follow, she was among the very few female Planetary Geologists. She emphasized competence as well as style.

Baerbel Koesters was born on October 2, 1938, in Münster, Germany. She is the second child of Bernhard and Fridel Koesters. Her mother traveled from the family residence at the western Germany border to Münster for the birth, as Baerbel's paternal grandfather was a doctor in that town and the Munich Accords, negotiated at that time, raised fear of war. Afterwards, the family returned to their home, eventually in eastern Germany. Baerbel has a brother, one year older (now living in the Canary Islands), and a sister, 3.5 years younger (now in Calgary, Canada).


Baerbel, husband Ivo, and daughter Maya
(1967)
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The children spent their early childhood in Weimar, not far from infamous Buchenwald, during the waning days of World War II. Baerbel attended elementary school for about one week in 1944, until the school was bombed out. She suffered through the heavy bombardment of German cities at the end of Word War II, hiding, terrified, in a vaulted coal cellar. Eventually, American forces advanced on the Weimar area. The family evacuated in fear that the city would be leveled; they traveled on the same road as the inmates of Buchenwald, who were forced to leave and return to the camp when Russian armies advanced from the east. During most of this time, Baerbel's father was first a conscripted soldier and then a prisoner of war in England for 2 years. After the Yalta agreement, Weimar was occupied by the Russian army. One year later, Fridel Koesters decided to escape confinement behind the Iron Curtain and fled to the west, taking the children to bombed-out Münster to live with Baerbel's grandparents. After his release from England in 1947, Bernhard Koesters rejoined his family and resumed his career as an architect in Münster. In 2002, he turned 91. Baerbel's mother is deceased.

As a child, Baerbel remembers becoming interested in geologic processes more than in the rocks themselves. On vacations with her mother to Swabia in southern Germany, she noticed that the Jura Cliffs were full of Jurassic marine fossils, but was bothered by the marine fossils being contained in the now dry cliffs. She wondered how these animals and marine rocks got so high and so far out of the sea. She also remembers being very puzzled as to how the low-lying Rhine River could have cut a narrow slot through the mountain range that harbors the massive Lorelei Rock. She was a tomboy who competed with her older brother, but also loved to sit alone and read.


Baerbel posing on Grover, the USGS' geologic rover used for astronaut training
(1972)
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In Münster, she attended a Catholic all-girl, public high school. At the time, all German schools were split by religion and gender. She graduated from high school with an "Abitur" degree in 1958, having had 9 years of English, 7 years of French, 6 years of Latin, and the usual German, math, physics, chemistry, geography, biology, etc. She was undecided on a college major, being interested in archeology, anthropology, ethnology, sociology, and geology, but eventually settled on geology, deeming it the most practical. After 1.5 years in German universities, she was awarded a Fulbright scholarship and was placed into Kent State, in Ohio. She earned a B.S. degree in Geology at Kent State, supported for the first year as a Fulbright Scholar and for the second as a German language instructor. She applied to several graduate schools. She chose an assistantship position at Pennsylvania State University because she was impressed by the sedimentology work of Professor P.D. Krynine. At Penn State, she switched to structure and tectonics when a research grant became available. She mapped three-quarters of a 15-minute quadrangle on the continental divide in Montana and Idaho, sorting out thrust faults in the area under Dr. Robert Scholten. In 1963, Baerbel received a M.S. degree. In 1966, she earned a Ph.D. in structural geology. In her dissertation, she carefully described peculiar conical fracture surfaces decorated with fan-shaped lineations, later found to be shatter cones of the Beverhead impact--the largest impact structure in the United States, but she was unaware of their significance at the time .


Headline from 1970s German sensationalist newspaper that reads "This woman makes astronauts dance to her tune"
(January 1971)
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At Penn State, her high-heeled, European elegance, in striking contrast to a sea of bobby-socked young women, attracted dashing Ivo Lucchitta. They got married in 1964 and had their one daughter Maya, in 1966. Baerbel initially got involved with Planetary Geology because Ivo moved to Flagstaff, having landed himself a job with the Apollo Program at the USGS. Baerbel and Ivo are not just a married couple, but friends that who have always enjoyed traveling, skiing, river running, hiking, and working together.

Baerbel started working part-time with the USGS in 1967 and eventually became full-time. She began her career by first mapping the Moon, then Mars, then the satellites of Jupiter. Baerbel was the first to observe that dark-halo craters on the Moon were of impact origin rather than volcanic. She taught Apollo Astronauts about the Moon. She and Harrison "Jack" Schmitt, the Apollo 17 geologist-astronaut, wrote a paper on lunar orange glass being volcanic rather than impact derived. She proved that the landslide at the Apollo 17 site was dislodged by ejecta from the young crater Tycho. Baerbel spent many years mapping Mars and elucidating many details on Valles Marineris, such as landslides, stratigraphic relations, volcanic features, and nature and origin of the chasmata. She is well known for her Landsat work on ice streams in Antarctica and the hypothesis that outflow channels on Mars may have been sculpted by ice. Baerbel authored the first geologic maps of Europa and, with Eugene Shoemaker and others, of Ganymede, and was the Coordinator of the Galilean Satellites Geologic Mapping Program. From 1986-1991, she held the position of USGS Astrogeology Associate Branch Chief.


Baerbel flanked left to right by Jack McCauley, Hal Masursky, and Larry Soderblom
(late 1970's)
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In 1995, Baerbel and Ivo jointly retired from the USGS. The Survey offered advantageous "Early Out" retirements just as the hassle of trying to scrap together soft-money funding finally became intolerable to her. Today Baerbel Lucchitta is a scientifically active Emerita with the Astrogeology Team in Flagstaff.

Dr. Lucchitta is known as a careful, observant Planetary Scientist, who emotes a cool Teutonic air. However, everyone who knows her understands that this trait is merely a shield, hiding a warm, fun-loving, sensitive, loyal, and caring personality. She uses this facade to her advantage, leaving her peers to respect and admire her with a bit of awestruck fear. The awe was always doubled for her male colleagues because of her elegant appearance. All of us admire Baerbel and her scientific work. However, quite a few of us feel genuine love.

For a more detailed account of Baerbel's professional achievements and personal history, see the nomination and response speeches of the Gilbert Award, and her publication record.



By Mary G. Chapman
14 November 2002


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