Charles Kenneth Leith died on 13th November, 1956, at Madison, Wisconsin U.S.A. He was 81 years of age.
He was born at Trempeleau, Wisconsin, and began work as a junior attendant in the Department of Geology, University of Wisconsin, where he remained to graduate B.S. in 1897 and Ph.D. in 1901. He was appointed an assistant professor in 1902 and a full professor in 1903 and on his retirement in 1945 was made Professor Emeritus of Geology in the University of Wisconsin.
He served as an assistant geologist to the U.S. Geological Survey from 1900 to 1905 and many of his investigations have been published by the Survey. He also contributed papers to professional societies and to the technical press and published in addition fourteen books, among which are Economic aspects of geology (1921), World minerals and world politics (1931), Mineral valuations of the future (1938), and World minerals and world peace (1943).
Professor Leith was adviser on minerals to the U.S. Boards of Shipping and War Industries during the first world war; he accompanied President Woodrow Wilson to Versailles, presided over several U.S. Government inquiries on mineral resources, and from 1934 to 1937 was Chairman of the Planning Commission for Minerals Policy. Among similar appointments, he was Chief of the Metals and Minerals Branch in the Office of Research and Development, War Production Board, 1942-5, and after the war continued to serve on many committees concerned with mineral resources, as well as energetically furthering the development of atomic energy. He was a member until 1956 of the Combined Development Agency of the United States, United Kingdom and Canada for the procurement and control of supplies of uranium.
Professor Leith was elected to Honorary Membership of the Institution in 1942 in recognition of his original work on the economics of mining and his contributions to the study of geology.
He was also a Foreign Member of the Geological Society of London; President of the Geological Society of America in 1933 and Penrose Medallist in 1942; President of the Society of Economic Geologists in 1925; Vice-President of the American Association for the Advancement of Science in 1920; a Fellow of the American Academy and of the National Academy of Sciences; and an active member of many other institutions throughout the world.
Vol. 67, Trans IMM 1957-58, p.228
