The 59th annual meeting of the Institute on Lake Superior Geology (ILSG) was held May 8 to 11, 2013 in Houghton, Michigan, at the Franklin Square Inn. The meeting was hosted by the A. E. Seaman Mineral Museum of Michigan Technological University and was chaired and organized by Ted Bornhorst (A. E. Seaman Mineral Museum) and Allan Blaske (AECOM). The meeting was attended by a total of 228 delegates from 14 U.S. states (Arizona, Colorado, Illinois, Indiana, Iowa, Massachusetts Michigan, Minnesota, New York, North Dakota, Ohio, Texas, Virginia, Wisconsin) and 4 Canadian provinces (British Columbia, Ontario, Manitoba, Quebec). There were 58 student attendees.

The two-day technical session began on Thursday morning with oral presentations on Archean topics and continued on Friday with presentations on Keweenawan and Quaternary geology. There were a total of 25 oral presentations, 10 of which were presented by students. The technical session included a total of 18 poster presentations, 10 of which were presented by students.

The meeting offered 5 field trips that highlighted the Keweenawan geology of the western Upper Peninsula of Michigan. Two pre-meeting trips were held on Wednesday: Geologic Overview of the Keweenaw Peninsula, Michigan, led by Ted Bornhorst (A. E Seaman Mineral Museum) and Caledonia Mine, Keweenaw Peninsula Native Copper District, Ontonagon County, MI, led by Bob Barron (Michigan Tech) and Richard Whiteman (Red Metal Minerals). A third scheduled pre-meeting field trip was cancelled because of the unusual lingering snowpack which prevented access to Silver Mountain. Friday afternoon featured a “field trip” open house at the A. E. Seaman Mineral Museum, with guided tours led by Museum Director, Ted Bornhorst. Two post-meeting trips were held on Saturday: Geology of the Keweenawan Supergroup, Porcupine Mountains, Ontonagon and Gogebic Counties, MI, led Laurel Woodruff (USGS), Bill Cannon (USGS), and Robert Wild (Porcupine Mountains Wilderness State Park) and Geology and Environmental Site Conditions of the Copperwood Deposit, Gogebic County, MI, led by Ted Bornhorst (A. E. Seaman Mineral Museum), Allan Blaske (AECOM), Dave Anderson (Orvana Resources US Corp) and Tom Repaal (Orvana Resources US Corp.). The field trips were well-attended with each being at maximum capacity (sold out). The unusual snow cover in the Keweenaw and cold weather on Saturday made some shuffling of field trip logistics necessary.

Four Doug Duskin Best Student Paper Awards were given for student paper presentations. Awards were presented for oral and poster presentations, with an award within each category for undergraduate students and for graduate students. The student awardees were Breanne Beh (Lakehead University, graduate student) and Emily Smyk (Lakehead University, undergraduate student) for their oral presentation and Jonathan Dyess (University of Minnesota – Duluth, graduate student) and Brynley Nadziejka (Lawrence University, undergraduate student) for their poster presentation.

Eisenbray Student Travel Awards are funded by ILSG and forty students received a travel award. Thanks to very generous support from ILSG corporate sponsors (AECOM, Coleman Engineering Company, Rio Tinto–Eagle Mine, and Superior Copper Corporation) we were able to award ILSG Corporate Student Registration Awards to all students who attended the meeting. The ILSG Corporate Student Registration Award consisted of the meeting registration fee. In addition, students who were presenting papers received additional monetary support in the form of an ILSG Corporate Presenter Award. We are pleased to report that $5,325 were awarded to students. Through the support of corporate sponsors, the ILSG can better promote geologic studies of the Lake Superior region to the next generation of professional geoscientists.

The ILSG social and banquet were held at the Franklin Square Inn, Houghton. There were 140 people at the banquet. Jim Ashley of the Lunar Reconnaissance Orbiter Camera Science Operations Center (LROC) at Arizona State University delivered the banquet address, entitled “Rusty Metal at the Martian Equator: The Search for Life on the Red Planet,” which discussed the occurrence and weathering of iron meteorites on the surface of Mars, and the implications these samples have to the history of water on Mars. The highlight of the banquet was the awarding of the 2013 Goldich Medal to Tom Waggoner (retired chief geologist and lands manager for Cleveland-Cliffs and currently a consulting geologist). Ron Seavoy provided a brief summary of Tom’s contributions to the geology of the Lake Superior region and the ILSG. Tom was greeted with warm applause upon receiving the prestigious ILSG award.

The Institute’s Board of Directors met on May 9 to discuss the business of ILSG. The meeting was attended by Ted Bornhorst (Board of Directors meeting Chair), Allan Blaske, Al MacTavish, Tom Fitz, Peter Hinz, Jim Miller, Mark Jirsa and Pete Hollings. ILSG Secretary Hollings took the minutes of the meeting, which are as follows:

1. Accepted report of the Chairs for the 58th ILSG, Thunder Bay, Ontario; as printed in the Proceeding Volume (Hinz), and minutes of last Board meeting, May 17, 2012 (Hollings).

2. Received, discussed, and accepted the 2012-2013 ILSG Financial Summary (Jirsa).

3. Received, discussed, and accepted the 2012-2013 report of the Secretary (Hollings).

4. Approved Allan Blaske as ILSG Board member representing the 2013 meeting.

5. Approved Hibbing as the site for the 60th annual ILSG meeting. The meeting will be hosted by Jim Miller and Mark Jirsa.

6. Discussed and approved renewal of Peter Hollings as Institute Secretary (end of term 2013). This was later approved by a vote of the membership during the technical session.

7. Discussed and approved replacing Laurel Woodruff as the “member from government” on Goldich Committee (end of term 2013) with Mark Smyk.

8. Discussed the possibility of having a short themed session with invited speakers at future meetings.

9. Requested that Secretary Hollings contact past chairs in order to compile statistics on the number of responses to the first circular in relation to attendance at the meeting.

10. Discussed the topic of the level of student participation required to be eligible for an Eisenbrey Student Travel Award. While there was no formal vote, the Board agreed that meeting Chairs should include a statement on the application indicating that full participation in the meeting was required to receive the award. In other words, a student cannot come for ½ day of the technical session or only attend a field trip to pick up the award.

The meeting co-Chairs would like to thank all those who assisted with this year’s meeting either by chairing sessions, judging student papers, leading field trips, driving vehicles for field trips, helping with the registration desk, operating the meeting and banquet projectors, and more. These volunteers made the quality of the meeting better and of course, made the job of the meeting chairs far easier than it may otherwise have been. A special thank you goes to Darlene Comfort, who tirelessly and patiently managed the registration and logistics for the meeting.

We are gratified by all of the positive comments by participants. While chairing and organizing an ILSG meeting involves time and a bit of stress on occasion, we are happy to have had the opportunity to serve the geological community of the Lake Superior region. We look forward to the 2014 meeting when we can be much more relaxed!

Respectfully submitted, Ted Bornhorst and Allan Blaske Co-chairs, 59th Institute on Lake Superior Geology

The meeting would not have been possible without the support of our sponsors.