REPORT OF THE 68th ANNUAL MEETING OF THE INSTITUTE ON LAKE SUPERIOR GEOLOGY
The Ontario Geological Survey (OGS), with support from the Geological Survey of Canada (GSC), hosted the 68th Annual Institute on Lake Superior Geology on May 07 – 12, 2023 in the “Cavern” at Science North in Sudbury, Ontario. The meeting consisted of two days of technical sessions with pre- and post-technical session field trips.
First, we would like to thank the meeting sponsors for their generous support, either through direct funding or in-kind support, namely: the Centre for Excellence and Sustainable Mineral Exploration in Thunder Bay, Gel Exploration Limited, the Northwestern Ontario Prospectors Association, Vale Canada, and the Ontario Geological Survey. We also thank the Individual Contributors to the Student Travel Scholarship fund: Mary Kay Arthur, Mike Beauregard, Ben Berger, Terry Boerboom, Jim DeGraff, Michael and Monica Easton, Dick Heglund, Joanna Hodge, Bob Mahin, Jim Miller, Dean Peterson, Mark and Laurie Severson, Al MacTavish and Graham Wilson.
The 2022 meeting was the first in-person meeting held since the 2019 Terrace Bay meeting. An ILSG meeting questionnaire, which ran from January 20 to February 20, 2022, was key to shaping the format and venue of the meeting during a period of rapidly changing COVID-related regulations, with most responses favouring an in-person meeting. For technical reasons, a hybrid meeting was not possible.
Total meeting registration was 80, including 12 students. This registration is about 80% of the attendance of the last two Sudbury area meetings (Sudbury 1997; Sault Ste. Marie 2006), and was a great turnout given the COVID-related travel restrictions still in place at the time of the meeting. Attendance from the United States was excellent, with attendance from the Sudbury area lower than expected, for unknown reasons. Despite the somewhat lower attendance, the technical program was nevertheless excellent, with a strong focus on Midcontinent Rift geology and mineralization in the Lake Superior region. In addition, four presentations focused specifically on Sudbury area geology. There was also time in the schedule for several impromptu presentations on a variety of topics on Wednesday afternoon prior to the announcement of the student awards.
Proceedings Volume 68 was published in two parts. Part 1 – Program and Abstracts, compiled and edited by Michael Easton (OGS), contains 28 published abstracts for 21 oral and 8 poster presentations (one poster did not have an abstract). Students presented 5 oral and 5 poster presentations. Part 2 – Field Trip Guidebooks, also was compiled and edited by Michael Easton. It contains descriptions of three pre-meeting and two post-meeting field trips. Hard copies of the Abstract Volume and Field Trip Guidebooks for trip participants were printed by Johanne Roux and Carlo Castrechino (OGS) after it proved impossible to find a commercial printer who could produce the volumes in time for the meeting. Both volumes are available for download from the Institute on Lake Superior Geology website. Monica Easton is thanked for assisting in preparing the digital versions of both volumes.
The 68th ILSG marked only the second time in the Institute’s long history that its annual meeting was held in Sudbury, the last time being in 1997. Since the discovery of distal ejecta from the Sudbury impact in the western Lake Superior area in 2005, many members of the Institute had suggested that the time was right for another Sudbury meeting. The meeting location enabled organizers to offer five field trips that showcased a variety of Proterozoic rocks in the Sudbury area itself, as well as along the north shore of Lake Huron. Three field trips focussed on the geology and mineralization related to the Sudbury Structure, and the organizers wish to thank the local exploration companies that graciously provided information and access to their properties. Parts of the other two of the field trips had been offered at previous ILSG annual meetings (e.g., Sudbury 1997; Sault Ste. Marie 2006), but both greatly benefitted from the new mapping, research, discoveries and interpretations that had taken place in the intervening years. COVID-related shortages of rental vehicles and/or drivers led to pre-meeting trips being held over several days, which unexpectedly, provided more opportunities for attendees to take in several field trips if they wanted. All the field trips, and the meeting itself, were blessed with sunny weather and a minimum number of pesky insects. Total field trip participation was 96 (excluding leaders and volunteer drivers). A list of field trips is provided below (numbers correspond to trip numbers in the Guidebook volume):
Pre-meeting field trips (and leaders) on Saturday, May 07; Sunday, May 8, and Monday, May 9.
5) A cross-section through the Huronian Supergroup at Elliot Lake, Ontario (Michael Easton, Ontario Geological Survey) (May 7)
2) Geology of the Grenville Front in the Sudbury area (Michael Easton, Ontario Geological Survey) (May 8)
1) Traverse across the Sudbury Impact Structure (Wouter Bleeker, Geological Survey of Canada, and Sandra Kamo, University of Toronto; Michael Lesher and Henning Seibel, Laurentian University) (Two-day trip, May 8 and May 9)
Post-meeting field trips (and leaders) on Thursday, May12
3) Magmatism and brecciation in the Footwall Rocks of the southwestern Sudbury Structure (Caroline Gordon, Ontario Geological Survey; Carol-Anne Généreux, Laurentian University and Terrane Geoscience; and Brad Clarke, SPC Nickel Corporation)
4) An overview of the geology of the Sudbury Structure (Shirley Péloquin, Ontario Geological Survey)
Many registrants attended the welcoming reception on Monday evening, which included an IMAX theatre presentation on “Dinosaurs of Antarctica”. Furthermore, the vast majority of registrants and invited guests attended the annual ILSG banquet on Tuesday night. Although a Homer Award overview presentation was given, no “recipients” were identified during the 2022 annual meeting, or in the previous 3 years!
As always, a highlight of the post-banquet activities was presentation of the 2022 Goldich Medal. This year’s very deserving recipient was Terry Boerboom. The Goldich Medal citation was presented by Mark Jirsa, his colleague for many years. Mark described Terry’s contributions to the ILSG and to the greater understanding of Minnesota’s geology over several decades during his time as a student and his 35 years with the Minnesota Geological Survey. Terry is indeed a worthy recipient of this prestigious award.
The 68th ILSG saw a return to the usual post-banquet guest speaker tradition. Andy Parmenter of the Canadian Nuclear Waste Management Organization (NWMO) travelled from Toronto to give an overview of NWMOs Geoscience site characterization of the Revell batholith in the Ignace area of northwestern Ontario. His talk provided detailed insights into the 3-D character of a Neoarchean granodioritic to granitic intrusion, based on detailed mapping and geophysical, seismic, and geochemical studies, as well as from multiple 1 km-long research cores obtained from the batholith.
In 2022, the student paper committee had its usual difficult job of selecting the best among five excellent oral presentations and five poster presentations for the Doug Duskin Student Paper Awards. The committee awarded four prizes, with the best talk award going to Rebecca Price for her talk on “Mineralogy and Petrology of the Good Hope Carbonatite Complex, Marathon, ON” and the best poster award going to Khalid Yahia for his poster on “Geochemical and isotopic composition of Midcontinent Rift-related intrusions of the Thunder Bay North Igneous Complex, northwestern Ontario, Canada”. Runner-up prizes went to Audray Hinkenmeyer for her talk on “Characterizing Late Wisconsinan Rainy Lobe till from the Hudson Bay Lowlands to SW Minnesota: Insights on provenance and ice sheet behavior during Late Wisconsin glaciation” and to Katherine Langfield for her poster on “Slip Kinematics of the Hancock Fault in the Midcontinent Rift System, Keweenaw Peninsula, Michigan”. Eisenbrey Student Travel Grants were given to three students: Connor Caglitoti (Lakehead University), Katherine Langfield (Michigan Technical University), and Miles Harbury (University of Wisconsin, Milwaukee).
The Institute’s Board of Directors met on Tuesday, May 10, 2022, and a brief overview of the meeting notes is provided below:
1. Accepted report of the Chairs for the 67th ILSG, Virtual Meeting; as published on the ILSG web site, and minutes of last Board meeting in May 2021.
2. Received, discussed, and accepted 2021-2022 ILSG Financial Summary.
3. Received, discussed, and accepted 2021-2022 report of the Secretary (Hollings).
4. Approved Michael Easton as on-going ILSG Board member
5. Discussed and approved renewal of Mark Jirsa as Institute Treasurer (end of term 2022). This was later approved by a vote of the membership.
6. Discussed and approved replacing Dan England as the “member from industry” on the Goldich Committee (end of term 2022) with Dean Peterson.
7. Approved Eau Claire as the site for the 69th annual ILSG meeting. The meeting will be hosted by Robert Lodge and Esther Stewart.
8. Reviewed and approved the guidelines for the Honouring the Pioneers of Lake Superior Geology with the charge that the document will be reviewed as needed.
9. Future meeting locations were discussed. Ted Bornhorst offered Houghton in 2024, Peter Hinz has offered Kenora as a future site and Mark Jirsa is keen to host the Mountain Iron meeting that was cancelled in 2020 because of the pandemic. In a subsequent discussion, Bernie Saini-Eidukat expressed a willingness to organize a meeting in St. Cloud.
10. The cost of insurance was discussed and it was agreed that the Board of Directors insurance and field trip insurance should be maintained for future meetings and that the costs would be included in the cost of each meeting. The fact that the Institute meets in both the US and Canada is an added complication.
11. Jirsa advised the board of the donation of polar bear carvings from Mike Beauregard, and it was agreed that a silent auction would be held during the meeting with funds going to support student travel. Dan England later donated two samples with visible gold and, combined, these items raised $395 for the Eisenbrey fund
12. Bornhorst advised that there are a small number of hard copies missing from the MTU archives and that he will work to fill these. It was agreed that the ILSG would make a donation of $1 per member (minimum $100) each year to the library as a “thank you” for their efforts
13. The 68th ILSG meeting was a great success and we wish to thank all the people who contributed to that success, including staff of the Ontario Geological Survey who were pressed into action as editors, field trip leaders and drivers. Patty Cobin and Ted Bornhorst (A.E. Seaman Mineral Museum, Michigan Technological University) handled the pre-meeting registration. Ted also supplied the poster boards. Thanks go also to the staff at Science North who helped the meeting run smoothly as well as Bryston’s on the Park in Copper Cliff who provided a first-class banquet dinner, as well as lunches and snacks during the technical sessions.
Michael Easton (OGS) and Wouter Bleeker (GSC)
Co-Chairs, 68th Institute on Lake Superior Geology
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