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Tracking Harry Reid’s Glaciers

For the past few years I have been tracking Harry Reid’s glaciers. Harry Fielding Reid was a geologist who studied, among other things, glaciers. In 1901, Reid circumnavigated Mount Hood and Mount Adams to describe and photograph the glaciers. Reid was the first person in the US to establish photograph “stations” of glaciers for the purpose of repeating in the future. The photographs contain important information on past glacier conditions. I am currently working to summarize the complete collection from Reid’s 1901 journey for the Glacier RePhoto Project. This means tracking down the original photo station locations and capturing new photographs.


Eliot Glacier, Station 999. Left by H.F. Reid (NSIDC); Rephotography by Hassan Basagic (The Glacier RePhoto Project)

I began rephotographing Reid’s work in 2012 on Mount Hood, documenting 8 stations of Eliot, Coe, and Newton Clarke glaciers. Several of his stations had been visited by scientists and photographers over the past decade, while others had never been revisited. In 2013, I began work on the north side of Mount Adams, where I rephotographed 8 of Reid’s stations. Late last summer, I visited Mount Hood and the north side of Mount Adams to rephotograph 12 of Reid’s photo frames. The new rephotographs are helping to better define how glaciers have changed on these volcanoes over the past century. Several examples from the 2014 field season are included below.


Eliot Glacier, Station 995 Left: H.F. Reid (NSIDC); Right: H. Basagic (The Glacier RePhoto Project)


Coe Glacier, Station 1005. Left: H.F. Reid (NSIDC); Right: Hassan Basagic (The Glacier Rephoto Project)

Pinnacle Glacier, Mount Adams, Station: 1041 Left: H.F. Reid (John Hopkins University); Right: Hassan Basagic (The Glacier Rephoto Project)



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