LangeMemo7

circa 16th century: Leonardo da Vinci and Bernard Palissy independently describe the hydrologic cycle. mid-17th century: The measurement of the Seine River is overrepresented in the early articulation of hydrologic knowledge. Important developments in this regard: Pierre Perrault, having earlier developed a method to quantify the contents of springs, measures the rainfall in Paris and shows that it is sufficient to maintain the flow of the Seine. Edme Mariotte develops a method to measure the discharge of the Seine. 1701: Edmund Halley estimates the amount of water that evaporates from the Mediterranean Sea and the amount of water from the Thaimes which flows into the Mediterranean. 1738: Daniel Bernouli, inventor of an early piezometer, publishes //Hydrodynamique// laying out what would become known as the Bernouli equation. 1844: Jules Dupuit posits a version of the groundwater flow equation. His assumption that groundwater flows horizontally in an unconfined aquifer is still common today. 1846: Jean Louis Marie Poiseuille formulates what would become known as Poiseuille’s law. 1855: Henry Darcy conducts experiments which established what would become known as Darcy’s Law describing the flow of water through a porous medium. last half of the 19th century: hydrologists begin working on civil engineering projects. The close relationship between hydrology and civil engineering continues to this day. 1904: Daniel Mead publishes the first textbook of hydrology, intended for use not by hydrologists, but by civil engineers. 1919: Adolf Meyers publishes another hydrology textbook. 1922: International Union of Geodesy and Geophysics establishes the Section of Scientific Hydrology. 1930: American Geophysical Union establishes the Hydrology Section. 1920s-1970s: Golden age of big dam projects in the west. 1940s-1960s: Hazen, Gumbel, Hurst, and Langbein develop statistical methods for analyzing hydrologic data. 1950s-1980: Meinzer, Theis, Slichter, and Hubbert articulate the theory of groundwater hydraulics. Prandtl, Von Karman, Rouse, Chow, Gilbert, and Einstein study sediment transport and stream hydraulics. 1960s: Thornthwaite and Mather describe evapotranspiration. 1960s-recent: Westerners become aware of the drawbacks of big dams, to create new demands, western engineers, economists, and hydrologists start pushing dams in the post-colonial countries, often funded by the World bank.