1889 Feb | March 2018

say wa?
Bibliophile
Washington Rocks!
Know your rocks with The
Roadside Geology of Washington
interview by Sheila G. Miller
University of Oregon geologist Marli Miller
has seen a lot of Washington. Miller, who
completed the second edition of The
Roadside Geology of Oregon in 2014, was
tapped to hit the road again to revisit The
Roadside Geology of Washington in its second
edition. That book, completed in 2017 and
written with Darrel S. Cowan, is hundreds
of pages of pretty much everything you
wanted to know about what the heck that
rock is by the side of the road.
Marli Miller is a University of Oregon geologist.
How do the first edition, written in
1984, and the second edition you
wrote differ?
They’re really different on several
accounts. I think one of the main
differences is the philosophy of the
publishing company has evolved—
they’re more interested in the author
going into detail, and so I wrote the book
with the idea that this would be a book
I would want to use. I used mileposts to
point out specific things, and I give a lot
of ages for things which helps show how
it all fits in. Also, we just know so much
more about the geology now than we did
when the original books were written—
it’s pretty amazing. There’s been huge
growth in our analytical abilities in the
lab to understand how, for example, one
rock might relate to another chemically,
that there may be a common origin to
them. We know the ages of so many
things we didn’t know before. So I was
able to present a much more complete
story. The other big difference is the
quality of printing—the publisher is
doing these books in full color now.
Who is this book written for?
I was aiming for the interested lay
person, so if you’re not really interested
in geology you will not like the book—
it’s pretty nerdy. There’s always the
issue of terminology and jargon, and
we tried our best to keep that out but
sometimes it is sort of unavoidable.
It is written for lay people, but at the
same time it’s useful for geologists
who are casually driving through the
state and say, ‘What is this stuff?’
I’m guessing it was not an easy process
to put a book like this together.
My job was to write the first chapter,
which was an introduction to the whole
state, and then to write all the road
guides. I drove each road in the book
and looked at the rocks and tried to
make sense of them on my first drive
through. I would record mileposts as I
took notes, and then I would also take
field guides and journals, and write my
own road guide. Then I would drive
the road again and I would correct the
mistakes I’d made and I would make
things more clear. You don’t want to
spend too much time on things you
can’t see, so I would eliminate those
types of things
and then take
more photos.
This was a twoyear
project,
which was
pretty full-time—there were
two quarters at the university when
I wasn’t teaching that I devoted fulltime
to the book.
What was the coolest thing you
learned about Washington’s geology?
Seeing some of the features I had heard
about with respect to Ice Age floods
in Eastern Washington was profound.
Some of the features that had to do
with the Columbia River basalt group,
those were mind-boggling. In some
ways it was just always amazing to be
able to drive these roads and always be
encountering new things.
Where will geology take you next?
I just signed a contract to write the
book Oregon Rocks, which is going to be
about geologic locations throughout
the state of Oregon.
FEBRUARY | MARCH 2018 1889 WASHINGTON’S MAGAZINE 17