Everett Olson; UCLA Paleontologist
Everett Olson, a zoologist, paleontologist and geologist who taught at UCLA and wrote prolifically about his research on evolution, has died at age 83.
Olson, who wrote seven books and more than 170 articles, died Nov. 27 in Los Angeles.
He was recognized internationally, particularly for his study of the American Southwest and the Permian strata in Russia. The name is derived from the Russian city of Perm, where copper miners in 1780 discovered fossils in a particular rock stratum that represented the beginnings of land animals.
Olson was president of the Society of Vertebrate Paleontology, which in 1987 awarded him its first Romer-Bimpson Distinguished Service Medal. He titled his 1990 autobiography, a candid account of his doubts about such new theories as plate tectonics, “The Other Side of the Medal.”
He was also president of the Society for the Study of Evolution and the Society of Systematic Zoology, and editor of Evolution and the Journal of Geology. He was awarded the medal of the Paleontological Society and was a member of the U.S. National Academy of Sciences.
A native of Wisconsin, Olson was educated at the University of Chicago and taught there for many years. He joined the UCLA faculty in 1969, teaching zoology, and later served as chairman of the biology department.
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