User:Btphelps/Sandbox/George Davidson

George Davidson (1825-1911) was a pioneering American surveyor

who arrived in California in 1850. As a geodesist, he observed and planned the 39th Parallel Survey from north of San Francisco through the Sierra Nevada Mountains, observer of the great Davidson Quadrilateral, measurer of the Yolo Baseline considered the most accurate baseline of the Nineteenth Century, President of the California Academy of Sciences for 16 years, member of the National Academy of Sciences, Regent 1877-1884 and Professor at the University of California until his death, author of the Pacific Coast and Alaska Coast Pilots, founder and first President of the Pacific Seismological Society forerunner of the Seismological Society of America, instrumental in convincing James Lick to endow the Lick Observatory, one of three Commissioners of Irrigation of the State of California, and many other significant positions and accomplishments.

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