August 30, 2023
The first time I met Jason was when he visited Scripps for a few days in the late 1970’s. Freeman Gilbert walked him around to meet some postdocs. Freeman had barely introduced me when he was called away. “I shall be back,” he said and left me, a recently minted PhD, alone with the founding father of plate tectonics. I was too shy and nervous to start the conversation and waited for him to ask a question, but Jason remained quiet. His face showed a glimpse of a smile, and behind his gold-rimmed glasses his eyes wandered to the computer plots scattered on my desk. What was he thinking? I finally had the courage to break a long silence and started to talk with him about my PhD research, when Freeman returned and led him further down the hall.
We did not meet again until years later when I joined the Princeton faculty. We quickly became friends and I worked with him on mantle plumes, especially during our joint experiment in Iceland with Richard Allen.
Jason is one of the most laureated geoscientists, but if he had an ego it never showed. During seminars he would often ask an apparently naive question within the first five minutes. Usually it wasn't naive at all but he posed it in such a way that even the younger students must have been encouraged to raise their own hands and interrupt the speaker to get something clarified. I once asked him if he did this on purpose. Jason was silent and did not respond. His face showed a glimpse of a smile. I think I know the answer.