Frank Oldfield
(University of Liverpool, Liverpool, UK)
A long career in environmental science has brought me into contact with many wonderful colleagues the value of whose friendship and inspiration greatly exceeds any words of appreciation that can be written. Liu Tungsheng is one such. I first met him at the Quaternary Research Center in Seattle in 1981 when I spent a month as Distinguished Visiting Professor at the invitation of Estelle Leopold. I overlapped there briefly with Liu Tungsheng and had my first conversations with this man of gentle, self-effacing wisdom. I had heard much about him from my mentor and life-long friend Donald Walker, so I was especially delighted to meet this much honoured scientist for the first time in the flesh. Our next encounter was in Mendoza, Argentina in 1995, where the IGBP PAGES (Past Global Changes) project held one of its Scientific Steering Committee meetings. At that stage, we were both on the Steering Committee. I remember well the respect and affection of the whole group for Liu Tungsheng whose quiet but totally authoritative voice spoke for a huge community of Chinese scientists who were quickly moving into leading research roles at international level. As part of the meeting, we all went on a coach trip over part of the mountain road linking Mendoza to Santiago, stopping at high altitude for a short walk on the edge of Aconcagua. One of my clearest memories of this trip was catching a glimpse of Professor Liu’s sketch book. Where everyone else was taking photographs, he was drawing beautifully detailed and rapid pencil sketches in a small book. They were a delight.
Later meetings with Liu Tungsheng took place in China where my visits reflected involvement in INQUA, PAGES and as a colleague in Chinese research projects. During the Geological Congress, he invited several of us to a banquet in a restaurant on the edge of the Forbidden City. This was a splendid, formal affair with a succession of elaborate dishes each introduced by a beautiful hostess. Typically, despite the formality, I came away with the warmth, friendship and thoughtfulness of our host as my dominant memory. Later meetings over the last 15 years also mostly involved superb meals with him as host. Many of these were shared with my wife, who, like me had immense affection for this wonderful man. His passing leaves me with a feeling of great sorrow that we shall not see him again or benefit from his experience, insight and generosity of spirit.
Two further thoughts come to mind. My role in PAGES involved encounters with many scientists from all over the world. All these echoed my affection and respect for Liu Tungsheng. Many senior scientists from Australia, Europe and America all went out of their way to express the high esteem in which he was held. International recognition through the award of the Tyler Prize in 2002 is just one reflection of this. My final memory is not of an encounter with Professor Liu but of my visit to the great loess section of Luochuan. The plaque there recording his great work speaks for itself, but it is the shear immensity of the sequence and the scientific insight, care, persistence and unimaginably hard work that went into its study that stay in the mind. Anyone who has, from time to time, felt daunted by the research task they have set themselves should go to Luochaun, contemplate that descending sequence of exposures and ask themselves how they might have handled such a challenge. We owe to Liu Tungsheng our introduction to the greatest terrestrial archives of environmental change on the planet. We record and honour not only this gift but the peerless personal qualities of the giver.
