Robert H. Carpenter papers, 1949-1992

Robert Halstead Carpenter, geologist, college professor (Colorado School of Mines), and mineral consultant was born in Pasadena, California in 1914. He received his bachelor's and master's degrees as well as his doctorate (geology-mining) from Stanford University, 1948. In 1941-1942 he pursued graduate studies while a teaching fellow at Princeton University. In 1957-1958 he was a Fulbright Research Scholar in Italy with headquarters at the Universities of Florence and Piza.

In 1940-1941 he worked with the U.S. Geological Survey on strategic mineral investigations then during World War II he was part of the search for strategic minerals as an Anaconda trained geologist. In his many years in the geology field, he covered the aspects of a consulting, economic, evaluation, exploration, mining, project and teaching geologist. He was a faculty member and the Professor of Economic Geology at the Colorado School of Mines for 32 years. He retired as Professor Emeritus in 1979.

He consulted in the Philippines, Hong Kong, Indonesia and the Soviet Union and lectured throughout the world in Columbia, Greece, Japan, Norway, Peru, China, and Denmark. He had an assignment from the United Nations to go to Burma in 1963 and headed an Agency for International Development (AID) project in Korea following the Korean War. President Carter appointed him a presidential advisor to study possible changes in the Mining Law of 1872. Over a two year period, Dr. Carpenter completed a study of uranium environments and discovery potential in igneous and metamorphic terrain of the Front Range (Colorado) for the United States Department of Energy that led to the publication of Modes of Uranium Occurrences in the Hard Rock Terrain, Colorado Front Range.

He held the position of President, International Mineral Engineers (IME), 1966-1973 and Vice President of Centennial Gold Corporation, 1981-1986.