SOCORRO, N.M. – New Mexico Tech lost one of its iconic emeritus professors earlier this week. Gerardo “Gerry” Wolfgang Gross passed away on June 16, 2019.

Dr. Gross was a professor of geophysics and then professor emeritus of geophysics at NMT for well over 50 years. He was born Sept.1, 1923, in Greifswald, Germany. He emigrated from Germany to Argentina in 1939. He obtained a Ph.D. from the University of Córdoba in Argentina. After World War II he moved to New York and joined his family there. He went on to earn a second Ph.D. in geophysics from Penn State University. 

He later joined the faculty at NMT in the early 1960’s. He was married to Ruth Filsinger Gross, who for decades constituted a one-woman language department for Tech, teaching German, Spanish, and French. 

Gerry’s training was in electrical methods in geophysics. He taught and used in his research conventional shallow electrical geophysics, such as resistivity surveys. However, his most significant contributions were in the measurement of the dielectric properties of ice with low and varying “doping” with ionic solutes. This work has had application to the stratigraphy of ice sheets, but is mainly important for understanding the electrification of clouds during thunderstorms. In addition to this electrical work, he set up one of the first laboratories in the United States for the measurement of tritium in natural water samples using electrolytic enrichment. He ran this lab from the early 1960’s to the mid-1980’s, using it mainly to understand groundwater recharge processes in New Mexico. 

Although Gerry’s appointment was as professor of geophysics, most of his teaching and research were in the Hydrology Program. He worked closely with Mahdi Hantush and his successor, C.E. Jacob, in the 1960’s.  Both Hantush and Jacob were among the most eminent groundwater hydrologists of their generation. Gerry played a critical role in the history of the Earth and Environmental science department in 1970 when C.E. Jacob died suddenly of a heart attack. Gerry launched a heroic one-man effort to keep the Hydrology Program alive and to find a worthy successor to Jacob. He accomplished this by bringing in several leading groundwater theoreticians to serve one-year temporary appointments teaching and doing research. These included Jacob Bear, from Israel, and G. De Josselin de Jong, from France. Ultimately, in the mid-1970’s he succeeded in hiring Lynn Gelhar from MIT as Director of the Hydrology Program, assuring its continuation. 

Dr. Fred Phillips, professor emeritus of hydrology at NMT, remembers Gerry fondly. He recalled an time in the early 1980’s, while Gerry was out of town, his undergrad lab assistant came running into Phillips’ office exclaiming that the electrolytic enrichment device was malfunctioning. 

“I ran up a series of metal staircases and catwalks in the old Workman building and managed to get it under control, which was important because the apparatus was pumping hydrogen gas into the building,” Phillips recalled. “Gerry afterwards thanked me profusely, saying that the lab would have exploded if the reaction had not been stopped.”

Phillips went on: “Gerry was an exceptionally kind and caring person.  He scrounged up R.A. support for many hydrology grad students in an era when that was more difficult than today. He is remembered fondly by them. He was helpful and nurturing when I arrived as a brand-new assistant professor in 1981.”

Gerry lived a very long, and very largely happy, life.  He had an incisive mind and contributed immensely to both the teaching and the research missions of NMT. 

Phillips said that, “He left an important legacy for all of us in the E&ES Department and especially the Hydrology Program. He was selfless and generous. He had a loving family and a deep faith in God. His was truly an example of a life well lived.”

Gerry is survived by his wife of 60 years, Ruth Filsinger; three children and their families, Ruth and Phil Zahn, Paul and Tanya Gross, and Teresa and Eliot Jardines; and grandchildren Adam, Ethan and Graham Jardines and Cecily, Matthias, and Anneliese Gross.

Visitation will be at 10:30 a.m. Saturday, June 22, 2019, at Daniels Family Funeral Services in Socorro. Services will immediately follow at 11 a.m. Interment to follow service at the Socorro Cemetery on Blue Canyon Road. To view information or leave a condolence, please visit www.danielsfuneral.com.

– NMT –