How the last global warming shaped our history – Event 26th May – 3pm – Catstrand
The Glenkens Story local history group will be plunging into the deep past at its next meeting to discover what happened the last time Galloway experienced global warming.
Twelve thousand years ago the glaciers covering this area were melting and on Sunday 26th May the history group will be hearing geologist Alan Gibbs explain the impact this has had on life here ever since.
“While we think of glaciation in terms of the erosion of high mountains corries, fjords, U-shaped valleys etc. – this is not the really interesting bit of the story in Galloway,” says Alan. !Here it’s about the gravels and rubble left behind as the sheet ice melts. This is what shaped the landscape we have lived in ever since.” Expect to hear of drumlins, eskers and other ancient features we pass by every day.
“I spent a career as a geologist telling stories in space and time to anyone who would listen” adds Alan, who comes from Annan. !I worked initially as an academic and then as commercial consultant heading a software modelling team working on projects globally.” He has also addressed more recent history, working with his family in restoring a tower house.
“In the last 10 years The Glenkens Story programme has spanned many eras,” says Mike Brown, one of the group”s organisers. !In 2022 we staged a conference on the Early Peoples of Galloway, starting with the first huntergatherers who arrived at the end of the last Ice Age. We did not expect to delve even further back but Alan”s lecture will explain much of our subsequent history.”
Alan Gibbs” talk on Drumlin Swarms and Beaded Eskers: what happened to Galloway at the last global warming?” will be held at CatStrand, New Galloway, at 3pm on Sunday 26th May. Tickets £10
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