Bruce Warren Nelson

1929 - 2025

Bruce Warren Nelson

March 17, 1929 - April 24, 2025

Dr. Bruce Warren Nelson, 96, Professor Emeritus of Environmental Sciences at the University of Virginia, of Charlottesville, Virginia passed peacefully away after a stoic battle with Alzheimers on Thursday, April 24, 2025 and was cremated at a small private family gathering on Wednesday, April 30.

Born March 17, 1929, in Cleveland, Ohio, he was the son of Glibert Demorest Nelson, a high school math teacher and Gertrude Slater Nelson, housewife, community volunteer and genealogist. He was preceded in death by his parents, his wife of 68 years, Sally Vance Cole Nelson (in January 2024), & many dear colleagues & friends.

After finishing high school in Lakewood, Ohio as valedictorian, Eagle Scout and three letter athlete, he graduated A.B. cum laude from Harvard 1951, M.S. (Mineralogy) from Penn State 1954, and in 1955 completed his Ph.D (Geology) at University of Illinois at Urbanna. He spent most summers between studies on adventures in the field: for the Cleveland Museum of Natural History, and the Ohio Geological Survey; to Greenland with Commander McMillan on the Bowdoin; to Homer, Alaska to study permafrost with the US Geological Survey.

His special areas of research interest were geochemistry, clay minerology, & sediment dynamics in rivers & estuaries, with a focus on measuring anthopogenic inputs. Combining teaching & research, he began his career 1955 as Associate Professor of Geology at Virginia Polytechnic Institute (now Virginia Tech) in Blacksburg, Virginia, while researching the rivers & estuaries of the Chesapeake Bay and was named full Professor there.

To answer the question of why Venice was sinking, in 1962, he spent a year in Chioggia, Italy mapping sediment flows in the Venetian lagoon & the Adriatic. In 1963, he was named Head of the Geology department at the University of South Carolina, which entailed moving the family to Columbia, where from 1966 to 1972, as Dean of Arts & Sciences, he was instrumental in improving & diversifying faculty quality, & hiring the first professors of color. After a sabbatical as Visiting Professor for Environmental Sciences at UVA in 1970-71, he was named South Carolina's Vice Provost for Advanced Studies and Research, and Dean of the Graduate School.

Professor Nelson moved to Charlottesville permanently in 1974, first, as Dean of the School of Continuing Education & Professor of Environmental Sciences. From 1977, he served as Vice Provost under David Shannon, as well as on numerous University committees. After leaving the UVA Provost's office in 1980, he returned to the Environmental Sciences Department where with a Fulbright & later, National Science Foundation grants, he extended his research & teaching to Southeast Asia at the University of Malaysia Institute for Advanced Studies, in Kuala Lumpur, on the rivers of Borneo and the Irrawady River from Rangoon, Burma (now Myanmar). After the Burmese Spring revolution of 1988, he moved to Mauritius as a Senior Fulbright Scholar with the Ghandi Institute to write a book on Geomorphology. He continued to publish on SE Asian River systems until 1996 and retired in 1998.

A member of Phi Delta Kappa (Education Honorary) and Society of the Sigma Xi, he was a Fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science, Fellow of the Geological Society of America, Fellow of the Mineralogical Society of America, and a member of many other professional organisations including American Geophysical Union, International Association of Sedimentologists, Clay Minerals Society, Atlantic Estuarine Research Society, American Association of Petroleum Geologists.

Appreciated by those who knew him for his humor & calm ability to listen, curiosity about the modes of thinking of other disciplines & cultures, and sharp intelligence, he is revered by his family for his teasing, his love and knowledge of the natural world, his wise counsel to make the most of life's opportunities but learn to roll with it's punches, his ability to make almost anything out of almost nothing & to call owls at dusk and have them come! He will be greatly missed.

Bruce is survived by his daughter, Margaret Nelson Spethmann, of Charlottesville & Hamburg, Germany (Jochen); three grandchildren: Henry Justin Spethmann (Francisco Portella) of London, England, Laurens Nelson Spethmann of Hamburg, Germany, Sara Lauren Spethmann (Philipp Duske) of Hamburg, Germany and one great grandchild , Margot Elinor Edith Duske. His sister, Nancy Nelson Stein of North Olmestead, Ohio & Nephew, Brian Stein, also survive him.

A celebration of his life is in planning for 20-21 October, 2025 and more details on this will be posted to the Hill & Wood Website at a later date. In Bruce's name, the family would like to thank the staff at the memory unit at the Colonnades for the special attention, respect and kind care they have given to him.

In lieu of flowers, the family requests that memorial contributions be made to The College Foundation at the University of Virginia earmarked for the Bruce W. Nelson Memorial Fund. Condolences can be sent to the family at www.hilland wood.com, or 2125 Ivy Road STE.1-136, Charlottesville, Virginia 22903.