John Oliver Wheeler

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John Oliver Wheeler (December 19, 1924 – May 24, 2015) was a Canadian geologist who spent most of his career with the Geological Survey of Canada (GSC). He came from a family of surveyors. His father, Sir Edward Oliver Wheeler, helped in the first topographical survey of Mount Everest in 1921 and later became Surveyor General of India. His grandfather, Arthur Oliver Wheeler, mapped British Columbia’s Selkirk Mountains and the British Columbia–Alberta border.

Wheeler joined the Geological Survey of Canada in 1952 and worked there for 39 years. In his first 20 years he mapped large areas, including much of the Cordillera from northern Washington to eastern Alaska, parts of the Yukon (including the Saint Elias Mountains), and parts of British Columbia such as the Selkirk Mountains. His mapping work laid the foundation for later Cordilleran mapping in Canada and set a standard for geological maps.

In 1968 he became head of the Survey’s Cordilleran Section. In the 1970s he moved to Ottawa to manage science programs and was promoted to Chief Geologist. In the 1980s he returned to Vancouver to edit the eight-volume Geology of Canada and helped prepare many regional and national maps. He also championed the Lithoprobe project, a 20-year program studying Canada’s crust with deep seismic transects; he chaired the Lithoprobe steering committee for two years.

Wheeler retired in 1990 and remained an unsalaried emeritus research scientist at the GSC in Vancouver. He was a lead author of the 2004 Canada–USA Geological Map of North America. He joined the Geological Association of Canada in 1957, served as Councillor from 1968 to 1972, and was President from 1970 to 1971.