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Charles Lapworth, FGS :

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One of the founding fathers of geology, Charles Lapworth was successful in classifying the graptolites, a long-extinct marine invertebrate that lived in the Silurian period about 700 million years ago. Lapworth visited outcrops of shales now called the 'Moffat Series' and made his researches there.

His 1877 paper on the Moffat Series was read to the Geological Society of London, of whom he became a Fellow. He listed nearly a hundred species of Graptolite, belonging to nineteen genera, and identified the geological series of Birkhill, Harthill and Genkiln Shales, which are respectively the Upper, Middle and Lower Moffat Series.

Later in life Lapworth established a first by being the first Professor of Geology of Birmingham University in England. His work contributed to the final studies of evolution by Charles Darwin, as it demonstrated the progressive development of the graptolites over geological time.

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