J. Laurence Kulp

John Laurence Kulp (February 11, 1921 – September 25, 2006) was a 20th-century geochemist. He led major studies on the effects of nuclear fallout and acid rain. He was a prominent advocate in American Scientific Affiliation circles in favor of an Old Earth and against the pseudoscience of flood geology. Kulp died on September 25, 2006 at the age of 85.

Kulp was raised in Trenton, New Jersey and was brought up as a practically atheistic Episcopalian. As a young man he left the Episcopal Church and entered into fellowship with the Plymouth Brethren. He attended Drew University, then entered Wheaton College as a junior transfer student. He spent a year in graduate school at Ohio State University before moving to Princeton University, where he obtained a Ph.D. in physical chemistry in 1945.

Kulp was professor of geochemistry at Columbia University between 1947 and 1965. He was also at various times vice president for research and development at Weyerhaeuser Company, director of research of the National Acid Precipitation Assessment Program, affiliate professor at the University of Washington, a consultant in environmental and energy affairs, and owner of Teledyne Isotopes.

His primary field was radiometric dating, which was transforming the field of geology in the 1950s. He was a pioneer in the field of Carbon 14 dating and in 1950, established the Carbon 14 research centre at Columbia University, the second in the United States.

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