While largely self-taught, McGee attended a rural
one-room schoolhouse north of Farley during the four winter months from about 1858 to 1867.[3] He devoted his early years to
reading law and to surveying.[4] He invented and patented several improvements on agricultural implements.[4]
He subsequently turned his attention to
geology.[4] In 1877–1881, he executed a topographic and geological survey of 17,000 square miles (44,030 km2) in northeastern
Iowa.[5][6][7] He then undertook an examination of the
loess of the
Mississippi Valley, researched the great
Quaternary lakes of
Nevada and
California and studied a recent
fault movement in the middle
Atlantic slope.[4]
He was appointed geologist for the
United States Geological Survey (USGS) in 1881. In 1884 McGee authored the article Map of the United States exhibiting the present status of knowledge relating to the areal distribution of geologic groups for the USGS Journal.[8]
While with the USGS, McGee travelled to
Charleston, South Carolina, in 1886 for the purpose of studying the
earthquake disturbances in its vicinity.
^McGee, W.J. and Call, R.E. 1882. "On the löss and associated deposits of Des Moines, Iowa." The American Journal of Science, 3rd Series, Whole no. 124, 24(141):202–223.
^McGee, W.J. 1884. "The drainage system and the distribution of loess of Eastern Iowa." Bulletin of the Philosophical Society of Washington 6:93–97.
^McGee, W.J. 1891. "The Pleistocene history of northeastern Iowa." In: Powell, J.W. (ed), Eleventh Annual Report of the Director of the United States Geological Survey, Part 1: 1889–1890, pp. 199–577.
^"Map of the United States exhibiting the present status of knowledge relating to the areal distribution of geologic groups". U.S. Geological Survey Annual Report 5: 34–41. 1884.
^McGee, W.J. and Johnson, W.D. 1896. Seriland. The National Geographic Magazine 7(4):125–133.
^McGee, W. J. (William John).
"The Siouan Indians". Retrieved Sep 12, 2022 – via Internet Archive.
Further reading
Bates, J. Leonard, "Fulfilling American Democracy: The Conservation Movement, 1907 to 1921" Mississippi Valley Historical Review (1957) 44#1 pp. 29-57
online
Darton, N. H. "Memoir of W J McGee." Annals of the Association of American Geographers (1913) 3: 103-10.
Hinsley, Curtis M., Jr. Savages and Scientists: The Smithsonian Institution and the Development of American Anthropology, 1846-1910 (Smithsonian Institution Press 1981)
HINSLEY, CURTIS MATTHEW, JR. "THE DEVELOPMENT OF A PROFESSION: ANTHROPOLOGY IN WASHINGTON, D.C., 1846-1903." (PhD dissertation, The University of Wisconsin - Madison; ProQuest Dissertations Publishing, 1976. 7618882).
Hodge, Frederick Webb. "W J McGee." American Anthropologist (1913) 14: 683-86.
Knowlton, F. J. "Memoir of W J McGee." Bulletin of the Geological Society of America (1912) 24: 18-29.