Robert Thomas Hill

Hill's fieldwork took him far beyond Texas. Between 1894 and 1902 he did reconnaissance in Central America and the West Indies, and the Handbook says it led to his support of Panama over Nicaragua as the canal route. In 1902 he was among the first scientists to study Mont Pelée on Martinique during its catastrophic eruption, and he first described its classic glowing cloud. He left the United States Geological Survey in 1903 for independent business interests, chiefly in New York, Nevada, California, Texas and Mexico, and mapped part of southern California.

What the plaque says

Robert Thomas Hill Robert Thomas Hill began life on August 11, 1858, in the aristocratic comforts of his parents' Nashville, Tennessee, home. His family, however, suffered tragic losses during the Civil War and by 1864 young Robert was an orphan living in his grandmother's Nashville home. He left Nashville in 1874 for Comanche County, Texas, to join his brother, Joe, as an employee of a local newspaper known as the "Comanche Chief." Hill developed a passion for geology while studying a nearby formation known as Round Mountain. He entered Cornell University in 1882 and in 1887 graduated with honors in geology. In 1888 the University of Texas established a geology chair to honor Hill for his landmark discovery of Cretaceous deposits on Round Mountain. He participated in the state geological survey and identified and named the Balcones Escarpment. In 1891 Hill became president of the Cosmos Club, a society of the nation's most distinguished scientists. In the 1890s and early 1900s Hill studied aquifer formations in the Southwest U.S., West Indies, Mexico and Central America. Hill's publications represent one of the most distinguished geological studies produced by one individual. Following his death on July 28, 1941, Hill's body was cremated and his ashes scattered over Round Mountain. (1995)

Where it stands

Worth the stop nearby

• Dublin Bottling Works — 20 mi
  The Erath County plant that bottled Dr Pepper with cane sugar from 1891 until a 2012 settlement ended its Dr Pepper license, and that still makes its own sodas the same way.
• Lake Brownwood State Park — 25 mi
  A CCC park on a reservoir that filled in a single flood before its dam was done, with stone cabins, a hilltop dance pavilion and a grand staircase climbed by dancers arriving by boat.

More markers nearby

• General Ashbel Smith, C.S.A. — steps away
• Fleming Oak — steps away
• Indian Raid in Comanche — steps away
• Old Cora Courthouse — steps away