Gates Gjelsvik

Tore Gjelsvik (born September 7, 1916 in Bodø , † January 23, 2006 in Bærum ) was a Norwegian geologist and director of the Norwegian Polar Institute . During the Second World War he played a central role in the Norwegian resistance.

Life

Gjelsvik was studying geology at the University of Oslo when Norway was occupied by the German Wehrmacht . In 1940 he took part in various combat operations in Østfold . Gjelsvik was one of the first to set up resistance groups. In October 1940 he got in touch with one of the first Norwegian resistance groups, the R group in Oslo. He was able to extend their contacts to the whole country. He was a central member of the Sivorg and was in contact with the Milorg and the XU. In 1943 he was a member of the coordination committee (KK) and later head of the KK secretariat. After the resistance organizations were largely destroyed by the Germans in 1944, he worked to rebuild them. He fought against the labor service . In autumn 1944 he was one of the last four surviving members of the KK. In January 1945 Gjelsvik was almost arrested by the Statspolitiet , the Norwegian State Secret Police, but was able to flee to Sweden shot and shot. A short time later he returned to Norway and made contact with Alf Sanengen and the Home Front Movement .

After the war he began at Harvard University with his dissertation, which he completed in Oslo in 1953. In the following years he worked for the Geological Service of Norway and took part in missions in Turkey and Burma as a geological advisor to the United Nations . In 1960 he was appointed director of the Norwegian Polar Institute , a position he held until his retirement in 1983.

He was primarily responsible for building the Home Front Museum, on whose council he had been a member since 1962.

Research work

Gjelsvik did her PhD on metamorphic dolerites in southern Norway. In the following period he dealt with deposits in Turkey and the geology of Svalbard . During his time as director of the Polar Institute, he was responsible for the resumption of the Norwegian Antarctic research program in 1976 after an interruption of 16 years.

Honors

• 1974 admission to the Norwegian Academy of Sciences
• 1975 Knight 1st class of the Order of Saint Olav
• 1982 North Star Order
• 1983 Copernicus Medal from the Polish Academy of Sciences
• 1984 Commander of the Order of Saint Olav
• 1988 Georg von Neumayer Medal from Pollichia

Gjelsvik is the namesake in Antarctica for the Gjelsvikfjella mountains in Queen Maud Land and for the Gjelsvik Peak in the Ross Dependency .

literature

• Olav Orheim: Remembering Tore Gjelsvik (1916-2006) . Polar Research, 25 , pp. 145-153.

Individual evidence

1. ↑ Notes on the Geology of Balya Maden ( Memento of the original from March 4, 2016 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. (English; PDF; 130 kB) 
2. ↑ Scientific Research in the Arctic by T. Gjelsvik  ( page no longer available , search in web archives )  Info: The link was automatically marked as defective. Please check the link according to the instructions and then remove this notice. (engl.)  

Web links

• Literature by and about Tore Gjelsvik in the catalog of the German National Library
• Obituary on the homepage of the Scientific Committee of Antarctic Research , accessed on October 19, 2011
• Ivar Kraglund: Tore Gjelsvik . In: Norsk biografisk leksikon