The Montana Bureau of Mines and Geology at Montana Tech has named Dr. Ennis Geraghty as the recipient of the Uuno Sahinen Silver Medallion. The award is named after former Bureau Director, the late Uuno Sahinen, who is widely recognized for the Bureau’s growth. The Uuno Sahinen Award acknowledges “outstanding contributions in understanding and development of energy, mineral, or groundwater resources in Montana” and is given to an outstanding geologist each year. The award will be presented to Dr. Geraghty at Montana Tech’s Commencement Ceremony on Saturday, May 17, 2014.
About Dr. Ennis Geraghty
Originally from Warrensburg, New York, a small town in the Adirondack Mountains of northern New York, Dr. Ennis Geraghty is a 1965 graduate of Warrensburg Central School. He received his A.B. in Geology from Colgate University and did his graduate work in Geology at Syracuse University, earning an M.S. and Ph.D. Both his Master’s thesis and Doctoral dissertation involved mapping in the Adirondack Mountains.
Little did he know that after working in Adirondack anorthosite minerals, he would be working in Montana anorthosite minerals in the Stillwater Complex 44 years later.
After completing his formal education, Ennis accepted a position as Research Structural Geologist with the New York State Geological Survey in Albany, New York. His research responsibilities included studying faulting in northern New York and mapping the Carthage to Colton mylonite zone, a major, terrain-bounding, ductile shear zone in the Adirondack Mountains.
In 1980, after 4 years of government work, Ennis, with his wife Sue, daughter Emily, and son Chris, moved west to Colorado where he joined the geology staff of Climax Molybdenum Company at the Henderson molybdenum mine in the Laramide Front Range uplift.
In 1988, Ennis was the last geologist standing from the storied Climax Geology Group. He was ultimately laid off and headed north to join the geology staff at the Stillwater palladium-platinum mine in Montana. Ennis worked his way up from Development Geologist doing ore-reserve work, to Production Geologist doing underground Grade Control and production planning, to Chief Geologist – Stillwater Mine, a position he held from 1994 until 2006.
As Chief Geologist, he was in charge of a department of some 27 geologists providing underground Grade and Dilution Control on the narrow J-M Reef palladium-platinum deposit, core-logging interpretation, and ore-reserve definition. In addition, Ennis carried out independent structural-geology research in the Beartooth Mountains that included discovery of major geologic structures that would affect production at the Stillwater mine.
Since about 1997, Ennis has continued independent research and outcrop mapping of the Beartooth front and the effect on the palladium-platinum, chromium, and nickel-copper ore zones within the Stillwater Complex. This work culminated in publication by the Montana Bureau Mines and Geology of a regional map titled “Geologic Map of the Stillwater Complex within the Beartooth Mountains Front Laramide Triangle Zone, South-Central Montana.” He continues to work as Senior Project Geologist for Stillwater Mining Company on current expansion projects along the J-M Reef in the Stillwater Complex.
Ennis is a member of the Geological Society of America, Society of Economic Geologists, Society of Mining Engineers, Montana Geological Society, Tobacco Root Geological Society, Wyoming Geological Association, and Yellowstone-Bighorn Research Association.