APCG Distinguished Service Medal

T he apcg takes great pleasure in honoring William A. Bowen, professor emeritus, Department of Geography, California State University, Northridge, with this year’s Distinguished Service Medal. Bill is a careful and thoughtful scholar, a dedicated teacher, and an influential ambassador for geography in both the private and public sectors.

William Bowen was born in Idaho but grew up in the San Francisco Bay Area. After completing his degrees in geography at uc Berkeley, Bill began his career at Northridge in 1971. He was department chair and oversaw the rebuilding of facilities after the devastating Northridge earthquake.

William and Marilyn Bowen.

During the 1970s, Bill was Cartography Team Director for The California Water Atlas (1979), published by the governor’s Office of Planning and Research. The atlas was highly innovative in its use of cartographic representations, and it stands today as a model geography product that combines sophisticated content with broad visual appeal. Few publications have done as much as this atlas to convince scientists, engineers, elected officials, policy makers, and the general public of geography’s central role in addressing issues of growth, development, and environmental quality.

Despite his formal retirement from the Northridge department in 2004, Bill continues to be active in the department, the apcg , the California Geographical Society, and the California Geographical Survey. Bill has used the Survey to make his innovative Digital Atlas of the United States available to support geographic education in public schools and universities throughout the country. By utilizing the Survey’s vast data sets, users can find a full array of electronic maps that bring to life the landscapes of the apcg’s home territory and of the larger world as well. With these electronic resources, the Survey’s motto, “Exploring the world, one map at a time” rings true.

For his role in communicating the value of geography to a diverse and wide audience and for his ongoing service to the Association of Pacific Coast Geographers, we award the Distinguished Service Medal for 2007 to William A. Bowen.