Committees: Honors & Awards
Honorary Member of the House Award
A visionary geologist and natural leader, whose wit, enthusiasm and charm com-bined to become tools to forge needed changes that will lead the AAPG into the future.
David Hawk is a remarkable geologist, brilliant communicator and natural leader with the unique ability to see the changes coming to the energy industry and react to them before they arrive. David served as an outstanding Chair of the House of Delegates with clear goals and he kept an ongoing dialog with the past Chairs of the House and the Executive Committee. David’s Sectional HoD Breakfasts were amazing. He would tell some jokes to relax the group to get their attention and then share the latest improvements for AAPG along with his rating of the breakfast biscuits. He worked for years prior to his chairmanship to implement changes to AAPG in order to preserve its relevancy. To do so, he tackled the splitting and redefinition of the AAPG vice-president into a Sections and Regions VPs. He also championed other internationalization efforts including the revised dues structure and membership requirements. David brought about more transparency in the HoD decision-making process. These changes would not have come about without David’s foresight, enthusiasm and sincerity.
His commitment to the House has been outstanding. He has been a Delegate from the Idaho Association of Professional Geologists from 1984-1994 and from 1997 to the present. He served on the HoD Constitution and Bylaws Committee from 2004-2007, was Vice-Chair from 2004 to 2005 and Chair from 2005 to 2007. David also served on the HoD Honors and Awards Committee from 2002 to 2004 and chaired the committee from 2003 to 2004. He served on the HoD Resolutions Committee and the HoD Credentials Committee from 2008 to the present. In 2007, David Hawk received the House of Delegates Long Service Award.
David Hawk, an Idaho Registered Professional Geologist, earned a BS in Geology from the University of Idaho in 1967 and an MS in Geology from the University of Oklahoma in 1970. He started his professional career as an exploration geologist with Atlantic Richfield in Dallas and Lafayette (1970-1972). Soon he moved to Tenneco in Denver (1972-1973). From 1973 to 1980, David worked for IGC Production Company in Boise as the Vice President, General Manager. After a short stint (1981-1983) as Senior Vice President of Exploration and Production at Horn Resources Corporation, David became the Director, Natural Resources at J. R. Simplot Company in Boise where he worked from 1984 to 2007, when he retired. It was at J. R. Simplot, the potato company, where David found a new meaning for the term “spudding-in”. For Mr. Simplot, David was the Chairman of the Board for Remington Oil and Gas Company for five years. His retirement didn’t last long, from 2007 to the present David has worked as a consultant, Energy Analysis & Answers.
David has spent most of his career supporting the profession and energy industry. He has been a member of the Lafayette Geological Society (1971-1972), the Rocky Mountain Association of Geologists (1973 to present) and President, Southwest Area Chair and member of the Idaho Association of Professional Geologists (1974 to present). Of significant note, David chaired the 1987 RMS annual meeting and served as RMS Secretary/Treasurer and RMS President-Elect (2001-2003) and he served as Rocky Mountain Section President from 2003 to 2004. He has served on the AAPG Executive Committee and numerous AAPG committees and received the 2004 AAPG Certificate of Merit.
David Hawk has given dozens of public lectures and interviews on energy and the oil and gas industry including economics, transportation, distribution and generation. He has also given testimony and been an advisor to judicial, regulatory and legislative bodies. Since 2008 he has been on the AAPG Geo-DC Board of Governors. David is a natural communicator with a relaxed comfortable style that endears him to his audiences and allows him to make his point. He is also a clear thinker with a vision for the future of the energy industry.
I have known David Hawk for many years and I find his wit, intelligence, foresight and dedication to the AAPG House of Delegates to be exemplary. He has made a difference and is greatly deserving of the Honorary Member of the House of Delegates award. I am honored to be his citationist.