NSS 2023 Luminary George Dasher

2023 Luminary Series - George Dasher, NSS #16643/RL/FE/AL/OS.
George Dasher is a force to be reckoned with in the Virginia Region and across the NSS. He grew up a cattle farm that was swallowed by Columbia, Maryland, and in college, he majored in geology and minored in biology. After college, George was interested in caving so in 1975, and he contacted the Baltimore Grotto. Bob Gulden answered his letters and invited George on a caving trip to Greenbrier County, West Virginia, where they visited Organ Cave. George later became involved with the Organ Cave Project, which was the survey of what was then the longest cave in West Virginia. George liked surveying, processing the data, and drawing the working maps, as well as the long trips underground and always exploring something new, and he worked with the project until it terminated in the early 1980s. He also, during that time, joined the Greenbrier Grotto and began surveying several other nearby caves, such Foxhole, Cricket, Patton, and Laurel Creek Caves.
Professionally, he has worked as a draftsman, an electric logger, and as an oil-and- gas geologist, a paramedic, and most recently with the West Virginia Department of Environmental Protection. But his caving career has centered on cartography, from exploration to processing the data, to drawing working maps. He wrote the book on cave mapping; he is the author of On Station, the NSS' foundational book on cave survey. In fact, George has become a prolific author. As a member and now executive director of the West Virginia Speleological Survey, he has been editor, author, or contributor for 14 WVASS bulletins, a monograph, and a geology field trip guide. He has also been editor of Greenbrier Grotto's The Carabiner Wrap Up, and continues to edit The West Virginia Caver, now in its 41st year. In addition, George has authored ten sci-fi and fantasy books.
George Dasher is a Life Member and Fellow of the NSS and has been a recipient of the Arts and Letters award and the William J. Stephenson Award for Outstanding Service. He is now retired and resides in Elkview, West Virginia.