Richard W. “Dick” Eppley died peacefully on 7 October 2023, just 5 days shy of his 92nd birthday. When the news spread among oceanographers now regarded as elders, one word in particular emerged: giant. Dick Eppley was indeed a giant in the field of biological oceanography, not only because of his fundamental contributions to its conceptual structure, but also through the lasting impacts of his mentorship, quiet support, and inspiration on a generation of scientists who have been guided by his vision of how to study processes that structure food webs and biogeochemical cycles in the sea (Fig. 1).
Son of a fifth-generation metalworker, Dick Eppley broke the mold. He was born and raised in Washington State, where he attended college (B.A. in Botany, Washington State College, Pullman) and met Jean, his life-long sweetheart. Dick played jazz in big bands and quartets to make ends meet and won a National Science Foundation (NSF) scholarship for graduate study. After quickly proposing to and marrying Jean, he enrolled in Stanford University's graduate program in marine biology. He completed his Ph.D. in plant physiology under the direction of Lawrence W. Blinks, studying ion transport in seaweeds at the Hopkins Marine Station. Seeking better opportunities for his growing family after teaching at the University of Southern California (1957–1960), he took a research position with the Northrop Corporation (1960–1963) where he worked on culturing algae for life support in space vehicles.
Dick's pivot to oceanography began in 1963 when he was recruited by the innovative and immensely influential John D. H. Strickland to join the new Food Chain Research Group (FCRG) at the Scripps Institution of Oceanography. Eppley remained with the FCRG throughout its existence, 1963–1989, as a Research Biologist, Lecturer, and de facto group leader after Strickland's death in 1970. When accepting ASLO's John Martin Award for his classic paper on new production (Table 1, Eppley and Peterson 1979), Dick showed a group photo of the FCRG, describing them as a “fun group to be with … kind of a who's who of biological oceanography at the time.” He took the time to identify contributions of individual FCRG students and each of the support staff, always the appreciative and proud leader.
The 1990 article describing Eppley's research provides a roadmap to a trove of information on his publications and their impacts at that time. Readily available with open access, it stands as a great resource for students. Because Dick always strove to place his work in historical context—he considered it “an obligation”—his papers also guide the reader to the ground-breaking work by others.
Recognizing the breadth, depth, and insight of his research, Dick's students and postdocs concluded that “Richard W. Eppley has established himself as one of the most influential biological oceanographers of this century through his contributions to the field of phytoplan
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