Jamaica is an Antillean island with a complicated geology and a colorful history of geological exploration. The study of the island’s geology during the nineteenth and early twentieth centuries relied upon rare visits by peripatetic specialists. They included the stellar, such as Sir Henry De la Beche and Wendell P. Woodring; the tragic, notably Lucas Barrett, who was only 25 when he died of the bends while studying Jamaican reefs; and the eccentric like Charles T. Trechmann, formulator of the Forbidden Theory of Mountain Uplift, and Charles A. Matley, who considered the Antilles a foundered continent. The theory and practice of geology had moved on with every visitor, so knowledge of the island’s geological history improved by major, albeit well-separated increments. Following the Second World War, the foundation of the modern Geological Survey Department based in Kingston consolidated geological research under the dynamic leadership of the Latvian Verners A. Zans.