Skip to content
Ellis Abel Learns.

In my own words · Smith County, TX

Why I love the ocean

An orange-and-white Saildrone autonomous research vessel under sail on the water near San Francisco Bay. Real NASA photograph used on the Ellis Abel Learns "Why I Love Oceans" page — read by families in Smith County, TX.
An orange-and-white Saildrone autonomous research vessel under sail on the water near San Francisco Bay. NASA/JPL-Caltech · Public domain
  • Most of it has never been seen.
  • It moves heat all the way around the world.
  • There are mountains down there.

You can love the ocean in Smith County.

What it really is

The ocean covers most of the planet and moves its heat.

Three things to try today

  1. Find out how deep the deepest part is.
  2. Compare that to the tallest mountain.
  3. Find out how much has been mapped.

For the grown-up reading this

Smith County is one of 254 counties in Texas. The question is not whether Smith County, TX has children who love the ocean. It is whether anyone told them that counts as something.

Less of the seafloor is mapped in detail than the surface of Mars.

If the kid who loves this is a girl

Read what one popular teacher said to one little girl who took out the classroom trash without being asked — and what that girl did with the rest of her life.

Girls are great at math — Smith County, TX →

Love something else too

A USGS cartographer bends over a light table, scribing contour lines by hand onto a topographic map separation. Real USGS photograph used on the Ellis Abel Learns "Why I Love Maps" page — read by families in Smith County, TX.Why I love mapsA worker checks a replacement distillation assembly for the space station's water recycling system in a processing facility. Real NASA photograph used on the Ellis Abel Learns "Why I Love Recycling" page — read by families in Smith County, TX.Why I love recyclingAn aerial photograph of the Vehicle Assembly Building under construction at Kennedy Space Center, its steel frame still open to the sky. Real NASA photograph used on the Ellis Abel Learns "Why I Love Building" page — read by families in Smith County, TX.Why I love buildingAn aerial view of construction crews and barges working to complete the westbound span of the Indian River causeway bridge. Real NASA photograph used on the Ellis Abel Learns "Why I Love Bridges" page — read by families in Smith County, TX.Why I love bridgesThe four-wheeled Artemis Jr. prototype rover, topped with a solar array, driving across a grass field beside the Operations and Checkout Building. Real NASA photograph used on the Ellis Abel Learns "Why I Love Cars" page — read by families in Smith County, TX.Why I love carsA humpback whale launching most of its body out of the ocean in a breach, with spray flying off its flippers. Real USGS photograph used on the Ellis Abel Learns "Why I Love Whales" page — read by families in Smith County, TX.Why I love whalesA bee crawling over the yellow centre of a wildflower while pollinating it on Kennedy Space Center property. Real NASA photograph used on the Ellis Abel Learns "Why I Love Insects" page — read by families in Smith County, TX.Why I love bugsA scientist looks through a microscope at human breast cancer cells in a cell bioassay laboratory, with an automated liquid handling robot behind her. Real USGS photograph used on the Ellis Abel Learns "Why I Love Medicine" page — read by families in Smith County, TX.Why I love doctors

Near Smith County

Why I love the ocean, everywhere in the US · All things to love · STEM jobs you could do · Summer camps in Smith County