[2] He received a Bachelor of Science in electrical engineering in 1956 from Lehigh University and went to work for Hazeltine Corporation from 1956 to 1960.
In 1960, he became a marine technician for Columbia University's Lamont–Doherty Earth Observatory, applying his expertise as an electrical engineer in oceanographic research.
Among his most important work was measurements of magnetic anomalies in the sea floor which supported the Morley–Vine–Matthews hypothesis explaining seafloor spreading.
[3] Pitman, along with Columbia colleague Bill Ryan, published evidence in 1997 that a massive flooding event greatly expanded the Black Sea very quickly around 5600 BC.
[3] In 1998, he received the Alexander Agassiz Medal of the United States National Academy of Sciences "for his fundamental contribution to the plate tectonic revolution through insightful analysis of marine magnetic anomalies and for his studies of the causes and effects of sea-level changes".