1933

Edwin Russell Kennedy, MS '34, PhD '36, on May 9; he was 96. Interested in science and especially chemistry from an early age and precocious in many respects, he obtained his pilot's license at 16 years of age and joined the Air Reserve Officers' Training Corps (Air ROTC), a training regime he kept up through his Caltech years, leading to a commission in the reserves as a lieutenant. After receiving his doctorate, Kennedy went to work for the Shell Oil Company, in Wilmington, California, as a petroleum technologist/engineer. Called to active duty in 1942, he was assigned with the rank of major to the Chemical Warfare Service, where he helped develop alternative fuel sources for the military. While serving on General Chennault's personal staff in the China Burma India theater, Kennedy was awarded the Legion of Merit for successfully converting motor-pool vehicles from gasoline to an ethanol-alcohol-gasoline blend, thereby saving the United States millions of dollars, and he frequently flew on missions with Chennault's "Flying Tigers" to conduct his research under battle conditions. Other military honors included the Asiatic Pacific Service Medal, the American Service Medal, and the World War II Victory Medal. After the war he remained in the reserves, rising to the rank of colonel and finishing a 35-year military career as assistant head of the chemistry lab at Eglin Air Force Base in Florida, where he led a team in developing the first widely used jet fuel (JP-3). He also resumed his employment with Shell Oil, working at the Richmond, California, refineries specializing in petrochemicals, petroleum products, and rocket and jet fuels. He remained with Shell for 25 years, eventually rising to a lead position in the research and development department of the Shell Chemical Company in New York City. Retiring early, he went to work for the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey as an engineer of materials research in the Engineering Division's research and development department. His achievements there included developing an anticorrosive paint for the George Washington Bridge, developing a railroad-car coupler with safety valves, and solving the problem of imploding windows due to wind pressure at the top of the World Trade Center by creating a system for discharging stabilizing gas between double glass panes. He retired from the Port Authority after 15 years. During his career, he was a member of the Sigma Xi Research Society, the American Chemical Society, and numerous other professional societies and associations. He enjoyed building things from scratch, including a color television and a personal computer, and he and his wife, Dorothea, custom built a home in Rye, New York, that included a system for recovering water from the air-conditioning unit and diverting it for watering the grass. He enjoyed keeping the yard up, growing roses, and fixing household appliances around the neighborhood. He also performed much of the building maintenance for the Rye Methodist Church, on whose board he served. Dorothea died in 1984, but he continued to live in Rye until 1995, when he sold the house and moved permanently to his second home in the village of Hoosick Falls, New York, after being diagnosed with Alzheimer's disease. In 2006 he moved to the Alzheimer's unit of the Vermont Veterans Home in Bennington. He walked 10 miles a day until his last few years, when he had to limit himself to one or two miles, and he enjoyed collecting Big Band music of the '30s and '40s, especially Glenn Miller and the Dorsey Brothers. With his ability to sew, he made all of the draperies and furniture slip covers for the Rye house, and he pursued a lifelong passion for photography. Kennedy participated in brain studies and Alzheimer's clinical drug trials at the Memory Clinic in Bennington for several years, and he appeared in a segment of Dateline NBC on how Alzheimer's disease could be managed with early intervention. He also participated in the Healing Arts Initiative developed by the Vermont Arts Exchange in North Bennington, where he explored creative movement, drumming, painting, and drawing. He was chosen to decorate one of the smaller "Palettes of Vermont," and a retrospective of his work is being planned. Predeceased by his wife; a sister, Bernice Stephenson; and an infant son, David, Kennedy is survived by three daughters, Virginia Kennedy-Brennan, Nancy Kennedy, and Linda Eve Kennedy-Swalm; a son, Mark; and four grandchildren and four great-grandchildren.



1935

Clyde Chivens, of Morro Bay, California, on February 27; he was 93. A mechanical engineer, he founded the South Pasadena company of Boller and Chivens in 1945 with partner Harry Boller and produced telescopes and research instruments. Predeceased in 1997 by Dorothy, his wife of 61 years, and by a son, Don, in 2005, he is survived by two sons, David and Allen, and by five grandchildren and two great-grandchildren.



1937

Charles F. Gates, MS '38, in Palos Verdes, California, on October 10, 2007; he was 93.

Dorr Kimball, in Oceanside, California, on January 27; he was 92. He was supervisor of the Edison Company's Precision Measurement Lab. He was also an expert photographer who built telescopes, grinding his own lenses. Predeceased by his wife, Violet, he is survived by two sons, Robert and Raymond; a daughter, Nancy Farris; and seven grandchildren and six great-grandchildren.



1939

Robert M. Kyte, of Centralia, Washington, on September 22, 2007.

Arthur J. Stosick, PhD, of Cupertino, California, on April 9.



1940

George H. Arvin, in Des Moines, Washington, on February 27.



1941

Hugh Bradner, PhD, of San Diego, on May 5; he was 92. A physicist and a professor emeritus at UC San Diego's Scripps Institution of Oceanography as well as at the Cecil H. and Ida M. Green Institute of Geophysics and Planetary Physics, he was noted for his role in the development of innovative ocean technologies, including the first neoprene wetsuit. As a nuclear physicist, he worked at the U.S. Naval Ordnance Laboratory in Washington, D.C., and the Lawrence Radiation Laboratory at UC Berkeley, and he was also a founding scientist at the Los Alamos National Laboratory during the Manhattan Project. He joined Scripps as a research geophysicist in the Institute of Geophysics and Planetary Physics in 1961, and he became a professor in 1964, serving as acting provost of UC San Diego's Revelle College in 1966–67 and remaining at Scripps and UCSD until his retirement in 1980. Bradner published extensively in the fields of physics, seismology, geophysics, and diving. Possessed by a lifelong passion for the ocean, he enjoyed diving and sailing and was one of the first Americans to make a deep-water scuba dive. In 1951, while working at UC Berkeley, he decided to spend some "weekend time" improving diving equipment for Navy frogmen, which began his pioneering research on the wetsuit. Focusing on the design of a wetsuit for military underwater swimmers, he developed a foam wet suit using a unicellular material known as neoprene. He collaborated with scientific divers at Scripps Institution of Oceanography who were experimenting with the new scuba regulator invented by Jacques Cousteau and Emile Gagnan, and it was Scripps divers who first tested his wet suit designs. His reluctance to claim himself as sole inventor of the wet suit illustrated his collaborative approach to science. Other research endeavors of Bradner's led to such novel diving equipment as underwater contact lenses, a single-hose regulator, a decompression meter, and even a loop system for quickly extracting U.S. Navy SEALs from the water via inflatable boats. He also combined his scientific and recreational interests by coauthoring a monograph on the radulae of the cowrie seashell. A fellow of the American Physical Society and a member of the Phi Beta Kappa and Sigma Xi honors societies, the American Geophysical Union, the Seismological Society of America, and the DUMAND (Deep Muon and Neutrino Detection) Steering Committee, Bradner was active in a number of local organizations as well, serving on the San Diego Planetarium Joint Powers Board in 1969–70 and on the board of the San Diego Hall of Science. He was also a member of the La Jolla Symphony Orchestra and Chorus, the American Surfing Association, the Explorers Club of San Diego, and the La Jolla Play Readers. He served on a variety of national, state, and university committees, both academic and concerned with diving safety. An avid outdoorsman, he hiked in the Sierra Nevada, swam in the La Jolla Rough Water Swim, and traveled worldwide to enjoy the sea. Known for his teaching, he was also a painter, a photographer, and a jeweler. He graduated from Ohio's Miami University in 1936 and received the Miami University Medal in 1960 and an honorary doctorate in 1961. Predeceased on April 10 by Marjorie, his wife of 65 years, he is survived by a daughter, Bari Bradner Cornet, and by three grandchildren and a great-granddaughter.

Charles L. Dailey, MS '42, PhD '54, on March 25.

Willis E. Dobbins, MS '46, on January 21.



1943

Irl Mowery, MS, of Houston, Texas, on February 20; he was 88. After receiving his master's in meteorology from Caltech, he served during World War II developing long-range weather forecasts for the Aleutian Islands. A native of Houston, he performed as an actor and singer at the former Houston Little Theater, then moved on to become a producer of plays and musicals in New York City. He was also the business manager in the early 1970s for the St. Paul, Minnesota, Opera. A leading Houston fund-raiser for cultural causes, Mowery's successful fund-raising for the Houston Ballet in the 1970s set a pattern for similar efforts benefiting local arts organizations. In 1981, he became executive director of the Houston Lyric Theater Foundation, which provided the Wortham Theater Center as the home for the Houston Ballet and Houston Grand Opera. In addition to writing plays, which were produced off-off-Broadway and in Hollywood, he wrote feature stories for the Houston Chronicle's former Sunday magazine, Texas. He is survived by his wife, Mary ("Dinnie").

Ralph Willits, on April 14. He served in the Navy during World War II and the Korean War and spent 35 years with Mobil Oil, after which he retired to the Rogue Valley in Medford, Oregon, where he pursued many volunteer activities and his great love of fishing. He is survived by Nancy, his wife of nearly 60 years, and by three children, seven grandchildren, and three great-grandchildren.



1944

Cran H. Barrow, on September 1, 2007.

Frank T. Edwards Jr., CAVU, on October 1, 2007. He was one of a group of students during World War II who received certification after completing an accelerated training program in meteorology, and who referred to themselves as Ceiling and Visibility Unlimited.

Neville S. Long, MS '48, on April 11.

Don S. Martin, PhD, of Prairie Village, Kansas, on March 6; he was 89. After completing his doctoral work in 1941, he was recruited to work on the Manhattan project, first at Northwestern University and later at Los Alamos, New Mexico. After the war, he joined the Chemistry Department at Iowa State University, where he taught until his retirement in 1985. He is survived by his wife, Marion, and by three children, several grandchildren, and a sister.

George M. Osgood, of Portland, Oregon, on November 28, 2007; he was 84.



1945

Mark M. Macomber, on March 16.

Donald K. Traverse, in Wilsonville, Oregon, on March 11.



1946

Charles W. Griffing, MS, Eng '47, on February 1.



1947

Paul Linam, on March 15.



1948

William S. Johnson, MS, on January 24. During World War II he served as an officer in the Air Transport Command in the China Burma India theater. Released from active duty in 1946 with the rank of captain, he served in the reserves until his retirement in 1980 as a lieutenant colonel. An aerospace engineer whose 40-year career included projects such as the B-58, the first supersonic bomber; the Apollo, Space Lab, and Soyuz missions; and amphibious assault landing craft, he was an associate fellow of the American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics, a life member of the Military Officers of America and the China Burma India Veterans Association, and a registered professional engineer. He was a long-time member of Memorial Presbyterian Church. Predeceased by two wives, Helen and Maxine, he is survived by a stepdaughter, Judy Bowles Pettinelli.

Edward F. Roskowski, on May 31, 2007.

Joseph W. Wechsler, MS '49, Eng '50, on February 3.



1949

Wayne Herzig, of Dana Point, California, on March 29; he was 82. After graduating from Caltech he worked as an engineer with the Division of Architecture in Sacramento, and then was employed by the Fraser Company in Pasadena. He later formed the Herzig Corporation and did both mechanical engineering and construction for 30 years. He is survived by his wife, Beverly.

Joseph W. Schmit, MS, on January 28; he was 85. on June 4, 2007. After graduating from Caltech, he joined Technicolor in 1949 and held various positions in its research and technical departments, including that of assistant technical manager and assistant to the corporate technical director for standards and specifications. He then served as a consultant in the motion picture and related industries from 1977 until 1984, when he rejoined Technicolor. He retired in 1988 but was called back a little more than a year later as the technical director of optical printing, and he remained in that position until 2002. A technical expert on the Technicolor imbibition process (aka the dye transfer process) used on movies ranging from The Ten Commandments to Disney's Swiss Family Robinson, Schmit was a member of the Technicolor team to receive a 1959 Academy Award (Scientific or Technical Class Two Award) for the development and practical application of equipment for wet printing (which prevented reproducing scratches from the negatives onto the film prints). He also received a patent in 1961 as coinventor of the projection printer used in wet printing. In addition, he was a life fellow of the Society of Motion Picture and Television Engineers and a senior member of the Society of Imaging Science and Technology. Active in the Boy Scouts for over 75 years, Schmit was involved in numerous scouting leadership activities, including serving for over 40 years on the Catholic Committee on Scouting (CCS) for the Archdiocese of Los Angeles, at one time serving as chairman. The CCS awarded him the St. George Emblem in 1970 for significant and outstanding contributions to the spiritual development of Catholic youth in Scouting, and the Msgr. James E. Dolan Award in 2003 for his many years of dedication, service, and support of the CCS and Catholic Scouting. Predeceased by Robin, his wife of 55 years, he is survived by a daughter, Diane; two sons, Michael and Richard; and two sisters, Mary Garrity and Suzanne Healy.



1950

Warren G. "Fritz" Whiting, of Las Cruces, New Mexico, on March 8; he was 85. He worked for the Reynolds Metals Company in Richmond, Virginia, for 34 years as a plant engineer, building and operating extrusion plants there and throughout the country. After retiring, he relocated to Albuquerque, New Mexico, for 18 years, then moved to Las Cruces a year ago. A lifelong fan of the St. Louis Cardinals baseball team, an avid carpenter, an amateur brewer of root beer, and a frequent patron of Chuck E. Cheese with his grandchildren, he was an active member of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints, which he served in many capacities, including twice as a bishop in Virginia, and then as a sealer for six years in the Albuquerque, New Mexico, Temple. He is survived by Eloise, his wife of 61 years; two sons, Bruce and Douglas; three daughters, Colleen McCall Bhasker, Marilyn Parker, and Karen Heiner; 16 grandchildren and 8 great-grandchildren; and one sister, Verna Mae Bean.



1953

James R. Kliegel, in Newport Beach, California, on January 10.

Norman Patrick "Pat" Wilburn, MS '54, PhD '58, of Richland, Washington, on January 10. He moved to Washington to work at the Hanford Project but pursued temporary assignments elsewhere, including postdoctoral studies at MIT and work at the Argonne National Labs. A key contribution at Hanford was his introduction of software engineering into the development of computer codes involving physics and safety required for fast-reactor regulatory review. Wilburn enjoyed boating, skiing, and camping, as well as world travel with his wife. An elder in the Westside Church, he as well as his wife volunteered for many years with the Wycliffe Bible Translators, applying his computer skills to the translation process. Missionary work took the couple to Pakistan, Kenya, and Burma, among other places. Wilburn is survived by Patty, his wife of 51 years; two sons, Scott and Matt; two daughters, Rebecca Harbour and Kristin Hoey; and 11 grandchildren.



1954

Thomas E. Feuchtwang, MS, on December 31, 2007.

John Keith Rowley, PhD, on October 29, 2006; he was 77. From the year he received his doctorate until his retirement in 2000 he worked as a research chemist at Brookhaven National Laboratory. His research centered on solar neutrinos, and he was involved with several solar neutrino collaborations, including the chlorine experiment in Homestake, South Dakota; the GALLEX experiment in Gran Sasso, Italy; and the SNO experiment in Sudbury, Ontario. Besides his love of learning and science, he enjoyed his family, sailing, birding, music, and being outdoors. Predeceased by a brother, Paul, he is survived by his wife, Karen; two sons, Karl and Steven; a daughter, Laura; two grandchildren; four brothers, Neil, Carl, George, and Tom; and three sisters, Marjorie Arvin, Mildred Chackarian, and Mary Rowley.



1957

Donald S. Lopez, MS, in Washington, D.C., on March 3.



1962

Stanley M. Flatte, on November 4, 2007.

Julian V. Noble, on March 1.



1964

Donald Harlow, on January 27; he was 65. "Remembered for his great intellect, inspirational passion for Esperanto, love of nature and frequent letters to the editor," he served in the U.S. Air Force from 1964 to 1975. His many years' involvement with the Esperanto community included serving as president of the Esperanto League for North America and as editor of its magazine, Esperanto USA, as well as working as a programmer, teaching courses, traveling to conferences, and writing original works and translating literature. He won several awards for both his literary endeavors and his website. Other passions included reading science fiction and fantasy, studying astronomy, solving physics equations for fun, hiking, and writing. He is survived by his wife, Angela, and by four children and four grandchildren.



1967

Steven R. Tyler, on March 19. He was a technical group leader at JPL.



1970

James E. Blakemore, PhD, on December 5, 2007.



1973

Ahmed M. Abdel-Ghaffar, MS, PhD '76, on April 17; he was 60. A professor of engineering at USC whose original work in the design and monitoring of bridges enabled the development of better methods for constructing them, Abdel-Ghaffar, as a Caltech grad student, conducted groundbreaking research on the Vincent Thomas Bridge, which links San Pedro to Terminal Island. He demonstrated that streaming data from sensors, even in the absence of an earthquake, could be used to create a mathematical model for representing the overall health of the bridge. Today, such diagnostic information is used to design bridges and other structures better able to withstand earthquakes, and a computer program developed by Abdel-Ghaffar was eventually used by the California Department of Transportation to retrofit the Vincent Thomas Bridge. During his career, Abdel-Ghaffar consulted internationally on the building of structures, including a bridge spanning the Gulf of Suez. He also collaborated with bridge researchers at major universities in Japan. Abdel-Ghaffar did other work, such as examining the interaction between soil and structures affected by earthquakes and conducting vibration studies on Santa Felicia Dam, which created Lake Piru in Ventura County, but bridges remained his passion. Before joining the USC Sonny Astani Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering in 1987, Abdel-Ghaffar served on the faculties of the University of Illinois and of Princeton. Divorced, he is survived by two sons, Samy and Tarek; a daughter, Sarah; and a brother and two sisters, who live in Egypt.



1977

Stephen Taylor, MS, PhD '86, on January 6.

 

 

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