Harold Lyons was a physicist whose primary interest was in atomic frequency standards and atomic clocks. The collection documents Lyons and his work with atomic clocks. The collection includes his research as manifested in published papers, presentations, reports, correspondence, laboratory notes, photographs and diagrams.
Scope and Contents:
The Harold Lyons Papers, 1935-1991, show his professional interests, especially his research from the 1950s, as manifested in published papers, presentations, reports, correspondence, laboratory results, and photographs. The bulk of the collection consists of papers and presentations of Lyons and others in the atomic physics field. Most of Lyons's work and the materials he collected address different aspects of microwave frequency.
Formats represented in the collection include published articles, typewritten and handwritten manuscripts, typewritten and handwritten personal correspondence, memorandums, photographs, diagrams, laboratory results, pamphlets, and newspaper clippings. The collection is arranged into five series.
Series 1, Biographical Information, 1955-1965; 1973, contains copies of Lyons's curriculum vitae (circa 1955, 1962, and 1971) and his entries in Who's Who in America and Who's Who in The West. This series also has two folders with materials relating to two honors he received, the Franklin Institute Certificate of Merit, in 1958, and the U.S. Department of Commerce's 25th Commemorative Award in 1973.
Series 2, Papers and Presentations, 1947-1962; 1973-1974, contains the journal articles and papers authored by Lyons and the conference and special presentations he gave during his career, most of which address research for aspects of the atomic clock. Included are papers he authored published in the Journal of Applied Physics, American Scholar, Scientific American, and Annals of the New York Academy of Sciences and presentations given at the National Bureau of Standards for the anniversary of the atomic clock.
Series 3, Correspondence, 1949-1991, contains general correspondence for the years 1949-1966, 1978, 1987, and 1991, as well as correspondence with the following individuals: Dirk Brouwer, Paul Forman, Polykarp Kusch, Koichi Shimoda, Wilbert F. Snyder, Charles H. Townes, and Jerrold R. Zacharias. The bulk of this series is incoming correspondence addressed to Lyons, although he did retain some copies of outgoing correspondence.
Series 4, Research, 1947-1958; 1970-1991, contains laboratory results for deuterated ammonia (via strip chart recordings) and general cesium atomic beam experiments through calibration of magnetic fields, calculation of c-fields in the magnetic chamber, and atomic beam measurements. It also contains brief information on other research interests, such as the International Scientific Radio Union, and scattered promotional materials for natural health and electrical products. In addition, this series contains a copy of the patent granted to Lyons and Benjamin F. Husten in 1955 for the atomic clock and photographs and diagrams relating to Lyons's work on the atomic clock. Included are black and white photographs of Lyons and his colleagues with views of the clock as well as diagrams and charts included in published and unpublished work and presentations. Most of the photographs and diagrams are undated and unlabeled.
Series 5, Collected Background Research Materials, 1935-1982, contains papers and presentation materials focused on atomic physics, including papers published in journals, memoranda, technical reports, conference programs, and conference proceedings. One folder in this series has materials relating to the promotion of the atomic clock through pamphlets, speeches, papers, and one oversize item of reproduced newspaper clippings. A folder relating to a university course of lectures, most likely authored by Polykarp Kusch of Columbia University, on molecular beams is also included in this series. In addition, this series contains copies of two patents, one granted to Friedrich H. Reder in 1960 for molecular resonance devices, and the other, an Australian patent, applied for in 1958, for an invention dealing with a frequency selective method and system.
Arrangement:
The collection is organized into five series.
Series 1, Biographical Information, 1955-1965; 1973
Series 2, Papers and Presentations, 1947-1962; 1973-1974
Subseries 2, Other Research Interests, 1947-1957; 1970-1991
Subseries 3, Photographs and Diagrams, 1957; undated
Series 5, Collected Background Research Materials, 1935-1982
Biographical / Historical:
Harold Lyons was born February 16, 1913 in Buffalo, New York, and attended the University of Buffalo, graduating summa cum laude with a B.S. in Physics in 1933. After obtaining a Ph.D. in Nuclear Physics from the University of Michigan in 1939, he worked at the Naval Research Laboratories for two years and then joined the National Bureau of Standards (NBS) in 1941. In 1944, he was appointed chief of the Microwave Standards Section of an Interservice Radio Propagation Laboratory (IRPL) established at the NBS during World War II. He continued in that position after the war when the IRPL, in 1946, was reconstituted as the Central Radio Propagation Laboratory (CRPL).
Lyons's work on microwave frequency standards led directly to his interest in atomic frequency standards and atomic clocks. On his initiative a substantial program of research and development was pursued in the Microwave Standards Section from 1948-1951. There under his direction the first operative atomic clock, based on the absorption of microwaves of ammonia, was constructed in 1948 and announced in early 1949.
Lyons remained with the CRPL after it was moved to Boulder, Colorado, in 1954, but left a year later to work in Hughes Aircraft Company's Culver City, California, research labs. Here he continued his atomic physics research, particularly applications for the atomic clock, including satellite technology, and expanding to development work in lasers. He continued his work on lasers at Electro-Optical Systems Quantum Physics Division from 1960-1962. In the late 1960s and during the 1970s, he was an independent physics consultant and conducted research through an association with the University of California, Los Angeles.
Harold Lyons died March 23, 1998 in Los Angeles, California.
Related Materials:
Materials in the Archives Center
National Company (NATCO) Atomic Clocks Records, 1955-1968 (AC0547), contains related archival materials, principally on the development of the first commercial atomic clock, the Atomichron.
Materials in the National Museum of American History
The Division of Work and Industry, formerly the Division of Information, Technology and Communication, holds the first operative atomic clock, constructed under Lyons's direction at the National Bureau of Standards in 1948.
Provenance:
The collection was donated by Harold Lyons's daughter, Sherrie L. Lyons, in January, 2000.
Restrictions:
The collection is open for research use.
Rights:
Collection items available for reproduction, but the Archives Center makes no guarantees concerning intellectual property rights. Archives Center cost-recovery and use fees may apply when requesting reproductions.
Papers relating to the career of the nuclear physicist Emilio Segre, including a set of previously classified, now unclassified government documents including correspondence, laboratory reports and memoranda, relating to Segre's research; several diplomas and honorary awards and the programs from the ceremonies at which they were conferred.
Scope and Contents:
This collection is divided into two series: Series 1: Manhattan Project, 1942-1947 and Series 2: Awards, Diplomas, and Other Documents, 1945-1997. Series 1 consists of correspondence, research findings, monthly reports, and patent filing documents associated with Emilio Segrè's work on the atom bomb at the Los Alamos Laboratories in New Mexico. Individuals represented in this series include: Farrington Daniels, Enrico Fermi, Marshall G. Holloway, John Jungerman, Joseph W. Kennedy, W.M. Manning, G.T. Seaborg, Edward Teller, Richard C. Tolman, and Clyde Wiegand. Series 2 contains numerous awards, diplomas, certificates, booklets, and posters related to Emilio Segrè.
Biographical / Historical:
Emilio Segrè was born in Tivoli, Italy in 1905 and studied engineering at the University of Rome in 1922. He would later study under Enrico Fermi, receiving his doctorate in physics in 1928. Segrè was appointed as assistant professor at the University of Rome, but would later leave in 1936 to become the director of the physics laboratory at the University of Palermo. While visiting California in 1938, Segrè found himself dismissed from the University of Palermo by the Fascist government. Thus he remained in the United States and became a research associate in the Radiation Laboratory at the University of California, Berkeley. Renowned in the field of nuclear physics, Segrè was a team leader at the Los Alamos Scientific Laboratories in New Mexico working on the atom bomb.
Segrè was naturalized as a United States citizen in 1944 and went on to be a professor of physics as Berkeley from 1946-1972. He was later appointed as professor of nuclear physics at the University of Rome in 1974. Working primarily in the field of atomic, nuclear, and particle physics, Segrè's work lead to the co-discovery of the elements Technetium, Astatine, and Plutonium-239, as well as of the slow neutron and the anti-proton. Together with Owen Chamberlain, Segrè received the Nobel Prize in Physics in 1959 for the discovery of the anti-proton.
He was a member of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States, the American Philosophical Society, the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, and received many honors from universities and governments throughout the world. His investigations in nuclear physics have increased our understanding of the production methods of nuclear energy.
Related Materials:
Archives Center, National Museum of American History
There are numerous medals, plaques, and other objects that relate to Emilio SegrŠ in the Numismatics Collection, and the Division of Medicine and Science (now Division of Medicine and Science). See Accession #1999.0027.
Provenance:
Collection donated by Rosa Segre Estate, through Peggy Cabaniss, August 27, 1998.
Restrictions:
Collection is open for research. Gloves required with unprotected photographs.
Rights:
Collection items available for reproduction, but the Archives Center makes no guarantees concerning copyright restrictions. Other intellectual property rights may apply. Archives Center cost-recovery and use fees may apply when requesting reproductions.
The collection consists primarily of notebooks, manuals, and other data and operational logbooks documenting the creation, building, and maintenance of Tantalus, and the experiments performed on the machine. Tantalus was the first dedicated synchrotron radiation laboratory and source. Series 5 and Series 6 include oral and video histories with Ednor Rowe, Fred Brown, Cliff Olson, Charles Pruett, and Roger Otte.
Arrangement:
The collection is divided into six series.
Series 1, Notebooks and Logbooks, 1940-1986
Series 2, Data and Operational Logbooks, 1965-1995
Series 3, User Beam Schedule Sheets, 1968-1986
Series 4, Storage Ring Blueprints, 1966-1972
Series 5, Video Histories, 1995
Series 6, Oral History Cassettes, 1995
Biographical / Historical:
At the University of Wisconsin during 1965-1967, a team led by particle physicist Ednor Rowe built a machine designed to analyze what goes on inside high-energy particle accelerators. This was the big, exciting technology in physics at the time. But just as the apparatus neared completion, funding was cut off. Its creators, feeling teased by fate and their government backers, dubbed the machine "Tantalus."
Rowe knew, though, that a by-product of Tantalus's operation was intense "synchrotron radiation," a form of ultra violet light that is used to study the structure of matter. He quickly adapted the machine to make this radiation available for use and soon the facility was crowded with experimenters from all over the world. Tantalus not only pioneered the use of synchrotron radiation, but created a research facility where both scientists and graduate students could perform hands-on work.
Researchers shared information and the results of their experiments in a collegial environment. There was no "King of the Ring" among these goal-oriented scientists. Those working at the Synchrotron Radiation Center always sought ways to improve upon Tantalus, with the result that Tantalus remained an important research tool until 1987, when it was retired and replaced by a newer machine, "Aladdin."
Related Materials:
The Division of Information, Technology, and Society (now the Division of Medicine and Science) collected part of the Tantalus synchrotron radiation ring. See accession 1997.0078.
Provenance:
The collection was donated by Ednor M. Rowe, Associate Director for Accelerator Development, Synchrotron Radiation Center, University of Wisconsin on November 20, 1995.
Restrictions:
The collection is open for research.
Rights:
Collection items available for reproduction, but the Archives Center makes no guarantees concerning copyright restrictions. Other intellectual property rights may apply. Archives Center cost-recovery and use fees may apply when requesting reproductions.
