Earl Randall Parker (November 22, 1912 — May 9, 1998) was an American engineer and professor. Parker began his

metallurgy Metallurgy is a domain of materials science and engineering that studies the physical and chemical behavior of metallic elements, their inter-metallic compounds, and their mixtures, which are known as alloys. Metallurgy encompasses both the sc ...

career in the mid 1930s as a researcher for the General Electric Research Laboratory. In the mid 1940s, Parker began teaching metallurgy at the

University of California, Berkeley The University of California, Berkeley (UC Berkeley, Berkeley, Cal, or California) is a public land-grant research university in Berkeley, California. Established in 1868 as the University of California, it is the state's first land-grant u ...

and remained in his teaching position until 1978. While at Berkeley, Parker was chair of the material sciences department and director of engineering research between the 1950s and 1960s. For awards, Parker received a

Guggenheim Fellowship Guggenheim Fellowships are grants that have been awarded annually since by the John Simon Guggenheim Memorial Foundation to those "who have demonstrated exceptional capacity for productive scholarship or exceptional creative ability in the ar ...

in 1960 and was named a National Medal of Science recipient in 1979.

Early life and education

On November 22, 1912, Parker was born in

Denver, Colorado Denver () is a consolidated city and county, the capital, and most populous city of the U.S. state of Colorado. Its population was 715,522 at the 2020 census, a 19.22% increase since 2010. It is the 19th-most populous city in the Unit ...

. For his post-secondary education, Parker graduated from the Colorado School of Mines with a

degree in 1935.

Career

After graduating, Parker was a metallurgy researcher at the General Electric Research Laboratory from 1935 to 1944. During this time period, Parker conducted research on copper, silver and steel to determine their

mechanical properties A materials property is an intensive property of a material, i.e., a physical property that does not depend on the amount of the material. These quantitative properties may be used as a metric by which the benefits of one material versus another ca ...

. In 1944, Parker studied

Liberty ships Liberty ships were a ship class, class of cargo ship built in the United States during World War II under the Emergency Shipbuilding Program. Though British in concept, the design was adopted by the United States for its simple, low-cost constr ...

at the

to determine the cause of their damages. During the mid-1940s, Parker began teaching metallurgy at Berkeley as an

associate professor Associate professor is an academic title with two principal meanings: in the North American system and that of the ''Commonwealth system''. Overview In the ''North American system'', used in the United States and many other countries, it is a ...

before being promoted to

professor Professor (commonly abbreviated as Prof.) is an Academy, academic rank at university, universities and other post-secondary education and research institutions in most countries. Literally, ''professor'' derives from Latin as a "person who pr ...

in 1949. Parker remained at Berkeley as a professor until his retirement in 1978 and held the position of

professor emeritus ''Emeritus'' (; female: ''emerita'') is an adjective used to designate a retired chair, professor, pastor, bishop, pope, director, president, prime minister, rabbi, emperor, or other person who has been "permitted to retain as an honorary title ...

from 1978 to 1988. Apart from academics, Parker was the chair of the material sciences department for Berkeley from 1953 to 1957. After directing Berkeley's school of engineering research between 1957 and 1964, Parker returned to his chair position with the material sciences department for two additional years.

Awards and honors

In 1960, Parker was awarded a

in engineering. In 1979, Parker was named a recipient of the National Medal of Science.

Personal life

Parker died on May 9, 1998, in

Sacramento, California ) , image_map = Sacramento County California Incorporated and Unincorporated areas Sacramento Highlighted.svg , mapsize = 250x200px , map_caption = Location within Sacramento C ...

. He was married and had two children.

References

1912 births 1998 deaths University of California, Berkeley faculty National Medal of Science laureates Fellows of the American Physical Society {{Authority control