Harvey Elliott White (January 28, 1902 – October 3, 1988) was an American

physicist A physicist is a scientist who specializes in the field of physics, which encompasses the interactions of matter and energy at all length and time scales in the physical universe. Physicists generally are interested in the root or ultimate caus ...

and professor 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 ...

Early life and education

White was born in

Parkersburg, West Virginia Parkersburg is a city in and the county seat of Wood County, West Virginia, Wood County, West Virginia. Located at the confluence of the Ohio River, Ohio and Little Kanawha River, Little Kanawha rivers, it is the state's fourth-largest city and ...

, but grew up in

Pasadena, California Pasadena ( ) is a city in Los Angeles County, California, northeast of downtown Los Angeles. It is the most populous city and the primary cultural center of the San Gabriel Valley. Old Pasadena is the city's original commercial district. I ...

. He received an A.B. from

Occidental College Occidental College (informally Oxy) is a private liberal arts college in Los Angeles, California. Founded in 1887 as a coeducational college by clergy and members of the Presbyterian Church, it became non-sectarian in 1910. It is one of the oldes ...

in 1925 and a Ph.D. from

Cornell University Cornell University is a private statutory land-grant research university based in Ithaca, New York. It is a member of the Ivy League. Founded in 1865 by Ezra Cornell and Andrew Dickson White, Cornell was founded with the intention to teach an ...

in 1929. In 1929–30 he was a

National Research Council National Research Council may refer to: * National Research Council (Canada), sponsoring research and development * National Research Council (Italy), scientific and technological research, Rome * National Research Council (United States), part of ...

Fellow at the

Physikalische Technische Reichsanstalt The Physikalisch-Technische Bundesanstalt (PTB) is the national metrology institute of the Federal Republic of Germany, with scientific and technical service tasks. It is a higher federal authority and a public-law institution directly under fe ...

Germany Germany,, officially the Federal Republic of Germany, is a country in Central Europe. It is the second most populous country in Europe after Russia, and the most populous member state of the European Union. Germany is situated betwe ...

, working on

atomic spectroscopy Atomic spectroscopy is the study of the electromagnetic radiation absorbed and emitted by atoms. Since unique elements have characteristic (signature) spectra, atomic spectroscopy, specifically the electromagnetic spectrum or mass spectrum, is appl ...

under

Friedrich Paschen Louis Carl Heinrich Friedrich Paschen (22 January 1865 - 25 February 1947), was a German physicist, known for his work on electrical discharges. He is also known for the Paschen series, a series of hydrogen spectral lines in the infrared region t ...

Career

While at Cornell, White was an Instructor in Physics from 1927 to 1929. After receiving his PhD and returning from Germany, he spent his career at the University of California, Berkeley: he was an Assistant Professor of Physics from 1930 to 1938, Associate Professor from 1938 to 1942, and then Professor. In 1958 he became Vice Chairman of the physics department. He designed two new buildings for the department at Berkeley, the second the 525-seat Physical Sciences Lecture Hall, which has a revolving stage divided into 120° sections each with its own chalkboard and demonstration facilities, and was also founder Director of the

Lawrence Hall of Science The Lawrence Hall of Science is a public science center in Berkeley, California that offers hands-on science exhibits, designs curriculum, aids professional development, and offers after school science resources to students of all ages. The Hall ...

. He retired in 1969. He was a major proponent of the

vector model of the atom Vector most often refers to: *Euclidean vector, a quantity with a magnitude and a direction *Vector (epidemiology), an agent that carries and transmits an infectious pathogen into another living organism Vector may also refer to: Mathematic ...

, which he used to illustrate

quantum mechanics Quantum mechanics is a fundamental theory in physics that provides a description of the physical properties of nature at the scale of atoms and subatomic particles. It is the foundation of all quantum physics including quantum chemistry, ...

. During

World War II World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great powers—forming two opposin ...

, he briefly worked with a group under

Ernest Lawrence Ernest Orlando Lawrence (August 8, 1901 – August 27, 1958) was an American nuclear physicist and winner of the Nobel Prize in Physics in 1939 for his invention of the cyclotron. He is known for his work on uranium-isotope separation f ...

measuring the

vapor pressure Vapor pressure (or vapour pressure in English-speaking countries other than the US; see spelling differences) or equilibrium vapor pressure is defined as the pressure exerted by a vapor in thermodynamic equilibrium with its condensed phases ...

of molten

uranium Uranium is a chemical element with the symbol U and atomic number 92. It is a silvery-grey metal in the actinide series of the periodic table. A uranium atom has 92 protons and 92 electrons, of which 6 are valence electrons. Uranium is weak ...

, then worked on problems in

optics Optics is the branch of physics that studies the behaviour and properties of light, including its interactions with matter and the construction of instruments that use or detect it. Optics usually describes the behaviour of visible, ultraviole ...

for the war effort. White was active in instructional television. He participated in ''Science in Action'', an early series produced in the

San Francisco Bay Area The San Francisco Bay Area, often referred to as simply the Bay Area, is a populous region surrounding the San Francisco, San Pablo, and Suisun Bay estuaries in Northern California. The Bay Area is defined by the Association of Bay Area Go ...

. In 1956 the Ford Foundation gave him a grant to produce a nine-month high-school physics course with the educational TV station WQED. He presented five half-hour programs each week, 163 in all. In 1958 the Ford Foundation invited him to go to New York to present the inaugural year of NBC's national series called ''

Continental Classroom ''Continental Classroom'' is a U.S. educational television program that was broadcast on the NBC network five days a week in the early morning from 1958 to 1963, covering physics, chemistry, mathematics, and American government. It was targeted at ...

''. It was viewed by millions and aired by over 150 television stations; NBC estimated that the physics series alone had 400,000 viewers on its first airing.

Honors

In 1928 Occidental College awarded White a Sc.D. degree. In 1941 he was awarded 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 ...

for a spectroscopic study of the gases of the Mauna Loa volcano in

Hawaii Hawaii ( ; haw, Hawaii or ) is a state in the Western United States, located in the Pacific Ocean about from the U.S. mainland. It is the only U.S. state outside North America, the only state that is an archipelago, and the only stat ...

; this was postponed until 1948. For his work on ''Continental Classroom'', he won a

Peabody Award The George Foster Peabody Awards (or simply Peabody Awards or the Peabodys) program, named for the American businessman and philanthropist George Peabody, honor the most powerful, enlightening, and invigorating stories in television, radio, and ...

, a Sylvania Television Award, and the

Oersted Medal The Oersted Medal recognizes notable contributions to the teaching of physics. Established in 1936, it is awarded by the American Association of Physics Teachers. The award is named for Hans Christian Ørsted. It is the Association's most prestig ...

for physics teaching.

Private life

White had a lifelong interest in ham radio; his

call sign In broadcasting and radio communications, a call sign (also known as a call name or call letters—and historically as a call signal—or abbreviated as a call) is a unique identifier for a transmitter station. A call sign can be formally assigne ...

was 6KS. He married Adeline Dally in 1928; they had three children. White dedicated his textbook ''Modern College Physics'' to his son Don. He died in

Modesto, California Modesto () is the county seat and largest city of Stanislaus County, California, United States. With a population of 218,464 at the 2020 census, it is the 19th largest city in the state of California and forms part of the Sacramento-Stockton- ...

Selected bibliography

*White, Harvey Elliott. ''Fundamentals of Physical Optics'' (McGraw-Hill, 1937) *White, Harvey Elliott. ''Introduction to Atomic Spectra'' (McGraw-Hill, 1934) *White, Harvey Elliott. ''Modern College Physics'' (1948) * Jenkins, Francis and White, Harvey Elliott. ''Fundamentals of Physical Optics'' (1937); revised ed. ''Fundamentals of Optics'' (1950)

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:White, Harvey Elliot 1902 births People from Parkersburg, West Virginia 1988 deaths Occidental College alumni Cornell University alumni University of California, Berkeley faculty