Crawford Hallock Greenewalt (August 16, 1902 – September 28, 1993) was an American chemical engineer who served as president of the

DuPont Company DuPont de Nemours, Inc., commonly shortened to DuPont, is an American multinational chemical company first formed in 1802 by French-American chemist and industrialist Éleuthère Irénée du Pont de Nemours. The company played a major role in ...

from 1948 to 1962 and as board chairman from 1962 to 1967.

Early life

Crawford Hallock Greenewalt was born in

Cummington, Massachusetts Cummington is a town in Hampshire County, Massachusetts, United States. The population was 829 at the 2020 census, down from 872 at the 2010 census. It is part of the Springfield, Massachusetts Metropolitan Statistical Area. History Cummingto ...

, the son of Frank Lindsay Greenewalt and Mary Hallock-Greenewalt, an inventor and pianist born in Beirut. In 1922 he earned a Bachelor of Science degree in chemical engineering from

Massachusetts Institute of Technology The Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) is a private land-grant research university in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Established in 1861, MIT has played a key role in the development of modern technology and science, and is one of the ...

, where he joined

Theta Chi Theta Chi () is an international Fraternities and sororities, college fraternity. It was founded on April 10, 1856 at Norwich University then-located in Norwich, Vermont, and has initiated more than 200,000 members and currently has over 8,700 c ...

fraternity. He later became a Life Member of the MIT Corporation in 1951, and emeritus in 1977.

Career

While at DuPont, Greenewalt was a key figure in their development of

nylon Nylon is a generic designation for a family of synthetic polymers composed of polyamides ( repeating units linked by amide links).The polyamides may be aliphatic or semi-aromatic. Nylon is a silk-like thermoplastic, generally made from pe ...

and their

nuclear power Nuclear power is the use of nuclear reactions to produce electricity. Nuclear power can be obtained from nuclear fission, nuclear decay and nuclear fusion reactions. Presently, the vast majority of electricity from nuclear power is produced ...

program. He was awarded the Lavoisier Medal for Technical Achievement by the DuPont Company in 1991. His widely varied interests included

ornithology Ornithology is a branch of zoology that concerns the "methodological study and consequent knowledge of birds with all that relates to them." Several aspects of ornithology differ from related disciplines, due partly to the high visibility and th ...

and

high-speed photography High-speed photography is the science of taking pictures of very fast phenomena. In 1948, the Society of Motion Picture and Television Engineers (SMPTE) defined high-speed photography as any set of photographs captured by a camera capable of 69 ...

via his friend Harold E. "Doc" Edgerton. Greenewalt published a book of 70 high-speed photographs of

hummingbirds Hummingbirds are birds native to the Americas and comprise the biological family Trochilidae. With about 361 species and 113 genera, they occur from Alaska to Tierra del Fuego, but the vast majority of the species are found in the tropics aro ...

in 1960 (Greenewalt, C.H. 1960. ''Hummingbirds'' Doubleday & Co., Garden City, New York.). And later, ''Dimensional relationships for flying animals'' Washington. Smithsonian Institution, 1962. In 1968 he published ''Bird Song. Acoustics and Physiology'' Smithsonian Institution Press, Washington, D.C. He also served as president of the

American Philosophical Society The American Philosophical Society (APS), founded in 1743 in Philadelphia, is a scholarly organization that promotes knowledge in the sciences and humanities through research, professional meetings, publications, library resources, and communit ...

. Greenewalt is the subject of the film ''The Uncommon Man: Crawford H. Greenewalt'', produced by the

Atomic Heritage Foundation The Atomic Heritage Foundation (AHF) is a nonprofit organization originally based in Washington, DC, dedicated to the preservation and interpretation of the Manhattan Project and the Atomic Age and its legacy. Founded by Cynthia Kelly in 2002, th ...

Personal life

Greenewalt and his wife Margaretta (née Du Pont) had two sons, Crawford "Greenie" Greenewalt Jr. (1937-2012) and David Greenewalt, and daughter, Nancy L. Frederick. The younger Crawford was a professor of classical archaeology 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 ...

who was among the leaders of the Archaeological Exploration of Sardis. David died in 2003. He died in

Wilmington, Delaware Wilmington (Lenape: ''Paxahakink /'' ''Pakehakink)'' is the largest city in the U.S. state of Delaware. The city was built on the site of Fort Christina, the first Swedish settlement in North America. It lies at the confluence of the Christina ...

one day after having a stroke.Staff report (September 29, 1993
Crawford Greenewalt of DuPont Dies.
MIT Tech Talk (Volume 38, Number 8)

References

External links

1965 Audio Interview with Crawford Greenewalt by Stephane Groueff
Voices of the Manhattan Project *
In memoriam: Crawford H. GreenewaltThe Crawford Greenewalt Manhattan Project Diaries
* Finding aid fo
Crawford Greenewalt photograph collection
at Hagley Museum and Library 1902 births 1993 deaths People from Cummington, Massachusetts DuPont people American chemical engineers William Penn Charter School alumni MIT School of Engineering alumni United States Army Science Board people Manhattan Project people 20th-century American engineers Member of the Mont Pelerin Society {{US-engineer-stub

Early life

Career

Personal life

See also

References

External links