Enthusiasms and Realities in Advanced Materials

Extract

Tom Read arrived at Columbia University on the same day that I did in 1948. He was a new professor in the School of Mines and I was a new graduate student. He was more than just a new professor. He was exceptional for that time. His father, T.T. Read, had been famous as an archeological metallurgist and professor at Columbia when the School of Mines was the premier school of its kind in the country. A measure of its eminence is that Irving Langmuir chose to study there rather than in a standard chemistry department.

The younger Tom Read had studied physics at Columbia under Shirley Quimby, one of the few solid-state physics professors of the time (pre-transistor). After graduation he worked at the Frankford Arsenal and at the Westinghouse Research Laboratories, where he and Frederick Seitz wrote their definitive review of the mechanisms of the plastic deformation of solids.

When he came back to Columbia as a professor, Tom Read's physics background made him almost unique among metallurgy professors. And, he had the zeal of a crusader — he was determined to teach fundamental knowledge rather than recipes. His techniques were often novel.

For example, one semester we were to learn about ferromagnetism. But he had trouble finding a good American text, so he announced that we would study both ferromagnetism and German using the famous book by Becker and Doring called Ferromagnetisms. As a result, I have never forgotten the essentials of ferromagnetism.