To Work at the Bureau

After I graduated from the old Western High School in 1927, college was next. Because of the low family income, I was to take a job temporarily, and attend evening classes at the George Washington University. I passed the necessary Civil Service examination which included the preparation of a mechanical drawing. Mine was a driving cylinder of a steam locomotive, reflecting my long-time interest in trains. On July 5, 1927, I reported for duty at the Bureau and had the good fortune to be assigned to the Spectroscopy Section located on the second floor of the South Building. There I received a cordial welcome from the Section Chief, Dr. William F. Meggers, who was to become a lifelong friend and mentor. 

My high-school buddy, George W. Irving, Jr., joined the Bureau at the same time and in the same way. He was assigned to the Section on Metal and Ore Analysis, Standard Samples, in the Chemistry Division where he began work by bottling standard samples. Not being inspired by his job, he transferred to the Industrial Building to work under Dr. Solomon F. Acree in utilization of farm wastes. Peanut shells is an example of materials studied. A year later George transferred to the Department of Agriculture.  

My first duty as a Minor Laboratory Apprentice, salary $900 per year, was to calculate wavelengths of spectra from numerous books of measurements made by Dr. Meggers and his associate Dr. Carl C. Kiess. The machine that I came to know so well was the Millionaire, an ingenious mechanically operating calculator. It was not so named because of its cost, but for its capability of handling eight-digit numbers. An early model, now truly a museum piece, is on exhibit at the Smithsonian’s National Museum of American History. When the first payday came, I joined the line on the floor below to receive my pay in cash. This may appear to be a questionable procedure but the paymaster did have security- - a short mild-mannered guard with a big pistol on his hip. 

In the Spectroscopy Section, after some months of calculations, I was introduced to photographing spectra and to searching for regularities in spectra (line pairs with identical differences) as a first step to determining atomic energy levels. After one year, at age 18, I had my first publication, being named as junior author of a paper with Dr. Meggers on “Regularities in the Spark Spectrum of Hafnium”. This was an encouraging event for a budding scientist and was characteristic of the generosity of Dr. Meggers. More papers with the same authors were published in succeeding years on the spectra of lutecium (later renamed lutetium) columbium, ytterbium, technetium and promethium, the last with a third author, William R. Bozman. The lutecium research resulted in publicity in the Washington Times providing us with a vintage photograph of Dr. Meggers and myself. (Figure 1) 

It is interesting to note that several persons listed in the 1905 organization of the Bureau were still active in 1930, a real tie to the earliest days. I came to know:  George K. Burgess, Director; Arthur Pienkowsky, Mass Measurements; Frederick Bates, Polarimetry; Oscar C. Lange, Shops; Herbert B. Brooks, Electricity; N. Ernest Dorsey, Electricity; William W. Coblentz, Infrared; Campbell E. Waters, Chemistry. 

I was at work on the sad day of July 2, 1932 when Dr. Burgess died at his desk one floor above our Section and I watched as he was carried down the steps to the waiting ambulance. He was succeeded by Dr. Lyman J. Briggs who headed the Bureau through the turbulent World War II period. Mr. Bates, with whom I had many contacts, later became Chief of the Optics Division, which included our Spectroscopy Section. Lange was the tough but helpful head of the Shops. The genial Dr. Dorsey was always recognizable on the Bureau grounds. He had a hearing defect but wasn’t sensitive about it. He wore his hearing aid, consisting of a long flexible tube with a funnel to speak into, draped around his shoulders. (This may have been the state of the art at that time,) Dr. Coblentz, the pioneer of modern infrared spectroscopy, often visited Dr. Meggers and usually had some aggravating problem to discuss with Meggers who listened patiently, nodding his head. Mr. Waters was Chief of the Section on Rubber, Lubricants and Textiles of the Chemistry Division. The Section was typical of the products-oriented organization of the Division at that time.