Memories of Dr. Eyring
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You Don’t Need Equations When You Know the Subject That Well.
I attended a lecture by Henry Eyring given at Washington State College in Pullman, WA on the subject of chemical kinetics. He was sponsored by the American Chemical Society, and the lecture was for faculty and grad students at WSC and the University of Idaho. I was surprised by his presentation in that he didn’t use the chalkboard and lots of equations. Instead he had a flannel cloth over the chalkboard on which he moved pink elephants and grey clouds to describe how chemicals reacted with each other. It reminded me of Junior Sunday School. I was amazed at how easy it was to understand the rather complex subject. When I commented on the unusual method of presentation to a fellow faculty member, he replied, “You don’t need equations when you know the subject that well.”
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Henry Eyring and the Nobel Prize
I’ve known for much of my life that people thought Henry Eyring was deprived of the Nobel Prize because of his religous beliefs. The archivists at the Nobel committee’s own web site seem to be flummoxed by the question of why Erying did not recieve the prize. They have explained the apparent oversight this way:
“Nobel’s will laid down that the prize should be awarded for work done during the preceding year, but in the statutes governing the committee work this has been interpreted to mean the most recent results, or for older work provided its significance has only recently been demonstrated. It was undoubtedly this rule that excluded Stanislao Cannizzaro from receiving one of the first Nobel Prizes, since his work on drawing up a reliable table of atomic weights, helping to establish the periodic system, was done in the middle of the 19th century. A more recent example is Henry Eyring, whose brilliant theory for the rates of chemical reactions, published in 1935, was apparently not understood by members of the Nobel Committee until much later. As a compensation the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences gave him, in 1977, its highest honor, other than the Nobel Prize, the Berzelius Medal in gold.”
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I Should Have Been Walking Too
Henry’s wife Mildred was my mother’s first cousin, although a bit older. My father, who came to the U of U in 1951 from Los Alamos, as Director of Research, worked closely with Henry and always had the greatest admiration for him.
Henry was always solicitous, kind and gracious to me. I used to try to give him a ride home when I saw him walking from work but soon learned that it was an offer in vain, and it made me feel like I should have been walking too. When he was on the high council in Bonneville Stake, I was serving as executive Secretary to President Frank Gibbons, and Henry was such a refreshing delight to have on that body. Great man and great story to tell.
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Dr. Eyring speaks to graduate class at BYU
I am sorry I can’t give you the exact date, but when I was a graduate student and art instructor at BYU before moving to Boston to complete my thesis research, I was a graduate class student body officer. I invited Dr. Eyring to speak to the graduate class. He was gracious enough to come, speaking on faith and science. Bonnie Lach Oswald
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A Man Who Got Things Done
Henry Eyring was the one responsible for my going to the University of Utah. I had gone to Texas A&M for 2 1/2 years before my mission. When I returned from my mission, I was working at the Romney Implement Co. in El Paso, Texas, a business involving Gordon Romney and Edward Vernon Turley (my father). Henry had come to visit his cousins, Gordon and Vernon, and I happened to be at the store.
Henry wanted to know what I was planning to do about my schooling. I sounded a bit uncertain; so, Henry invited me to come up to the U. I told him I would like that. Within in two weeks he had me registered into the University, he had reserved a dormitory room for me, and he had found me a part-time job! He was a man who got things done, and I shall never forget him.
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The Janitor Presented the Seminar
I was blessed during 1967-68 to attend a seminar for undergraduates by Dr. Eyring at the U. of U. College of Mines and Mineral Industries. At the time I was a practicing Mormon, but was totally oblivious to who and what this great man was. I was blown away by the seminar, in which I understood almost nothing, but recognized a great intellect, kindly man, and inspired teacher.
I’ve often wished I had known who Professor Eyring was during the seminar. I remember his voice. I remember him whimsically and futilely attempting to demonstrate molecular vibration rates with his fingers—and talking about “Old Man de Broglie” and Professors Bohr, Born, Einstein, Planck and others. And relating how Einstein “didn’t know beans.” Otherwise, his efforts were all but wasted on the biggest dullard to ever sit in one of his classes.
In the hallway prior to seminar, I had passed a rumpled, kindly smiling and somewhat elfin gentleman whom I thought, with juvenile condescension, might have been the janitor. Making deliberate eye contact with this skinny perfect stranger, he offered a genuine warm “hello.” Imagine my surprise when the janitor presented the seminar. I was subsequently pleased to read and be influenced for a while by “The Faith of a Scientist.”
I am a former Mormon who ultimately left Mormonism when I left Christianity, not because of science, but with study of the Bible. I am grateful, however, to still enjoy my associations with my Mormon family and friends (one of whom gave me this book). I’m grateful for an expanding appreciation of human life and experience that includes an awareness of the positive role religious belief can have in the lives of individuals and communities of all faiths.
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Going the second mile for a humble undergradduate
When I was still an undergraduate at the University of Utah in 1952 I got a note from the secretary of my major department saying that Graduate School Dean Henry Eyring would like to see me. With some fear and trembling that there was a problem with my major or with my graduation plans I showed up at the Dean’s office.
Dean Eyring told me he’d been going over my transcript and found that I had many more classes than needed to graduate. Moreover, several of these were Upper Division classes in which I ‘d gotten A’s which could count as graduate classes. If I took a couple of more summer school classes I could graduate with a Masters as well as my B.S. This meant that when I joined the US Diplomatic Service after graduation I was inducted one grade higher (with a higher salary) than others of my group of new Foreign Service Officers.
I wondered at the time why Dean Eyring would spend time going over the records of a humble undergraduate. I now realize he took seriously his objective of turning the University of Utah into a major graduate university and was rounding up every student eligible for a graduate degree. But I wonder how many other U students he gave such an important leg up in life.
David Brighton Timmins; BS, MS, University of Utah; PhD, Harvard; US Foreign Service Officer (ret.)
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