Trip to Madison

I had a good trip to Madison, WI, this past week. I was invited to give a talk at the 50th anniversary of the first meteorological satellite Explorer VII (in October 1959) and one of the key scientists involved in the launch and experiments on the satellite (the late Professor Vern Suomi (1915-1995), professor at UW-Madison). There were about 300 people in attendance at the Monona Conference Center (designed by Frank Lloyd Wright). Quite a festive event. The title of my talk was Suomi: Pragmatic visionary, and I tried to follow the path to his first successful effort to measure the earth's radiation budget from space. There were six speakers including myself. I've never received so many positive responses to any of my talks over the past 40 years (my first presentation was made in December 1969). Better with age I guess. I talked from the heart about Vern and his influence on many of us who worked around him, and also about the Center (Space Science and Engineering Center (SSEC) at UW-Madison) that he created. It is the only organization where I have worked where the sprit of camaraderie was so prevalent. I mentioned this with example as a preliminary to the talk and that was appreciated. Although I left the organization in 1986, I'm always welcomed as if I've been away about two weeks. It's a real lift to visit my colleagues at SSEC and to give tribute to Vern and the organization. The talk was "off the cuff" and I wasn't quite sure how to end it, but I knew the material very well since I've spent the last few years writing a historical paper (with three co-authors) on Vern (will be published in March 2010). Anyway, I ended with a recollection of Vern's about his graduation from Winona Teachers College in 1936. Vern had came from a hardscrabble life on the Iron Range during the Great Depression. He was destined to be a miner following his father and older brother Anard. His father either lost his job or was fired from the mines in 1929. Anard became the breadwinner at the age of 23 for a family of 9 (two parents and seven children). Anard miraculously scraped up the money for Vern to go to Junior College in Eveleth, MN, and then to the teachers college. Anard came to Vern's graduation at Winona (far SE MN where Eveleth was in the far NE) in 1936 and Vern felt great guilt at Anard's sacrifice. The wise Anard said, "When they honor you, they honor us". Little did he know that Vern would receive the National Medal of Science from Jimmy Carter in 1976. Anyway, I ended with this recollection. After the talks were completed, two older women came up to me --- one was Vern's sister and the other was Anard's daughter. Tears were running down their faces and I of course began to tear up also. I had no idea they were in the audience. We had a long wonderful talk with all kinds of details supplied by the women. It was a night to remember.

Uncle John