Alfred L. Loomis
Alfred Lee Loomis (November 4, 1887-August 11, 1975)
was the lawyer, investment banker, physicist, philanthropist,
and devotee and patron of scientific research who established
the famous Loomis Laboratory in the Tower House mansion at
Tuxedo Park.
Born in New York City, New York,
Loomis was the son of Henry Patterson Loomis and Julia Stimson.
Loomis did his undergraduate work at Yale University
and graduated cum laude from Harvard Law School in
1912. He worked in corporate law after
graduation.
In 1917, with the United States' entry into World War I,
he voluteered for military service. He was commissioned
as a captain and rose to the rank of lieutenant colonel
He worked in ballistics and invented the
"Aberdeen Chronograph".
In the 1920s, Loomis collaborated with his bother-in-law,
Landon K. Thorne, to take Bonbright and Company from the
verge of bankruptcy to a preeminent U.S. investment
banking-house, specializing in public utilities. In the
process, Loomis became very wealthy.
During this period, Loomis also established Tuxedo Park
Loomis Laboratory. The facility was visited by prominent
scientists, including Albert Einstein, Niels Bohr,
Werner Heisenberg, Vannevar Bush and James Franck.
In its early years, the laboratory's work focused on timekeeping.
Just prior to the 1929 stock market crash, Loomis liquidated
his holdings, thereby avoiding financial ruin. He used his
personal wealth to support scientific research over the
ensuing two decades.
In 1939, Loomis began a collaboration with Ernest Lawrence
and was instrumental in financing Lawrence's 184 inch
cyclotron project.
Loomis chaired the Microwave Committee of
National Defense Research Committee and invented LORAN.
He also made a significant contribution
to the development of Ground Controlled Approach technology
(a precursor of today's Instrument Landing Systems),
which used radar to permit ground controllers to "talk-down"
airplane pilots when poor visibility made visual landings
difficult or impossible.
He was elected to the National Academy of Sciences in 1940.
Loomis received honorary degrees from Wesleyan University (D.Sc
1932), Yale University (M.Sc 1933), and the University of California
(LL.D 1941).
References
- Alfred Lee Loomis, Alvarez, Luis W. [in] National Academy of Sciences. Biographical memoirs. v.51 (1980). Washington D.C., National Academies Press, 1999. pp. 308-341. http://books.nap.edu/books/0309028884/html/308.html
- Tuxedo Park, Jennet Conant. New York, Simon & Schuster, c2002. ISBN 0-684-87287-0
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