Background
Samuel was born on July 18, 1861 on his father's farm at Litchfield, Illinois, United States, the son of Samuel and Mary B. (Webster) Stratton.
(Presented To The Academy At The Autumn Meeting, 1935.)
Presented To The Academy At The Autumn Meeting, 1935.
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(This book is a reproduction of a volume found in the coll...)
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Samuel was born on July 18, 1861 on his father's farm at Litchfield, Illinois, United States, the son of Samuel and Mary B. (Webster) Stratton.
From early youth the son shared in the farm labor, and from boyhood he showed the keenest interest in mechanics. He attended the schools of his native township, and, after working for two years to earn money for further education, he entered the University of Illinois in 1880 as a special student. He quickly decided to undertake the four-year course in mechanical engineering. Earning his way from year to year, he received the degree of Bachelor of Science in 1884 and engaged in special research problems.
In 1885 he was appointed instructor in mathematics in the university; but his work was soon confined to physics alone, and he became professor of physics in 1891.
In 1891 he was asked to establish and take charge of a new course in electrical engineering. In 1892 he became assistant professor of physics at the newly organized University of Chicago, where he remained until 1901. While there he became associated with Michelson on his investigation on the speed of light, planned and supervised construction of the Ryerson laboratories, and gave much attention to the application of physics to engineering.
From college days he had always maintained a deep interest in military affairs and on taking up his work in Chicago joined the naval militia and rose to the rank of lieutenant-commander. As head of this organization, he entered the naval service during the Spanish-American War in 1898, with the rank of lieutenant. His unit was assigned to the Texas.
Two years later, in 1900, through the instrumentality of the assistant secretary of the treasury, Frank A. Vanderlip, who had been one of his close college friends at Illinois, he was asked by the secretary of the treasury, Lyman J. Gage, to prepare a report for a proposed bureau of standards. The bill authorizing the establishment of the bureau was drawn by him, with the existing office of weights and measures as a nucleus, and the many hearings and demonstrations before the congressional committee were skilfully handled by him and won acceptance and generous support.
The bill was passed in 1901 and the bureau of standards became an actuality. On the insistence of Gage, he became its first director. His vision of the usefulness of such a bureau was so clear that he was never seriously handicapped by the limitations of function expressed in the organic act, and from the beginning the work of the bureau expanded greatly in scope and usefulness.
In 1903 the bureau was transferred to the department of commerce, thereby making possible a greater opportunity for emphasizing and assisting in the prosecution of research as an aid to commerce and industry. He and the bureau became important factors in the international conference on weights and measures, as well as in manifold advisory committees for the better development and standardization of basic industries.
Notable among his scientific papers are "A New Harmonic Analyser" published with Michelson in the Philosophical Magazine (Jan. 1898) and "Metrology in Relation to Industrial Progress" in the Journal of the Franklin Institute (October 1912). While at the bureau, he never lost interest in technical education, and when he was invited to become the president of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology in 1923 he accepted, in the belief that he could render a special service both to the Institute because of his knowledge of the needs of industry, and to American industry by participating actively in the training of men of the type who would become the leaders in the industrial fields.
He felt strongly that technical schools should render an increasing service to industry and to the public through basic instruction and through emphasis on research in both pure and applied science, and during his presidency worked with these ends in view. For many years the position of president of the Institute had made exacting and almost impossible demands on the energies of its incumbent.
In 1930 a reorganization of administrative policy was effected, whereby he became chairman of the corporation, and Karl T. Compton was elected to the office of president. Thus two men shared the many and varied responsibilities that one had always borne hitherto. This arrangement was of brief duration, however, for Stratton died suddenly, while in the act of dictating a eulogy of his friend Edison, who had died earlier that same day.
On October 18, 1931, he died of heart disease at his home in Boston's Back Bay.
(This book is a reproduction of a volume found in the coll...)
(Presented To The Academy At The Autumn Meeting, 1935.)
book
He had the gift of obtaining first the confidence and then the cooperation of industrial leaders and men of vision and high character in many technical fields.
Unusually modest and often unassertive to the point of shyness, he had qualities that greatly endeared him to a very wide circle of devoted friends. He was a man of strong personality, of forceful character, and of unswerving loyalty.
Quotes from others about the person
As recounted by Time magazine, "he demonstrated the economic wisdom of generous support for research in pure science".
He had never married.