Abstract
A COMPLIMENTARY dinner to Prof. A. Fowler on his retirement after fifty-two year's association with the Royal College of Science, South Kensington, was held at the Imperial College Union on October 9. Dr. H. Dingle, assistant professor of astrophysics at the College, occupied the chair, and among the assembly, in addition to many old students and colleagues and the Rector of the College, Mr. H. T. Tizard, were representatives of a number of scientific societies, including Sir James Jeans, president, and Prof. W. W. Watts, president-elect, of the British Association; Prof. F. J. M. Stratton, president of the Royal Astronomical Society, Prof. H. H. Plaskett, Savilian professor of astronomy, Oxford, and Prof. Allan Ferguson, secretary of the Physical Society. In an eloquent speech proposing the toast of the guest of the evening, Dr. Dingle gave an outline of Prof. Fowler's career from the time when he entered the College as a scholarship student at the early age of fourteen and a half years to his appointment as Yarrow research professor of the Royal Society in 1923 from which he is now retiring. During almost the whole of this period, Prof. Fowler has been engaged in experimental research in spectroscopy, and hi's laboratory has become the chief centre of such work in the world. He is a leading authority on the identification and reproduction of celestial spectra, and his intuition and knowledge revealed in spark spectra series of lines which have fundamental significance in connexion with modern theories of the atom. In supporting the toast, Sir Richard Gregory said that metaphorically Prof. Fowler had for fifty years been listening to celestial language and music and had been successful in reproducing many of the fundamental notes, as well as analysing the over-tones into a regular sequence. After hearing the morning stars singing together in their glory for so long, it was no wonder that they had influenced his character and made him to his many admirers only a little lower than the angels. The Rector of the College, Mr. Tizard, afterwards presented Prof. Fowler with an illuminated address, together with a writing desk, chair and a silver tea-tray from past and present colleagues.
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The Retirement of Prof. A. Fowler, F.R.S. Nature 134, 562–563 (1934). https://doi.org/10.1038/134562c0
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/134562c0