David L. Anderson Papers

David Leonard Anderson was a Navy serviceman and scientist at Los Alamos during WWII, an Oberlin College physics professor and departmental chair, and an Episcopal priest. He was born on December 19, 1919 in Portland, Oregon, to Alden William (1887-1959) and Myrtle Charlotte Hanson Anderson (1888-1960).He was the grandchild of Swedish and Norwegian immigrants. He had an older brother, Norman William (1916-1955), and a younger sister, Jean Charlotte (1923-1997). Attending Harvard University was an unexpected privilege—only 18 of Anderson's high school class of 100 attended college—which was made possible with a $400 tuition scholarship and jobs waiting tables and working in a physics lab. A physics major, he graduated summa cum laude; he completed his graduate work at Harvard (S.B. 1941, A.M. 1947, Ph.D. 1950).

In December of 1943, Anderson began work on the Manhattan Project to construct an atomic bomb in Los Alamos, NM. At the time, the Los Alamos community consisted of approximately 6,000 scientists, support staff, security, and their families. Enrico Fermi, Edward Teller, Richard Feynman, and Robert J. Oppenheimer were among the luminaries of physics Anderson worked with at Los Alamos. Anderson was employed there first as a civilian scientist, then as a Naval officer, between 1943 and 1946. In the spring and summer of 1946, he was temporarily stationed on the island of Tinian in the Mariannas, preparing for and witnessing the two Bikini bomb tests. Years of reflection never led him to regret his wartime involvement, claimed Anderson in newspaper interviews, since the bomb saved American lives and ended World War II.

Following an honorable discharge from the U.S. Navy in September, 1946, Anderson returned to Harvard University to earn advanced physics degrees with a pre-doctoral fellowship awarded by the National Research Council. He was also reunited with a woman he had met during the war, Madeleine "Molly" Mather (1921-2015). They were married in June of 1947. The couple had their first son, Philip Alden, or "Denny," in 1948 in Massachusetts. Their other children, Stephen Andrew (b. 1951), Samuel Mather (b. 1953), and Constance (b. 1959), were born and raised in Oberlin, Ohio.

Although Anderson did not officially earn his Ph.D. in physics until 1950, he was hired by Oberlin College to teach in 1948. Between 1948 and his retirement in 1984, Anderson worked as an assistant, associate, and full professor of physics at Oberlin College. His introductory astronomy courses were popular, in part due to his efforts to make physics understandable to non-science majors. One general physics class he taught was dubbed "poet's physics." Anderson chaired the physics department from 1963 to 1972.

At Oberlin, Anderson served both his college and the wider academic community. He was a member of several general faculty and college faculty councils, including chairmanships of the 1973-1974 faculty presidential search committee, the Mead-Swing Lectureships, the Student Life Committee, and the Educational Policy Committee. In 1970-1971, Anderson's years of service as an examiner-consultant for the North Central Association Woodrow Wilson Fellowship Committee culminated in his chairmanship of the Ohio and Michigan Regional Selection Committee. Anderson was also a member of several honorary and professional societies, including the American Physical Society, the American Association of Physics Teachers, Sigma Xi, Phi Beta Kappa, and the History of Science Society.

As an academic, Anderson was an active researcher and writer. He authored several books, including The Discovery of the Electron (Van Nostrand, 1964), The Discovery of Nuclear Fission (with co-author Hans Graetzer, Van Nostrand, 1971), and Discoveries in Physics (Supplemental book for Harvard Project Physics, published by Holt, Rinehart, and Winston, 1973). His first book was translated into Swedish, Polish, Spanish, Russian, and Italian. Anderson contributed articles and book reviews to the professional journals Physical Review, American Journal of Physics, Technology and Culture, and Physics Today. Four sabbaticals took Anderson to the University of Birmingham in England (1954-1955), the University of Edinburgh in Scotland (1968-1969), and Harvard University (1961-1962 and 1975-1976).

Anderson's career as a physicist was paralleled through several decades by his life as an Episcopal priest. Without attending a seminary, Anderson passed the Canonical Examinations, first to be a deacon in 1954 and then to be ordained to the priesthood in 1956. He served as an unpaid associate rector at Christ Church in Oberlin, Ohio, but also was a frequent guest lecturer at several parish churches and universities.

David Anderson was also concerned about the growth and improvement of the town of Oberlin. He was involved in the campaigns of local politicians, often encouraging people like James F. (Bill) Long (1913-) to run for political office. Anderson assisted in local business ventures, providing both financial resources and advice.

David Anderson retired from Oberlin College in 1984. In 1993, he and his wife, Madeleine, moved to Kendal at Oberlin, a retirement community. The Anderson’s house, on Morgan Street, was subsequently purchased by Andrew Evans (V.P. of Finance), and then resold to Sharon F. Patton (b. 1944) (Director, Allen Art Museum). David Anderson died on March 9, 1996, after a brief illness.

Note written by Jessica G. Broadwell.