Floyd Rowe Watson

Floyd Rowe Watson (also Floyd R. Watson , FR Watson ; born April 23, 1872 in Lawrence , Kansas , † January 18, 1974 in Pasadena , California ) was an American acoustician .

Life

Family and education

Floyd Rowe Watson, born in Lawrence, Kansas, raised in Los Angeles , California, the son of Norman Allen Watson and Helen Altana Hitchcock Watson, graduated from the State Normal School in Los Angeles in 1893. He then turned to studying physics at the University of California, Los Angeles , and in 1899 he received a Bachelor of Science degree . Watson continued his studies at Cornell University in Ithaca , New York , in 1902 he was awarded a doctorate of philosophy .

The Methodist baptized Floyd Rowe Watson married on August 14, 1902 Estelle Jane Bard. The sons Norman Allen and Robert Barden came from the connection. He died in January 1974 at the old age of 101.

Professional background

Floyd Rowe Watson, who was awarded the President White Fellowship in Physics, took up a position as a teaching assistant at Cornell University in 1901. In the following year he moved to the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign as an instructor in Physics , in 1904 he was promoted to Assistant Professor , in 1915 to Associate Professor , in 1917 to Full Professor of Experimental Physics , and in 1940 he retired . Floyd Rowe Watson, one of the leading pioneering researchers in the fields of building acoustics , building acoustics , room acoustics , was also an acoustic consultant for the Eastman Theater and the Kilbourn Hall of the Eastman School of Music in Rochester , New York , for the National Gallery of Art in Washington, DC , for the Purdue Music Hall in Bloomington , Indiana , for the Indianapolis Coliseum, for the Pentagon, as well as for numerous other buildings.

His research covered the topics of surface tension and viscosity , surface waves , sound transmission through partition walls, sound absorption through buildings and acoustic materials, and in particular the acoustics of buildings. Watson was a founding member, since 1954 an honorary member of the Acoustical Society of America , a fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science and the American Physical Society, and a member of the Sigma Xi scientific association .

Publications (selection)

• Surface tension at the interface of two liquids determined experimentally by the method of ripple waves. Dissertation, Cornell University, New York, 1901
• Elementary laboratory course in physical measurement. Stephens Pub. Co., Lewisburg, Pa, 1906
• Acoustics of auditoriums. in: Bulletin (University of Illinois (Urbana-Champaign campus). Engineering Experiment Station), no.73. University of Illinois, Urbana, 1914
• An investigation of the transmission, reflection and absorption of sound by different materials. in: Some contributions from the Laboratory of Physics of the University of Illinois, v. 2, pt. 1. University of Illinois, Urbana, 1916
• The absorption of sound by materials; a method of measurement, with results for some materials . in: University of Illinois. Engineering experiment station. Bulletin, no.172. University of Illinois, Urbana, 1927
• Sound: an elementary textbook on the science of sound and the phenomena of hearing. J. Wiley & Sons, New York, Chapman & Hall, London, 1935
• Acoustics of buildings, including acoustics of auditoriums and sound-proofing of rooms. 3d ed., J. Wiley & Sons, New York, Chapman & Hall, London, 1941

literature

• Edward Wight Washburn, International Research Council, United States National Academy of Sciences, United States National Research Council: International critical tables of numerical data, physics, chemistry and technology Volume 6. McGraw-Hill, New York, 1929, p. 453.
• Who was Who in America. Volume 5: 1969-1973. Marquis Who's Who, New Providence, NJ, 1973, p. 761.
• Floyd Rowe Watson, Acoustical Society of America. Technical Committee on Architectural Acoustics: Floyd Rowe Watson, 1872-1974: physicist, acoustician, teacher, author, editor, consultant, pioneer, founder, centenarian. 1976
• Winton U. Solberg: The University of Illinois, 1894-1904: The Shaping of the University . University of Illinois Press, Urbana, 2000, pp. 163, 164.
• Emily Ann Thompson: The soundscape of modernity: architectural acoustics and the culture of listening in America, 1900-1933. MIT Press, Cambridge, Mass., 2002, p. 349.
• William J. Cavanaugh, Gregory C Tocci, Joseph A. Wilkes: Architectural acoustics: principles and practice. John Wiley & Sons, Hoboken, NJ, 2010, p. 39.
• Keith W. Anderson: The Los Angeles State Normal School: UCLA's forgotten past: 1881-1919. lulu.com, California, 2015, p. 81

Web links

• Literature by and about Floyd Rowe Watson in the WorldCat bibliographic database