C. N. H. Lock
{{Short description|British aerodynamicist (1894–1949)}}
{{Use dmy dates|date=May 2022}}
{{Use British English|date=May 2022}}
Christopher Noel Hunter Lock (21 December 1894 – 27 March 1949) was a British aerodynamicist, after whom the Lock number is named.{{cite book |last1=Prouty |first1=Raymond W. |title=Helicopter aerodynamics |date=2009 |publisher=Eagle Eye Solutions |isbn=978-0-557-09044-0 |location=Lebanon, Ohio |page=222}}{{cite book |last1=Johnson |first1=Wayne |title=Helicopter theory |date=1994 |publisher=Dover Publications |isbn=978-0-486-13182-5 |location=New York |page=267}}
Biography
Lock was born at Herschel House, Cambridge, the youngest son of John Bascombe Lock (18 March 1849 – 8 September 1921) who was bursar of Gonville and Caius College, Cambridge,{{cite book |last1=Venn |first1=John |title=Alumni Cantabrigienses: A Biographical List of All Known Students, Graduates and Holders of Office at the University of Cambridge, from the Earliest Times to 1900 |date=15 September 2011 |publisher=Cambridge University Press |isbn=978-1-108-03614-6 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=OuU54j4aT6QC&pg=PA195 |access-date=3 May 2022 |language=en}} and Emily née Baily. His brother was Robert Heath Lock. Lock was a Scholar at Charterhouse School, and in 1912 was awarded a Major Scholarship at Gonville and Caius College,{{cite journal |last1=Fage |first1=A |title=Obituary Notices: C. N. H. Lock |journal=Proceedings of the Physical Society, Section A |date=December 1949 |volume=62 |issue=12 |pages=831–832 |url=https://archive.org/details/in.ernet.dli.2015.25799/page/n893/mode/2up?view=theater |access-date=6 May 2022}} where he was the only b* wrangler of 1917.{{cite book |last1=Aubin |first1=David |last2=Goldstein |first2=Catherine |title=The War of Guns and Mathematics: Mathematical Practices and Communities in France and Its Western Allies around World War I |date=7 October 2014 |publisher=American Mathematical Society |isbn=978-1-4704-1469-6 |page=86 |url=https://books.google.com/books?id=8By8BAAAQBAJ&pg=PA86 |access-date=3 May 2022 |language=en}} He took his BA in 1917, won a Smith's Prize in 1919, and became a fellow of Caius College in 1920.{{cite web |last1=Beamish |first1=David |title=The Lock family of Dorchester, Dorset, Version 3.04 |url=http://www.broadhurst-family.co.uk/FamilyTree/Source%20Data/Others/Lock%20family%203.04.pdf |access-date=3 May 2022 |date=8 April 2004}}
He was a member of the Anti-Aircraft Experimental Section, and in 1920 moved to the Aerodynamics Division of the National Physical Laboratory in Teddington, to work on the dynamics of shells.{{cite journal |title=Herbert William Richmond, 1863-1948 |journal=Obituary Notices of Fellows of the Royal Society |date=November 1948 |volume=6 |issue=17 |pages=219–230 |doi=10.1098/rsbm.1948.0027 |s2cid=162385944 |url=https://royalsocietypublishing.org/doi/pdf/10.1098/rsbm.1948.0027 |access-date=6 May 2022 |language=en |issn=1479-571X|url-access=subscription }} He conducted wide-ranging experiments, including on autogyros, and became an authority on airscrews. From 1939 until his death, he ran the Aerodynamics Division's High Speed Research Group.{{cite journal |last1=Young |first1=A. D. |last2=Pankhurst |first2=R. C. |last3=Schultz |first3=D. L. |title=Douglas William Holder. 14 April 1923-18 April 1977 |journal=Biographical Memoirs of Fellows of the Royal Society |date=1978 |volume=24 |pages=223–244 |doi=10.1098/rsbm.1978.0008 |jstor=769761 |s2cid=72595623 |url=https://www.jstor.org/stable/769761 |access-date=6 May 2022 |issn=0080-4606|url-access=subscription }} He developed the pitot-traverse method for measuring profile drag, and investigated the effect of sweepback at high Mach numbers.
He was a Fellow of the Royal Aeronautical Society and the Physical Society.{{cite book |last1=David |first1=Thomas Rhodri Vivian |title=British Scientists and Soldiers in the First World War (with special reference to ballistics and chemical warfare) |publisher=Imperial College London |page=338 |url=https://spiral.imperial.ac.uk/bitstream/10044/1/71582/1/David-TRV-2009-PhD-Thesis.pdf |access-date=3 May 2022}} He was a member of various committees of the Aeronautical Research Council.
Personal life
Lock married Lilian Mary née Gillman (1886/7–7 Oct 1966, aged 79) on 26 April 1924, at St Leonard's Church, Streatham.{{cite web |last1=Beamish |first1=David |title=Transcript of Lock entries from the digital archive of The Times prior to 1985 |url=http://www.broadhurst-family.co.uk/FamilyTree/Source%20Data/Others/Lock%20entries%20from%20The%20Times.pdf |access-date=3 May 2022 |date=9 April 2004}} They had two sons, Robert Christopher (Robin) Lock (14 Aug 1925–19 March 1992) and John Michael Lock (25 Oct 1926–2 March 2002), who were both research students at Gonville & Caius.
References
{{reflist}}
External links
- [https://reports.aerade.cranfield.ac.uk/discover?filtertype=author&filter_relational_operator=equals&filter=C.+N.+H.+Lock Publications by C. N. H. Lock]
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