Harrison M. Randall

Randall was born in Burr Oak, Michigan, on December 17, 1870. His family then moved to Ann Arbor, where he spent his formative years. He graduated from the Ann Arbor High School in 1889.

Randall entered the University of Michigan at the age of 19 and earned his bachelor's degree in Physics from the university in 1893.{{cite web|last1=University of Michigan|title=Harrison McAllister Randall.|url=http://um2017.org/faculty-history/faculty/harrison-mcallister-randall|website=Faculty History Project|access-date=2 April 2015}} A year later he completed a master's degree, then spent a few years teaching in high schools in West Bay City and Saginaw, living with his intended Ida Muma.{{cite web|last1=Dennison|first1=David M.|last2=King|first2=W. James|title=Oral History Transcript: Dr. Harrison M. Randall|url=http://www.aip.org/history/ohilist/4840_1.html|website=American Institute of Physics|access-date=2 April 2015}}

In 1899 he returned to the University of Michigan to pursue a PhD in Physics while working as a graduate student instructor. He completed his PhD in 1902 and took a position on the faculty. His PhD thesis measured the coefficient of expansion of quartz.

File:Friedrich Paschen Physiker.jpg, Randall's mentor during his sabbatical year at University of Tübingen]]

During his 1910-11 sabbatical year, Randall moved abroad to work under Friedrich Paschen at the University of Tübingen. This was shortly after Paschen had discovered what is now called the Paschen series in the spectrum of hydrogen, and about 20 years after the discovery of what is now called Paschen's Law of electrical discharges. Randall said that he knew nothing about spectroscopy at the time and Paschen simply handed him a spectrometer and expected him to get to work—which he ultimately did. Under Paschen's mentorship, Randall became an expert in infrared spectroscopy. Even to the end of his life Randall considered Paschen his greatest mentor.

Prior to 1910, the physics department at the University of Michigan had focused on precision metrology. Quantum mechanics did not yet exist as a field, and the study of atomic spectra was largely ad hoc experimentation with very little theoretical underpinning. Randall came home from his 1910 sabbatical at Tübingen with new ideas, and went on to overhaul physics research at Michigan. He served as the head of the physics department from 1915 to 1941 and implemented changes that elevated the university to a prominent status in the field.

At that time Walter Colby was the only resident theorist, so, with Randall’s encouragement, Colby recruited Oskar Klein. Although Klein returned to Europe after two years, the importance of theoretical colleagues was established. Subsequently, Randall brought Otto Laporte, Samuel Goudsmit, George Uhlenbeck and David Dennison onto the faculty. Randall and Colby also started the Michigan Summer Symposia in Theoretical Physics, an annual, multi-week gathering that held from 1927 to 1941. It provided lectures from famous physicists, including Niels Bohr, Paul Dirac, Enrico Fermi, Werner Heisenberg, Wolfgang Pauli and others. Randall also started a program in which the university's physicists would get a sabbatical every two years to work with physicists in Europe.

In 1925 Randall became vice-president of the American Association for the Advancement of Science. Randall was President of the American Physical Society in 1937, and remained chair of the physics department at the same time. From 1917 to 1919 Randall was a researcher at the National Bureau of Standards.

Harrison Randall died on November 10, 1969, at the age of 98.{{cite news|author=Bush, Larry|title=World Renowned Physicist Dies|newspaper=Ann Arbor News|date=11 November 1969|url=http://oldnews.aadl.org/node/83674}}

• The Optical Society Frederic Ives Medal (1952){{cite web|last1=Optical Society|first1=The|title=Harrison McAllister Randall|url=http://www.osa.org/en-us/history/biographies/harrison-mcallister-randall/|website=History: Biographies.|access-date=2 April 2015}}{{Cite web |title=Harrison McAllister Randall {{!}} Optica |url=https://www.optica.org/History/Biographies/bios/Harrison-McAllister-Randall |access-date=2024-09-18 |website=www.optica.org}}

In interviews, Randall displayed a complex mix of humility—often downplaying his own substantial accomplishments—and bitterness over what he felt were his ideas stolen by other researchers, particularly his students who went on to publish more prominently than he ever did.

Randall married Ida Muma on August 24, 1898. His daughter Mary Foote Randall married geneticist Sterling Howard Emerson.

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• {{cite journal | last1=Oetjen | first1=R. A. | last2=Randall | first2=H. M. | title=The Infra-Red Spectra of the Isomeric Octanes in the Vapor Phase | journal=Reviews of Modern Physics | publisher=American Physical Society (APS) | volume=16 | issue=3–4 | date=1 June 1944 | issn=0034-6861 | doi=10.1103/revmodphys.16.265 | pages=265–270| bibcode=1944RvMP...16..265O }}
• {{cite journal | last=Randall | first=Harrison Mcallister | title=On the Coefficient of Expansion of Quartz | journal=Physical Review |series=Series I | publisher=American Physical Society (APS) | volume=20 | issue=1 | year=1905 | issn=1536-6065 | doi=10.1103/physrevseriesi.20.10 | pages=10–37| bibcode=1905PhRvI..20...10R | hdl=2027/mdp.39015030725934 | hdl-access=free }} (this is a refinement of his 1902 thesis experiment)
• {{cite journal | last=Randall | first=H. M. | title=Infrared Spectroscopy at the University of Michigan* | journal=Journal of the Optical Society of America | publisher=The Optical Society | volume=44 | issue=2 | date=1 January 1954 | issn=0030-3941 | doi=10.1364/josa.44.000097 | pages=97–103}} (overview of work in Ann Arbor)
• {{cite journal | last=Nielsen | first=Harald H. | title=Harrison McAllister RandallA Half-Century of Infrared Spectroscopy | journal=Journal of the Optical Society of America | publisher=The Optical Society | volume=50 | issue=12 | date=1 November 1960 | issn=0030-3941 | doi=10.1364/josa.50.001147 | page=1147}} (Ives medal encomium for Harrison M. Randall)
• {{cite journal | last1=Randall | first1=H. M. | last2=Dennison | first2=D. M. | last3=Ginsburg | first3=Nathan | last4=Weber | first4=Louis R. | title=The Far Infrared Spectrum of Water Vapor | journal=Physical Review | publisher=American Physical Society (APS) | volume=52 | issue=3 | date=1 July 1937 | issn=0031-899X | doi=10.1103/physrev.52.160 | pages=160–174| bibcode=1937PhRv...52..160R }}
• {{cite journal | last1=Randall | first1=H. M. | last2=Smith | first2=D. W. | title=Infrared Spectroscopy in Bacteriological Research* | journal=Journal of the Optical Society of America | publisher=The Optical Society | volume=43 | issue=11 | date=1 October 1953 | pages=1086–1092 | issn=0030-3941 | doi=10.1364/josa.43.001086 | pmid=13109611 }} (example of work done after his retirement)
• {{cite journal | last=Sawyer | first=Ralph A. |author-link=Ralph A. Sawyer| title=Obituary: Harrison Randall of Michigan; Applied Infrared Studies to Bacteria | journal=Physics Today | publisher=AIP Publishing | volume=23 | issue=1 | year=1970 | issn=0031-9228 | doi=10.1063/1.3021913 | pages=127–129}}

{{Presidents of the American Physical Society|state=collapsed}}

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Category:1870 births

Category:1969 deaths

Category:University of Michigan faculty

Category:American physicists

Category:University of Michigan College of Literature, Science, and the Arts alumni

Category:People from St. Joseph County, Michigan

Category:Scientists from Ann Arbor, Michigan

Category:Presidents of the American Physical Society

Category:Pioneer High School (Ann Arbor, Michigan) alumni