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James Wynne
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Last Updated: |
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August 15, 2010 |
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Residing In: |
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Mount Kisco, NY USA |
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Wife: Barbara J. (Silverberg) Wynne, wed in 1964
Barbara is from Rochester, NY. She went to college at Boston University, where she majored in Psychology and Education. Her first day at B.U. in 1961, she met Susan Diamond, a "gem" of a girl who knew me from the previous year and who made the match. On our first date, I was smitten. But it took me some time to propose marriage. We were married on August 22, 1964. The ensuing 46 years have been fabulous.
Barbara taught 2nd grade in the Boston area while I was going through graduate school. After our second child started college in 1994, Barbara worked as an office manager at a Temple and later at a Music School. She is now retired.
Son: Keith A. Wynne, born 1974
Keith attended University of Delaware, where he majored in Early Childhood Education and Family Studies. After college, he taught English in Japan for two years, the second year as a kindergarten teacher to Japanese children in an all-English language school. Since returning from Japan, he has taught all grades of elementary school. He has just completed his 4th year as a science specialist teaching children in grades 2 - 5 in a public school (P.S. 58) in Brooklyn, NY. He has a Masters in International Education from Columbia Teachers College and is pursuing a Masters in School Administration from Baruch College.
Keith is not married, but he is looking for the right woman and he will make a GREAT husband and father.
Daughter: Alexis E. (Wynne) Mogul, born 1976
Alexis attended Vassar College, where she majored in Physics (a "chip of the old block"). After college, she worked at Lawrence Livermore Lab, east of San Francisco. Then she attended Cornell University, where she earned a Masters in Applied and Engineering Physics.
In 2004, she married Douglas Mogul, who had been pursuing her since 1992 in high school. Subsequently, she has been working as a copy/production editor for Science magazine and PLOS Biology. They moved to San Francisco in 2006, where Doug was trained in Pediatrics at Stanford University Medical Center. They have now moved to Baltimore, where Doug is pursuing a Fellowship in Pediatric Gastroenterology at Johns Hopkins Childrens Center. Alexis is working for Science magazine again.
Grandchildren: Amelia and Jonah Mogul, twins, born 2006
They are terrific (and delicious) children (and I'm not the least bit biased). Barbara and I love to spend time with them, and Baltimore brings them closer to us than San Francisco. (Check out their pictures below)
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Spouse/Partner: |
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Barbara J. (Silverberg) Wynne: wed in 1964 |
| Education: |
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Harvard College, B.A. - 1964
Harvard University, Ph. D., Applied Physics - 1969
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Occupation: |
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Scientist, Program Manager |
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Lewis Love, my high school physics teacher, turned me on to physics as a possible career. During the summer of 1963, I took a job on Long Island working with lasers, which had been invented in May, 1960, just before we graduated from high school. At the end of the summer, I decided to go for a doctorate in physics and also propose to Barbara, both without first asking my parents permission. So I finally "grew up" at that summer.
My Ph. D. thesis at Harvard was in the area of nonlinear optics, a field that emerged with the invention of the laser. My thesis advisor, Nicolaas Bloembergen, later was awarded the Nobel Prize in Physics for being the "father" of nonlinear optics.
Fresh with my doctorate, I joined IBM Research, where I have been employed for ~40 years. For my first assignment, I worked at the IBM Zurich Research Lab in Ruschlikon, Switzerland, a suburb of Zurich. There I continued to investigate nonlinear optics.
Life in Europe was fantastic. Things cost ~1/4 of what they cost in the United States. We could eat at fine restaurants for $2/person. We could ski all day for $4/person. In Austria, we could stay in a chalet/hotel for $4/night, with a private bath and breakfast. Those were the "good old days."
During the week, I worked at IBM and Barbara planned our weekend trip. We traveled to Spain, Italy, France, Austria, Germany, The Netherlands, England, and everywhere in Switzerland. I estimate that I skiied on 50 different days during my two winters in Switzerland.
Upon returning to the US in January, 1971, I joined the IBM T. J. Watson Research Center in Yorktown Heights, NY, where I have worked ever since. We moved to our home in Mt. Kisco in 1973, and are still there.
At IBM, I continued to work in laser physics research through the early 1990s. Since then, I have had an administrative job with the office of the Director of Research. I spend the majority of my time recruiting IBMers to volunteer for technical education outreach, i.e., visiting local schools to get kids aware of and interested in Science, Technology, Engineering, and Math (STEM), with the goal being to stock the pipeline of future engineers and scientists.
As for my work in laser physics, my highest impact achievement was to co-invent excimer laser surgery, the foundation for laser refractive surgery (LASIK, PRK) - National Inventors Hall of Fame profile . My IBM colleagues and I have received many awards for this discovery, including the Rank Prize for Opto-Electronics (presented to me in London on February 8, 2010), but the best personal reward was that my son, who was myopic and astigmatic, had the PRK procedure in 2006 and now sees 20/15 in each eye.
2010 marks the 50th anniversary, not only of our high school class' graduation, but the invention of the laser. Several professional science societies are organizing a celebration: LaserFest . See my LaserFest Profile as one of the "Important People in Laser Science":
One more thing: In 2005, Les Paul was inducted into the National Inventors Hall of Fame for his invention of the solid body electric guitar. For the occasion, I composed lyrics about the 2005 inductees, to the melody of Les and Mary Ford's hit song "How High the Moon." At the induction event, Les joined the combo providing background music for the event, and they played "How High the Moon" while I and many of the other attendees sang my lyrics - see the picture below. (Les, 94 years old, passed away on August 13, 2009. His influence on modern music is staggering.)
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| Lifelong Hobbies: |
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Tennis - since 1952; my hand-to-eye coordination and my serve have never been better; my speed afoot leaves a lot to be desired; but I now bend my knees, the failure to do so being the "Achilles Heel" of my tennis youth
Squash rackets (until ~6 years ago) - I was a member of our varsity team that was the national champion in 1963-64. But I can't really brag too much, because my roommate, Vic Niederhoffer, who played #1 on the varsity for three years, was the intercollegiate champion, won the U.S. Nationals on 6 different occasions, and even won the North American Open in 1975. To learn more about Vic, see Victor Niederhoffer
Reading:
My favorite book of fiction is The Fountainhead by Ayn Rand, even though I mostly disagree with her philosophy, i.e., I am a democrat, NOT a libertarian.
I recently reread The Crash of '79, by Paul Erdman, a fictional account of massive misbehavior, i.e. bad loans by big banks, compounded by a misguided war to take over the middle eastern oil fields. It is a great read, with an eerie foresight about today's worldwide financial crisis.
Travel - lived in Puerto Rico, Cuba, and Zurich; honeymooned in Bar Harbor, Maine; visited our grandchildren in San Francisco many times, and now visit them in Baltimore; visited our son while he lived in Japan; love to visit Sedona, AZ; will visit Istanbul (hopefully) in the near future; most memorable short vacation trip: Florence, Italy.
Listening to music - Beethoven, Saint-Saens, Tchiakovsky, especially his violin concerto performed by Jascha Heifetz with Fritz Reiner conducting the Chicago Symphony Orchestra
Favorite move - Lady and the Tramp
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Check out my playlist of favorite songs:
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| Did You Graduate From North Or South? |
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North
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How I looked in 1958, somewhere in Great Neck.
With my sister Judy (GNHS '57) in 1953, at the boat dock in GN Estates Park
My ticket to our 50th Reunion
Left to right:
My father, Richard Wynne; my mother, Beatrice Wynne; my future wife, Barbara Silverberg; yours truly - at the Club Caribe, Caribe Hilton, San Juan, Puerto Rico, February 1964. Don't we look happy?
Barbara and I were married that August, and I was even happier, and still am!!
My wife, Barbara, and I in Chappaqua, August 1, 2009
Barbara and I in Sedona, Arizona, on 12/8/09. This is a view from the Sedona airport. No matter which way one looks, the view is "drop-dead" gorgeous. Maybe we should hold our reunion in Sedona?
My wife, Barbara; Our son, Keith; Our daughter, Alexis; myself - at Alexis' wedding, 10/3/2004 (Doug, the groom, is not in the picture)
National Inventors Hall of Fame event, May 2005, when Les Paul, inventor of the electric guitar, was inducted.
I'm standing in the middle, holding up lyrics I wrote to "How High The Moon". Les is to the far right, playing a Les Paul/Gibson electric guitar. The women to the left is Joel Schmiegel, the wife of the inventor of Prozac.
Here I am with my two grandchildren, Amelia and Jonah, 3 weeks old, on Christmas Day, 2006
Jonah and Amelia at Yosemite National Park, April 2009
Electron micrograph of human hair, etched by pulses of ultraviolet light from an excimer laser. The discovery of this technique, by me and my IBM colleagues, laid the foundation for the laser refractive surgery procedures, LASIK and PRK.
Here I am on 8/30/09, with my trusty VW Beetle, better known as "LASERBUG."
My Christmas present from my children: A jigsaw puzzle of a Geological Survey map, with my house right in the center.
The Wynnes with Ron and Laurie Moss on Feb. 6, 2010, at a restaurant in Portobello Road, London, UK.
The Wynnes with Arthur and Jacquie Levi on Feb. 12, 2010, at Chez Julien in Paris, France
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