Discorsi

Issue 3, January 1995

A Year in Review

Nineteen ninety four has been a year of momentous change in the life of the department. Perhaps in no other period during the forty year history of the program have so many events combined to bring an occasion for reflection and planning and an opportunity for growth and development.

Early in the Spring, Mary Jo Nye announced that she and Bob would be departing the University of Oklahoma for Oregon State University, where they would both assume positions as Mary Jones and Thomas Hart Horning Professors of the Humanities and Professors of History. During her 25 years in Norman, Mary Jo was a dynamic and crucial member of the department. Three dissertations were completed under her direction; several others were in process at the time of her departure. Her scholarship, her role as President of the History of Science Society and leadership in many other areas of the discipline, and her membership in the American Academy of Arts and Sciences brought national and international prominence to the department. The Nyes' vitality and vision will be long remembered in our community. We wish them well in their new home and projects.

During 1993-94, the department underwent a long and thorough program review, including assessment by evaluators external to the university. In April, the review committee issued its final report, observing that the department was one of the finest at the University of Oklahoma and recommending that additional support be provided to strengthen and augment the program. During the summer, the Dean of the College of Arts and Sciences approved two faculty searches, one to replace Mary Jo Nye at the senior level, the other to restore the sixth faculty position lost temporarily on the retirement in 1991 of Thomas M. Smith. We wish to thank all the individuals, including external evaluators, former and current students, and members of the review committee, for their tremendous efforts in this long review process.

On August 22, the program was saddened by the death of Duane H. D. Roller. Duane's role as professor in the department and curator of the History of Science Collections until his retirement in 1990 made him in many senses the father of the history of science at the University of Oklahoma. His tremendous energy as teacher and his constant love for the Collections will long be remembered at the University and beyond. Inside this edition of Discorsi, we have reprinted the obituary published in the October issue of the History of Science Society Newsletter.

Finally, the end of the year marked the retirement of Marcia Goodman, whose affiliation with the program has spanned 38 years, and who has served as the librarian of the History of Science Collections since 1973. For many readers of Discorsi, Marcia has been a tireless caretaker of books and people whose presence will be sorely missed, although we hope to see her in the Collections at work on her many independent projects. The University Libraries has begun a search to replace the irreplaceable.

Amid all these changes, I have become the Interim Chair and editor of this edition of Discorsi. As preparation for this task, I began looking more closely at other newsletters, becoming something of a connoisseur of this genre. In closing, I would like to shamelessly appropriate a story from the pages of my own alma mater's history department newsletter. It seems that an American Latin teacher was making her first visit to Rome. Not knowing any Italian, but realizing that Italian and Latin were cognates, she assumed that she could make herself known by speaking Latin to the Romans, and approached a young Italian to ask directions to the Tiber. "Ubi est flumen?" The young man looked quizzical, then responded in perfect English, "It appears that it has been some time since your last visit...."

If your last visit to the department or the Collections has become ancient history, may I suggest that you let us welcome you back to show you how the program has changed?

Steven J. Livesey

Interim Chair

Recipient of Mellon Fellowship Named

As reported in the last issue of Discorsi, The Andrew W. Mellon Foundation awarded a grant of $215,000 to the University of Oklahoma in support of a new program based in the University's History of Science Collections and the History of Science Department. The program focuses on "Historical Intersections of the Biological and Social Sciences," and brings postdoctoral fellows to campus over a period of five years.

In February, the selection committee met to evaluate proposals for the 1994-95 academic year. The committee was delighted with the quality of the proposals submitted by candidates from the United States, Great Britain, India, and France and from distinguished programs in the history of science, including Cornell University, Johns Hopkins University, the University of California-Berkeley, the University of Wisconsin-Madison, and the University of California-San Diego.

Katherine Pandora from the University of California-San Diego was selected as our first Mellon Postdoctoral Fellow in the History of Science for her project "Knowledge from Further Afield: The Uses of Natural History in Contesting Scientific Conventions in 20th Century America." The selection committee was particularly impressed by Dr. Pandora's innovative approach to historical questions dealing with the intersections of the biological and social sciences, and her ability to weave this material into a fabric illuminating important issues in American cultural history and the history of science. This fall, she offered an upper division/graduate seminar on the history of natural history that has proven quite stimulating to both faculty and students.

The fellowship award for 1995-96 will be announced by the end of March, 1995. Inquiries about applications for 1996-97 and subsequent awards should be addressed to: Dr. Gregg Mitman, Department of the History of Science, 601 Elm, Room 622, The University of Oklahoma, Norman, OK 73019-0315; Telephone: 405-325-2213; Fax: 405-325-2363; E-mail: aa2214@uoknor.edu.

Smith Receives Graduate Research Award

The History of Science Graduate Research Award for excellent research accomplished in the history of science during the year 1993 was presented to Laurel Smith for her paper, "Those Who Were Employed in Discovery and Description: Thomas Hariot, John White, and Theodore de Bry." The paper focuses on the literary and visual aspects of Thomas Heriot's Briefe and True Report of the expedition to North America in 1585. For her accomplishment, Laurel received a check in the amount of $175. This award is made possible through the generosity of an anonymous donor to the History of Science Department.

Midwest Junto for the History of Science Hosted at OU

The 37th meeting of the Midwest Junto for the History of Science was held on the University of Oklahoma campus March 25-27. Sixty seven people attended, with 32 papers on the program. Nineteen ninety-four was the fortieth year of Duane H. D. Roller's presence on the University of Oklahoma campus. To recognize this milestone, the Readex Microprint Corporation and Landmarks of Science sponsored a reception in his honor on Friday afternoon. Dr. Roller was the after-dinner speaker at the concluding banquet Saturday evening. The 1995 Junto meeting will be held at the University of Wisconsin, Madison.

1994 Visitors and Speakers

The department and its students sponsored numerous speakers during 1994. In early February, J. Rosser Matthews of the department presented a colloquium on "Major Greenwood vs. Almroth Wright: Contrasting Visions of Scientific Medicine in Edwardian Britain." Two weeks later, John Lewis, of OU's School of Meteorology, spoke on "LeRoy Meisinger: Early Explorer of the Upper Air."

In conjunction with the 37th annual Midwest Junto meeting, Professor Sandra Harding of the Department of Philosophy at the University of Delaware presented two lectures in late March. The first was co-sponsored by the Women's Studies Program, the Department of Philosophy, and the History of Science Department, and was devoted to "Feminism and Science: New Issues, Challenges, and Opportunities." Professor Harding's second lecture was entitled, "After the Neutrality Ideal: Strong Objectivity."

In early April, Professor Daniel Kevles, of the California Institute of Technology, delivered a lecture entitled, "Eugenics and the Human Genome Project: Is the Past Prologue?" Two weeks later, Professor Lawrence Frank, of the Department of English at OU, spoke on "Charles Lyell, Sigmund Freud and the Archeology of Mind."

During the fall semester, there were two colloquia and four lectures. In late September, Marc Swetlitz, of the department, presented a colloquium on "The Contested Meaning and Usage of Fitness in Post-World War II Evolutionary Biology." At the end of October, Pamela Gossin, of the School of Arts and Humanities at the University of Texas, Dallas, spoke about "Living Poetics, Enacting the Cosmos: Diane Ackerman's Popularization of Astronomy in The Planets: A Cosmic Pastorall."

The end of the semester was a very busy one. The department hosted four lecturers in five weeks. In November, Harold Cook, of the Department of the History of Medicine, The University of Wisconsin, Madison, spoke on "Natural History and Medicine during the Scientific Revolution," and Albert Van Helden, of the Department of History at Rice University, presented a lecture entitled "Galileo and the Destruction of the Aristotelian Master Narrative." The following month, Peter Barker, of the Center for the Study of Science in Society at Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University, spoke about "Religion and Natural Philosophy in the Sixteenth Century: Enemies or Friends?" Katherine Olesko, of the Department of History at Georgetown University, delivered a lecture entitled "The Cultural Foundations of Measurement: Resistance, Tolerance, Consensus."

Thanks go to all of our co-sponsors and to those who helped organize the lectures and colloquia, particularly Gregg Mitman and Laurel Smith. We look forward to continuing this tradition in 1995.

Graduate Student Research and Activities

Pat Cross spent two weeks in Dublin pursuing materials for his PhD dissertation, "The Development of the Dublin Scientific Community in the Late Eighteenth and Early Nineteenth Centuries." Among the collections he used were those of the National Library of Ireland and the libraries of Trinity College, Dublin and the Royal Dublin Society. His research was supported by the Department of Mathematics and the Graduate College.

Kerry Magruder accepted a position as Planetarium Director and Assistant Professor of Natural Sciences at Oklahoma Baptist University, where he joins Michael Keas (Ph.D. 1992). Kerry continues to work on his dissertation on theories of the earth.

Aaron Poffenberger is currently working to complete his Master's thesis on the sixteenth- century Spanish logician, Domingo de Soto, and more generally, the scholastic response to Renaissance humanist logic.

Laurel Smith presented a paper entitled "Life-Groups and Life-Zones: Otis Mason and Anthropological Exhibits" at the 37th annual meeting of the Midwest Junto for the History of Science, 27 March at OU. In September, she presented a paper, "An Anthropologist's Evolutionary Theory: Gender-Specific Technology," at the Eighth Annual Women's Studies Conference in Bowling Green , with some travel assistance from the Department. During the Fall 1994 semester, she has served as the student coordinator of departmental colloquia.

Currently seven students are writing PhD dissertations, and four students are working on master's theses.

News Notes of Faculty and Staff

Marcia Goodman retired on December 31 after working at OU for 38 years. There were 10,000 volumes in the DeGolyer Collection when she began working in 1956. She worked half-time until 1973, when she accepted the full-time position as History of Science Librarian after completing the M.A. degree in Library Science. "I feel exceedingly fortunate to have played a part in the development and growth of the History of Science Collections to nearly 83,000 volumes at my retirement," Marcia commented recently. "To me, I had the best of all possible positions in the library, being groomed and guided by the best of all possible teachers, Duane Roller, and working with him for so many years, and to have had the friendship and association of among the best of the University's faculty, graduate students, and library colleagues over many years. I have enjoyed immensely working with Marilyn Ogilvie these past few years, and in retirement, I hope to continue this association for a few years to come." Besides finishing projects begun in the Collections, she plans to complete her research papers on William Gilbert's De magnete and Peter Short. And she also plans to spend a lot of time and to have much fun learning all that she possibly can about her retirement present, a Macintosh Proforma 6115 CD computer. The Goodmans will be spending time at a newly acquired condo on Grand Lake in northeastern Oklahoma, enjoying the many offerings of that area.

The annual Collections Christmas party was once again the occasion for catching up with friends and colleagues. George Goodman joined the party and mentioned that his book, Retracing Major Stephen H. Long's 1820 Expedition: The Itinerary and Botany, co-authored with his former Ph.D. student, Cheryl Lawson, will be published in 1995 by the University of Oklahoma Press. George and Cheryl travelled over 10,000 miles through Nebraska, Colorado, New Mexico, Texas, and Oklahoma to answer many questions about the route of the Long Expedition. The book gives a day-by-day account of the route of the expedition, and presents a complete listing of the Louisiana Territory botanical contributions made by Edwin James, M.D., the botanist who accompanied the expedition to the Rocky Mountains.

Marjorie Roller stopped in, as did Thomas M. Smith and Libba. Tom continues his collaboration with Kent C. Redmond on the history of computers. This fall, the department was filled with draft copies of their book.

David B. Kitts continues to work on his book manuscript on Darwin's first four chapters of the Origins of Species. We were delighted to welcome David and Nancy back to Norman during their visit in October.

Steven J. Livesey spent the spring and summer in Paris, working on his biographical database of medieval commentators on Aristotle and Peter Lombard's Sentences, with funding from the Centre Nationale de la Recherche Scientifique (CNRS) and the Neil Ker Fund of the British Academy. Along with research at the Institut de Recherche et d'Histoire des Textes, he conducted a seminar at the Université de Paris I (Sorbonne) and was invited to present papers at two other seminars in Paris, in the Philosophisch Instituut, Katholieke Universiteit Nijmegen, and at an international workshop on computing techniques and the history of universities in London. His edition and translation, Antonius de Carlenis, OP, Four Questions on the Subalternation of the Sciences, was published by the American Philosophical Society in the Transactions series (vol. 84). His article, "Robert Graystanes O.S.B. on the Subalternation of Sciences," was published in Recherches de théologie ancienne et médiévale 61(1994) 236-272.

J. Rosser Matthews published an entry entitled "Probabilistic and Statistical Methods in Medicine," in Companion Encyclopedia of the History and Philosophy of the Mathematical Sciences, ed. Ivor Grattan-Guinness (Routledge 1994). An article, "Major Greenwood vs. Almroth Wright: Contrasting Visions of 'Scientific' Medicine in Edwardian Britain," will be published in Bulletin of the History of Medicine. His book, Quantification and the Quest for Medical Certainty has been accepted by Princeton University Press and will appear in September 1995.

Gregg Mitman was invited to present a paper at a Cornell University workshop on "The Nature of Science Studies." The paper, "When Nature is the Zoo: Vision and Power in the Art and Science of Natural History," has also been accepted for a volume of Osiris that Henrika Kuklick and Robert Kohler are editing on the history of the field sciences. During the summer, he worked in the Library of Congress, viewing films and television shows on nature topics from the 1910s to the 1950s, and the University of Missouri, St. Louis, where he was one of the first scholars to use the Marlin Perkins Papers. With his colleagues Rajeev Gowda (Political Science), Zev Trachtenberg (Philosophy), and Linda Wallace (Botany), he launched the Interdisciplinary Perspectives on the Environment program with funding from NEH/NSF/FIPSE. Beginning in 1995, students can officially add an IPE minor to their major. The highlight of the year came in November, when he received word that he had been selected to receive the 1994 Gustave O. Arlt Award in History (more on this in a separate panel).

Mary Jo and Robert Nye have been settling into their new positions at Oregon State University in Corvallis. Their home department is the Department of History, chaired by historian of science Paul L. Farber. During the spring quarter, April-June 1995, they will be By-Fellows at Churchill College at the University of Cambridge. Mary Jo and Bob welcome news from Discorsi readers. Write to them at their history department, or send messages to nyem@ucs.orst.edu or nyer@ucs.orst.edu.

Mary Jo's book, From Chemical Philosophy to Theoretical Chemistry, will be the subject of a symposium at a meeting in late February of the Oregon Academy of Sciences. She is completing a new book on the history of the physical sciences in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, and she is beginning a new project on "Scientific Practice and Scientific Politics in Modern Britain," with a focus on Patrick Blackett and Michael Polanyi. She gave a paper at a Caltech symposium and an OSU chemistry colloquium in November on biological and physical modes of thought in the chemical work of Linus Pauling. Mary Jo and Bob are among the organizers of a conference to be held in Corvallis during 1-2 March on the theme "Life and Work of Linus Pauling (1901-1994): A Discourse on the Art of Biography." The papers of Ava Helen and Linus Pauling are held at Oregon State University's Kerr Library in a special collection.

Robert Nye gave talks at Duke and Arkansas and a seminar on his book Masculinity and Male Codes of Honor in Modern France (Oxford 1993) at the National Humanities Center in Raleigh- Durham. He gave a paper at the Social Science History Association meetings in October and chaired a session on the history of homosexuality at the History of Science Society meeting in New Orleans. He published articles in Historical Reflections and in a new anthology, Foucault and the Writing of History, published by Basil Blackwell. He has an article on the history of medical ethics coming out in the Bulletin of the History of Medicine in the spring and new articles in Actes de la recherche en sciences sociales and in an anthology on modernism entitled Prehistories of the Future (Stanford 1995). He has also written an introduction to a new edition of Gustave LeBon's The Crowd (Transaction 1995), and a paper on Michel Foucault's History of Sexuality for a forthcoming anthology on the history of homosexuality.

Marilyn Ogilvie's bibliography on women in science is almost complete, and will be published by Garland Press. She has also signed a contract with Henry Holt to edit the definitive biographical dictionary on women in science. During 1994, she completed a paper entitled "Annie Maunder (1869-1928) and the British Amateur Tradition," currently under review. She has also contributed to a volume on collaboration in science to be published by Rutgers University Press; her chapter focuses on the collaboration of two couples in astronomy, the Maunders and the Campbells. In addition to several articles for encyclopedias, Marilyn plans to submit a biography on Alice Boring, an American biologist who spent most of her life in China, to Rutgers University Press. She presented papers at the History of Science Society annual meeting, a Conference on Philanthropy and Cultural Context at the Rockefeller Archive Center, and the meeting of the American Association of Physics Teachers. When she wasn't writing, she was tending to the Collections, planning the Junto, and serving on several University committees. She also serves on the History of Science Society's women's prize committee, and she says that the committee's reading load has kept her out of trouble!

Katherine Pandora, the Department's Mellon Postdoctoral Fellow, is pursuing research on a project entitled "Knowledge from Further Afield: The Uses of Natural History in Making Modern American Science Speak in the Vernacular." In this project, she is studying the cross-disciplinary traffic among social and biological scientists who, by adopting methods and concepts derived from natural history, challenged the epistemological assumptions of their orthodox colleagues about how best to search for scientific knowledge. She is particularly interested in how this work served as an "intellectual commons" that was accessible to the public. Among the scientists she will be studying are sociologist William H. Whyte, psychologist Roger Barker, anthropologist Ruth Benedict, and ornithologist Margaret Morse Nice. This fall she taught a seminar in "Natural History as Modern Science," and submitted an article to Isis on Luther Burbank as a cultural icon. Katherine received her Ph.D. in History/Science Studies from the University of California at San Diego in 1993.

F. Jamil Ragep, Sally, Anwar, and Lina took an extended research trip/vacation to Turkey in June, where Jamil gave a lecture in Istanbul at a conference commemorating the 15th-century astronomer-Prince Ulugh Beg of Samarqand. After the conference, Jamil managed to get permission to do research at several Istanbul libraries, including one at the glorious Topkapi museum. (No, they don't give out samples!) Sally and kids spent the time exploring Istanbul and other Turkish delights. They also managed a week in Anatolia where they had many adventures and misadventures (including breaking down on the bridge connecting Europe and Asia--Jason had an easier time of it). The Greek miracle tour included Pergamum, Ephesus and Miletus, all of which were hauntingly beautiful. In October, Jamil gave a talk at a session he co-organized on Islamic science and religion at the History of Science Conference in New Orleans. Among other things keeping him and Sally busy these days is working with Steve Livesey to prepare the proceedings of the 1992 and 1993 conferences for publication by Brill in 1995.

Marc Swetlitz has joined the Department as Visiting Assistant Professor for the 1993-1994 academic year. This past May, he gave a paper on "American Jewish Responses to Darwin" at a conference at the University of Otago in New Zealand on comparative responses to Darwin. The paper will appear in a volume of conference papers. Just after arriving in Oklahoma, Marc was pleased to learn that an article, "The Contested Meanings and Usage of 'Fitness' in Post-World War II Evolutionary Biology," had been accepted for publication by Perspectives on Science. He was also asked to contribute an article on "Evolution and Ethics in the Writings of Julian Huxley, George Gaylord Simpson, and Conrad H. Waddington," for Biology and the Foundation of Ethics, the first volume of a new series on biology and ethics, edited by Jane Maienschein and Michael Ruse for Cambridge University Press.

Kenneth L. Taylor received the University of Oklahoma Regent's Award for Superior Professional and University Service this year. He published "New Light on Geological Mapping in Auvergne during the Eighteenth Century: The Pasumot-Desmarest Collaboration," in Revue d'Histoire des Sciences. In October, he was invited to present a paper for the History of Geology Symposium at the Annual Meeting of the Geological Society of America in Seattle, "Earth and Heaven, 1750-1800: Enlightenment Ideas About the Relevance to Geology of Extraterrestrial Operations and Events." With Léo Laporte (U.C. Santa Cruz) and Naomi Oreskes (Dartmouth), he was co-director of the Penrose Conference: Interdisciplinary Perspectives on the History of the Earth Sciences, held in San Diego in March. He was elected to the office of Vice-President (1995-96) of the History of the Earth Sciences Society, and will become President in 1997-98. During the Fall semester, he was on sabbatical leave of absence, writing on Desmarest.

Gustave O. Arlt Award Presented to Gregg Mitman

In November, the Department learned that Gregg Mitman has been awarded the 1994 Gustave O. Arlt Award in History. The Gustave O. Arlt Award is given each year to a young scholar in the humanities who has earned the doctorate within the past seven years and who has published a book deemed to be of outstanding scholarly significance. The Award committee concluded unanimously that Professor Mitman's book, The State of Nature: Ecology, Community, and Social Thought, 1900-1950 merited such a designation.

Professor Mitman's book was a revised version of his dissertation, completed at the University of Wisconsin, Madison in 1988. It focuses on a neglected aspect of the history of scientific naturalism, the story of how biologists whose views were to the left of the political center used their science and its cultural authority to achieve their political ends. Mitman concentrates on a group of animal ecologists at the University of Chicago, including Alfred Emerson, Warder Clyde Allee, and Ralph Gerard, whose views ranged from mainstream to liberal pacifist or radical. All the members of this school emphasized the integrating forces that unite groups into functional wholes, the population rather than the individual as the unit of selection, and the role of cooperation rather than competition as an important force in selection. Mitman relates the biological discourse of the Chicago school to the political discourse of American intellectuals during and between the First and Second World Wars. In his conclusion, he suggests that this organicist, cooperative emphasis failed to generate new avenues of research in the post-World War II period, when new political and scientific discourses swept away the older view of the ecologist as social healer and replaced it with the view of the ecologist as environmental engineer. As a result, the book presents insights into the nature of ecology as a discipline in the first half of the twentieth century and current approaches to environmental ethics.

The Council of Graduate Schools restricts nominations to one from each institution, and the award rotates through a series of disciplines in a seven-year cycle. As a result, Professor Mitman's achievement carries even greater significance, since it assesses the quality of historical writing over time. The award consisted of an inscribed certificate, a check for $1000, and a formal presentation made at the Annual Meeting of the Council of Graduate Schools in Seattle December 7-10, 1994.

Recent Degrees

Samantha McClintock completed a Master's degree in May 1994; she currently works for Prudential Securities in Mobile, Alabama.

Laurel Smith completed a 1994 Master's degree in the History of Science with her thesis, "In the Museum Case of Otis Mason: Natural History, Anthropology, and the Nature of Display at the United States National Museum." Her thesis director was Gregg Mitman, and other members of the committee were Kenneth L. Taylor and David Levy (from the Department of History).

Marcus Sturm became the first student to complete an undergraduate Planned Program in History of Science upon his graduation in December 1994. This specially-designed program included 21 hours in the history of science and coursework in at least four of the natural sciences and mathematics, together with more advanced work in one of these fields. The departmental advisor for this program was Kenneth L. Taylor.

Lynne Williams completed her Master's degree in the history of science in May, 1994. Currently she teaches at Holmes Middle School in Colorado Springs.

The department extends its congratulations to the following students who have graduated during 1994 with a Minor (15 credit hours) in the History of Science: James A. Brown (Spanish major, May 1994); Freddie Dean Cox (Geography major, December 1994); Kerry Scott Decker (Geography major, May 1994); Warren Litchfield (Chemistry major, December 1994); Randall R. Segnar (Pre-med major, May 1994); Steven Smith (History major, December 1994); Stella L. Graves Stuart (Philosophy major, May 1994); Luke N. Walker (French major and pre-med, May 1994). Walker completed a Senior Honors Essay, supervised by Professor Taylor, entitled "Reconciling Progress and Materialistic Fatalism: An Essay on Baron d'Holbach's Système de la Nature."

Duane Henry DuBose Roller (1920-1994):A Tribute

By Kenneth L. Taylor and Marilyn B. Ogilvie

University of Oklahoma

Duane H. D. Roller died at his home in Norman, Oklahoma, on 22 August 1994. Duane was well known for his development of the University of Oklahoma's History of Science Collections, and of the academic programs in the history of science reliant on the Collections.

Duane came to the University of Oklahoma in 1954, to teach the history of science and to serve as Curator of the special collection begun a few years earlier on the foundation of gifts from OU alumnus E. L. DeGolyer. Under Duane's supervision and largely through his efforts, the collection grew from about 5,000 volumes to nearly 80,000 at the time of his retirement in 1990. The undergraduate and graduate instructional programs he launched at Oklahoma bear the mark of his convictions that historical study of civilization hardly makes sense if science is overlooked, and that there is no better route to understanding of cultural change than through the history of science.

Born in Eagle Pass, Texas, on 14 March 1920, the son of Duane Emerson Roller and Doris DuBose Roller, Duane spent a good part of his youth in Norman, where his father was an OU physics professor. He received the B.A. degree in history of science from Columbia University in 1941 before becoming a naval radar officer during the Second World War. He served in the Navy until 1946, reaching the rank of Lieutenant Commander. Duane and Marjorie Fair Williamson were married on 15 March 1942. After the war Duane earned the M.S. degree in experimental physics at Purdue University in 1949, and in 1954 received his Ph.D. degree in the history of science and learning from Harvard University.

In his four decades at Oklahoma, Duane worked tirelessly on multiple fronts to promote and develop the history of science. He deliberately took on instructional overloads, opening up and teaching new classes and then arguing (successfully) with administration for additional faculty appointments to meet student demand. By the mid-1970s there were six faculty positions in the history of science. He secured the essential institutional support for sustained expansion of the History of Science Collections. For many a summer Duane and Marjorie frequented the shops of European antiquarian book dealers; each fall Duane reapplied the pressure on university fund-raisers to find more private funding, so that the stream of books to the Collections could continue. He worked on large bibliographical projects, notably the printed Catalogue of the Collections (1976), done in collaboration with Marcia M. Goodman; he edited the huge Landmarks of Science microform reproduction of original sources in history of science. As the History of Science Collections' reputation grew, he was called on to give a substantial portion of his time showing it off to everyone from schoolchildren to visiting luminaries. Duane regularly did this with such skill and zest that he ranked about equally with the old books themselves among the university's most prized and most conspicuously displayed cultural assets.

Duane did all these things and more (for example, he headed the university's faculty research committee for two decades) while pursuing diverse scholarly interests and while maintaining a full schedule of classroom teaching and graduate student direction. His outstanding teaching was recognized in a Regents' Award for Superior Teaching in 1970, and by his appointment in 1981 as David Ross Boyd Professor, a title added to his 1963 appointment as McCasland Professor. He was presented the university's Distinguished Service Citation in 1980.

Duane's doctoral thesis became the foundation for a book on The De Magnete of William Gilbert (1959). Much of the scholarship for which he is remembered centered on the early modern physical sciences. The Collections' particular richness in 16th- and 17th-century works is in some measure a reflection of Duane's special interest in the Renaissance and early modern period. Duane also developed a keen interest in Ancient Greek science, taking sabbatical leaves of absence on two occasions as an Associate of the American School of Classical Studies in Athens. In his research, as well as in the lively discussion with which he animated countless seminars and coffee-table conversations, two among Duane's favorite themes were likely to surface: the supreme importance of language in all intellectual transformation, and the affinity between scientific creativity and novel expression in the arts.

In the History of Science Society, Duane was twice a member of the Council (1956-58, 1968-70). He chaired the Pfizer Award Committee in 1968. He was one of the three 'Founding Fathers' of the Midwest Junto, along with Robert Schofield and Robert Siegfried. The Junto was the society Duane liked best because it was the least formal, the least expensive, and the most inviting to participation by graduate students. Among numerous distinctions, two that he especially relished were his service as Sigma Xi National Lecturer (1977-79) and as AAAS/NSF Chautauqua Short Course Lecturer (1978-79).

Keen-witted, imaginative, and energetic, Duane was adept at provoking others into critical re-examination of cherished ideas, or into their clearer defense and elaboration. A fine raconteur, Duane told (and retold) stories for the amusement they afforded, but usually also because they made a point, for Duane was always teaching. We know many others join us in sorrow that we will not again hear Duane's familiar opening, "Have I ever told you about . . . ?" -- nor enjoy the mischief that followed.

He is survived by his wife Marjorie; their son, Duane Williamson Roller, Professor of Classics at Ohio State University at Lima; and their daughter-in-law, Letitia K. Roller, Lecturer in Art at OSU-Lima. A memorial fund is established in Duane's name to endow the purchase of books for OU's History of Science Collections. Donations may be made to the University of Oklahoma Foundation for the Duane H. D. Roller Collection, History of Science Fund. The Foundation's address is 100 Timberdell Rd., Norman, OK, 73109-0685.

*****

The forgoing tribute appeared originally in the History of Science Society Newsletter. It is reprinted here with the permission of the authors.

Gifts and Contributions Are Important to the Department and Collections

The History of Science Collections and the History of Science Department have been pleased to receive gifts in support of several funds that support research and teaching activities of faculty and students. Gifts can be designated through the University of Oklahoma Foundation for these and other purposes. Among the long-term goals of the Department are establishment of endowments for a distinguished professorship in the history of science, a graduate fellowship in the history of science, and a fund for small travel grants to enable scholars and students to travel to Norman to use the resources of the History of Science Collections.

The Department and the Collections are grateful for the support it receives from friends and alumni. We would like to express our thanks in a more specific way by listing the names of donors during the previous year in future issues of Discorsi. Should you wish that your name not appear as a donor, please notify us. Donors are reminded that many companies have programs to match contributions to non-profit organizations, thus doubling one's support of the history of science. Gifts can be made through the OU Foundation, 100 Timberdell Road, Norman, OK 73019; Tel. 405-321-1174 (Ron D. Burton, Executive Director) or the OU Office of University Affairs, 730 College Avenue, Room 338, Norman, OK 73019; Tel. 405-325-3701 (Donna M. Murphy, Director of Development).

Alumni News

José Bach (PhD, 1985) attended a National Endowment for the Humanities Summer Seminar for College Teachers, "Pragmatism and Cultural Criticism," 21 June - 5 August at the University of California, Santa Barbara.

Don Baucom (PhD, 1976) received the 1994 Richard W. Leopold Prize for his book, The Origins of SDI, 1944-1983 (University of Kansas Press). The prize is awarded biennially by the Organization of American Historians for the best book in the areas of foreign policy, military affairs broadly construed, the historical activities of the federal government, or biography in one of these areas.

Van H. Cline made a visit to the Collections a short time ago. He is Senior Attorney for AT&T in San Francisco.

John Eddy's (PhD, 1977) article, "Buffon's Histoire Naturelle History? A Critique of Recent Interpretations," will be published in 1995 in the 'Critiques and Contentions' section of Isis.

Jun Fudano (PhD, 1990) was promoted to the rank of full professor at Kanazawa Institute of Technology, making him the youngest professor on the current KIT faculty. Jun and Hiroko were awarded several large research grants from the Japanese Ministry of Education, and both have had busy schedules as directors of several exchange programs between KIT and universities around the world.

Maria Hidalgo de Portillo (MA, 1984) and Yaritza Ferrer De Valero (MA, 1983) are working on doctoral programs in education in the area of research administration at Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University at Blacksburg. They both plan to complete their work during the summer of 1995.

Kuang-tai Hsu (PhD, 1992) is Associate Professor in the General Education Department at the National Tsing-Hua University, Taiwan. His recent research involves the Jesuits and Chinese science, and he is completing a study of Matteo Ricci's missionary strategy and the transmission of Aristotelian ideas in the late 16th and early 17th centuries.

Michael Keas (PhD, 1992) is Assistant Professor of Natural Sciences at Oklahoma Baptist University. He and Christine became the proud parents of a son, Josiah David Keas, on 8 August.

Liba Taub (PhD, 1987) was a visiting scholar at the Whipple Museum of Cambridge University during the 1993-94 academic year. This fall, she was appointed as the Director of the Whipple Museum, a post she will take up in 1995.

Martha Ellen "Sukoshi" Webb (PhD, 1981) keeps busy with her business, Making History, by editing, publishing, and marketing books, and by planning and preparing historical exhibits for museums and other sites. In addition, she teaches history of science part-time at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln and serves on the board of the Nebraska State Historical Society. She and her husband, Jerry, along with family enjoyed a trip to Norway visiting relatives on old family homesteads and touring the beautiful countryside.

Build Your Collection While You Help Build Our Program

Members of the History of Science Department Faculty have made a collective gift to help the Department raise funds for the program. The Department proposes to offer a copy of recent faculty publications to the winner of a drawing. The books to be presented are:

Gregg Mitman, The State of Nature: Ecology, Community, and American Social Thought, 1900-1950. Chicago: University of Chicago Press 1992. [Gustav O. Arlt Award Winner!]

F. Jamil Ragep, Nasir al-Din al-Tusi's Memoir on Astronomy (al-Tadhkira fi 'ilm al- hay'a). 2 volumes. New York: Springer-Verlag 1993.

Steven J. Livesey, Theology and Science in the Fourteenth Century: Three Questions on the Unity and Subalternation of the Sciences from John of Reading's Commentary on the Sentences. Leiden: E. J. Brill 1989.

The current value of the collection is approximately $200. (The winner may have to pay income taxes on the prize.) We ask that all who are interested in Discorsi and the program to return the form below. We certainly hope that you will include a gift or a pledge, although it is not necessary to do so to enter the drawing. We will draw a winner on March 20, 1995.

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I enjoy receiving Discorsi and would like to enter the History of Science Drawing for the book collection.

[ ] I enclose ____ $25 ____ $50 ____ $100 ____ $150 ____ $200 ____ $300 for the History of Science Department Fund in support of teaching, research and other activities of the Department.

[ ] I enclose ____ $25 ____ $50 ____ $100 ____ $150 ____ $200 ____ $300 for the following History of Science Collections Fund:

[ ] The Duane H. D. Roller Book Fund [ ] The History of Science Collections Acquisitions Fund

[ ] I cannot make a contribution at present, but I wish to continue receiving Discorsi and participate in the drawing.

[ ] My employer has a matching gift program and my form is enclosed.

Make all checks payable to the OU Foundation and return this form to: Discorsi Drawing, Department of the History of Science, The University of Oklahoma, 601 Elm, Room 622, Norman, OK 73019-0315.

History of Science Alumni and Friends Information

Name: ____________________________________________ Degree/Date: _____________

Address:____________________________________________________________________

City: ____________________________________ State: ____________ Zip:_____________

Telephone: Home ____________________________ Office:__________________________

E-mail: _________________________________________

Your news:

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Please mail this form to: Department of the History of Science, The University of Oklahoma, 601 Elm Street, Room 622, Norman, OK 73019.