John Graham Backus (April 29, 1911 – October 28, 1988) was a

Lithuanian American Lithuanian Americans refers to American citizens and residents who are Lithuanian and were born in Lithuania, or are of Lithuanian descent. New Philadelphia, Pennsylvania has the largest percentage of Lithuanian Americans (20.8%) in the United ...

physicist and acoustician. John Backus was born and raised in

Portland, Oregon Portland (, ) is a port city in the Pacific Northwest and the list of cities in Oregon, largest city in the U.S. state of Oregon. Situated at the confluence of the Willamette River, Willamette and Columbia River, Columbia rivers, Portland is ...

, where he studied at

Reed College Reed College is a private liberal arts college in Portland, Oregon. Founded in 1908, Reed is a residential college with a campus in the Eastmoreland neighborhood, with Tudor-Gothic style architecture, and a forested canyon nature preserve at ...

, receiving a BA in 1932. He went on to graduate studies at the

University of California, Berkeley The University of California, Berkeley (UC Berkeley, Berkeley, Cal, or California) is a public land-grant research university in Berkeley, California. Established in 1868 as the University of California, it is the state's first land-grant u ...

, where he did research in

nuclear physics Nuclear physics is the field of physics that studies atomic nuclei and their constituents and interactions, in addition to the study of other forms of nuclear matter. Nuclear physics should not be confused with atomic physics, which studies the ...

at the Radiation Laboratory under

Ernest Lawrence Ernest Orlando Lawrence (August 8, 1901 – August 27, 1958) was an American nuclear physicist and winner of the Nobel Prize in Physics in 1939 for his invention of the cyclotron. He is known for his work on uranium-isotope separation fo ...

. He received an MA in 1936, and a PhD in 1940. In 1945 he was appointed Professor of Physics at the

University of Southern California , mottoeng = "Let whoever earns the palm bear it" , religious_affiliation = Nonsectarian—historically Methodist , established = , accreditation = WSCUC , type = Private research university , academic_affiliations = , endowment = $8.1 ...

, a post he retained until his retirement in 1980. During the early part of his career, his research focussed on gaseous discharges in strong magnetic fields. He was also a musician, trained as a performer on piano, bassoon, clarinet and other

woodwinds Woodwind instruments are a family of musical instruments within the greater category of wind instruments. Common examples include flute, clarinet, oboe, bassoon, and saxophone. There are two main types of woodwind instruments: flutes and reed ...

and received the degree of MMus in conducting from the University of Southern California in 1959. In his later career he turned increasingly to the study of

musical acoustics Musical acoustics or music acoustics is a multidisciplinary field that combines knowledge from physics, psychophysics, organology (classification of the instruments), physiology, music theory, ethnomusicology, signal processing and instrument build ...

, particularly those of

wind instrument A wind instrument is a musical instrument that contains some type of resonator (usually a tube) in which a column of air is set into vibration by the player blowing into (or over) a mouthpiece set at or near the end of the resonator. The pitc ...

s and organ pipes. In 1969 he published ''The Acoustical Foundations of Music'', a book which became a standard text for introductory courses in musical acoustics. A second edition appeared in 1977. He received the Silver Medal of the

Acoustical Society of America The Acoustical Society of America (ASA) is an international scientific society founded in 1929 dedicated to generating, disseminating and promoting the knowledge of acoustics and its practical applications. The Society is primarily a voluntary org ...

in 1986. Backus died in

Los Angeles Los Angeles ( ; es, Los Ángeles, link=no , ), often referred to by its initials L.A., is the List of municipalities in California, largest city in the U.S. state, state of California and the List of United States cities by population, sec ...

in 1988. John Backus was a Renaissance man who in addition to music and physics was a highly skilled mountaineer. The Sierra Club's

Hundred Peaks Section The Hundred Peaks Section (HPS) is a mountaineering society within the Angeles Chapter of the Sierra Club that serves to provide mountaineering activities for Sierra Club members in the southern Sierra Nevada, the Transverse Ranges, and the Peninsul ...

List contains approximately 275 summits, and John was the first person to ascend every mountain on the list six times. He was also the first person to lead every peak on the list, among his many hiking and climbing accomplishments.

Works

References

Sources

*Campbell, Murray. 2001. "Backus, John (Graham)". ''The New Grove Dictionary of Music and Musicians'', edited by Stanley Sadie and John Tyrrell. London: Macmillan.

External links

The John Backus Archive
at CCRMA, Stanford University. 1911 births 1988 deaths 20th-century American physicists American nuclear physicists Acousticians Scientists from Portland, Oregon Reed College alumni UC Berkeley College of Letters and Science alumni University of Southern California faculty {{US-physicist-stub