Richard Henry Bolt (April 22, 1911 – January 13, 2002) was an American

physics Physics is the natural science that studies matter, its fundamental constituents, its motion and behavior through space and time, and the related entities of energy and force. "Physical science is that department of knowledge which rel ...

professor Professor (commonly abbreviated as Prof.) is an academic rank at universities and other post-secondary education and research institutions in most countries. Literally, ''professor'' derives from Latin as a "person who professes". Professor ...

MIT The Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) is a private land-grant research university in Cambridge, Massachusetts. Established in 1861, MIT has played a key role in the development of modern technology and science, and is one of the ...

with an interest in acoustics. He was one of the founders of the company

Bolt, Beranek and Newman Raytheon BBN (originally Bolt Beranek and Newman Inc.) is an American research and development company, based next to Fresh Pond in Cambridge, Massachusetts, United States. In 1966, the Franklin Institute awarded the firm the Frank P. Brown ...

, which built the

ARPANET The Advanced Research Projects Agency Network (ARPANET) was the first wide-area packet-switched network with distributed control and one of the first networks to implement the TCP/IP protocol suite. Both technologies became the technical foun ...

, a forerunner of the

Internet The Internet (or internet) is the global system of interconnected computer networks that uses the Internet protocol suite (TCP/IP) to communicate between networks and devices. It is a ''internetworking, network of networks'' that consists ...

Early life

Bolt was born in

Peking } Beijing ( ; ; ), Chinese postal romanization, alternatively romanized as Peking ( ), is the Capital city, capital of the China, People's Republic of China. It is the center of power and development of the country. Beijing is the world's Li ...

, China, where his parents were medical

missionaries A missionary is a member of a religious group which is sent into an area in order to promote its faith or provide services to people, such as education, literacy, social justice, health care, and economic development.Thomas Hale 'On Being a Mi ...

. His family returned to the

U.S. The United States of America (U.S.A. or USA), commonly known as the United States (U.S. or US) or America, is a country primarily located in North America. It consists of 50 states, a federal district, five major unincorporated territor ...

in 1916 and settled in

California California is a state in the Western United States, located along the Pacific Coast. With nearly 39.2million residents across a total area of approximately , it is the most populous U.S. state and the 3rd largest by area. It is also the ...

. Bolt graduated from Berkeley High School, California in 1928 and went to college and graduate school 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 ...

. Although he initially expected to major in either music or graphical design, he decided on

architecture Architecture is the art and technique of designing and building, as distinguished from the skills associated with construction. It is both the process and the product of sketching, conceiving, planning, designing, and constructing buildings ...

, in which he attained a BA in 1933. At that time, he had already developed an interest in acoustics, combining his interests for music, design and architecture. After his marriage to Katherine Mary Smith, right after his graduation in 1933, they made a honeymoon to Europe, where he became acquainted with a number of scientists from

Berlin Berlin is Capital of Germany, the capital and largest city of Germany, both by area and List of cities in Germany by population, by population. Its more than 3.85 million inhabitants make it the European Union's List of cities in the European U ...

, and the honeymoon was extended to ten months while Bolt learned German and studied acoustics.

Berkeley

Returning to Berkeley in 1934, he entered the graduate

program, and, earning an

M.A. A Master of Arts ( la, Magister Artium or ''Artium Magister''; abbreviated MA, M.A., AM, or A.M.) is the holder of a master's degree awarded by universities in many countries. The degree is usually contrasted with that of Master of Science. ...

in 1937 and qualifying for Berkeley's Physics

Ph.D. A Doctor of Philosophy (PhD, Ph.D., or DPhil; Latin: or ') is the most common degree at the highest academic level awarded following a course of study. PhDs are awarded for programs across the whole breadth of academic fields. Because it is a ...

program, which he completed in 1939. He performed his research at

UCLA The University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA) is a public university, public Land-grant university, land-grant research university in Los Angeles, California. UCLA's academic roots were established in 1881 as a Normal school, teachers colle ...

, given the fact that Berkeley had no acoustics research facilities at that time. After attaining his PhD in 1939 he worked at

for a year on the transmission of sound in various shapes of rooms. Excluding a brief period at the

University of Illinois The University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign (U of I, Illinois, University of Illinois, or UIUC) is a public land-grant research university in Illinois in the twin cities of Champaign and Urbana. It is the flagship institution of the Unive ...

and a stationing in

London London is the capital and List of urban areas in the United Kingdom, largest city of England and the United Kingdom, with a population of just under 9 million. It stands on the River Thames in south-east England at the head of a estuary dow ...

during

WWII World War II or the Second World War, often abbreviated as WWII or WW2, was a world war that lasted from 1939 to 1945. It involved the World War II by country, vast majority of the world's countries—including all of the great power ...

, he remained associated with the MIT until his retirement.

MIT and BBN

Bolt started a consulting firm with another MIT professor,

Leo Beranek Leo Leroy Beranek (September 15, 1914 – October 10, 2016) was an American acoustics expert, former MIT professor, and a founder and former president of Bolt, Beranek and Newman (now BBN Technologies). He authored ''Acoustics'', considered a ...

, in 1948, and worked on such projects as doing an audio analysis of the

JFK John Fitzgerald Kennedy (May 29, 1917 – November 22, 1963), often referred to by his initials JFK and the nickname Jack, was an American politician who served as the 35th president of the United States from 1961 until his assassination i ...

assassination Assassination is the murder of a prominent or important person, such as a head of state, head of government, politician, world leader, member of a royal family or CEO. The murder of a celebrity, activist, or artist, though they may not have a ...

, the "18.5 minute gap" in

Nixon Richard Milhous Nixon (January 9, 1913April 22, 1994) was the 37th president of the United States, serving from 1969 to 1974. A member of the Republican Party, he previously served as a representative and senator from California and was ...

White House The White House is the official residence and workplace of the president of the United States. It is located at 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue Northwest, Washington, D.C., NW in Washington, D.C., and has been the residence of every U.S. preside ...

tapes, and improving the sound in

concert hall A concert hall is a cultural building with a stage that serves as a performance venue and an auditorium filled with seats. This list does not include other venues such as sports stadia, dramatic theatres or convention centres that m ...

s. In later years, after the addition of one of his former students, Robert Newman, the firm of

, better known as BBN, designed the first

modem A modulator-demodulator or modem is a computer hardware device that converts data from a digital format into a format suitable for an analog transmission medium such as telephone or radio. A modem transmits data by modulating one or more c ...

in 1963, helping computers communicate with each other. This led to work on the

, which became the

. BBN helped develop

e-mail Electronic mail (email or e-mail) is a method of exchanging messages ("mail") between people using electronic devices. Email was thus conceived as the electronic ( digital) version of, or counterpart to, mail, at a time when "mail" mean ...

and, in 1971, one of BBN's researchers,

Ray Tomlinson Raymond Samuel Tomlinson (April 23, 1941 – March 5, 2016) was an American computer programmer who implemented the first email program on the ARPANET system, the precursor to the Internet, in 1971; It was the first system able to send mail be ...

, chose the " @" sign for e-mail addresses. Bolt retired in 1976.

External links

Obituary
at th
Acoustical Society of America
focused on Bolt's achievements in acoustics.
BBN website

by Leo Beranek
Richard H. Bolt Papers
MC-0562. Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Department of Distinctive Collections, Cambridge, Massachusetts. {{DEFAULTSORT:Bolt, Richard 1911 births 2002 deaths 20th-century American physicists American acoustical engineers Berkeley High School (Berkeley, California) alumni Internet pioneers ASA Gold Medal recipients Fellows of the American Physical Society UC Berkeley College of Environmental Design alumni American expatriates in China

Early life

Berkeley

MIT and BBN

See also

External links