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Homer Levi Dodge was born on October 21, 1887, in Ogdensburg, New York. His father, Orange Wood Dodge, taught at the Ogdensburg Free Academy, which Homer attended. His mother, Isabella Donaghue Dodge, was an active participant in the intellectual life of the community; after her death, the children's room of the public library was dedicated to her. From them their son acquired a deep appreciation of the natural world and was encouraged to challenge it both intellectually and physically.
Homer Dodge graduated from Colgate University in 1910, and went on to obtain an M.S. in 1912 and Ph.D in physics in 1914 from the University of Iowa. From 1906 to 1915 he spent his summers as a surveyor for the United States Geological Survey. At Iowa he taught physics first as a graduate assistant, then as an instructor, and finally in 1915 as an assistant professor. He was especially interested in applied physics, and concentrated on laboratory experiments and equipment and the investigation of materials. During World War I he was a member of the National Research Council Sub-committee on Detection of Invisible Aircraft; in 1919 the War Department published the results of his investigations. While at Iowa, he applied for and was eventually granted two patents, one for an improved rheostat and the other for a porous damper for acoustical instruments. In 1917 he married Margaret Wing, with whom he had two children, Alice Isabella in 1920 and Norton Townshend in 1927.
In 1919 Dodge became chairman of the physics department at the University of Oklahoma, and in 1926 dean of the graduate school. He also developed and directed a program in applied physics for engineers and geologists. He was president of the Board of Trustees for the School of Religion from 1927 to 1944. In 1941 he organized within the university the Oklahoma Research Institute and became its first director. The purpose of the Institute was to conduct research that could be supported by the state government and industry. During this time, most of his papers and lectures reflected his interest in education and his investigations into methods of improving it.
When Dodge began teaching at Iowa, a far greater emphasis was placed on research than on teaching, as American physicists tried to build up departments that could provide the same level of training as their European counterparts. Although Dodge published many research papers, he was becoming more interested in the education of future physicists, and he and Paul Klopsteg, who was then at the University of Minnesota, tried to influence the American Physical Society (APS) to take up these concerns. The APS appointed Dodge as their official representative on the editorial staff of the journal School Science and Mathematics, where he edited a column called "Research in Physics," which presented the newest developments in the field. He oversaw this column from 1916 to 1924 and contributed many articles.
Since the APS did not provide an official outlet for the concerns of those who were interested in teaching as well as research, Dodge and Klopsteg met with their colleagues at the December 1930 meeting of the APS to organize the American Association of Physics Teachers (AAPT). They were able to excite the interest and active participation of many prominent physicists, such as Karl T. Compton, Frederick Palmer Jr., Floyd K. Richtmyer, Marshall States, and William S. Webb. Shortly after its establishment, the AAPT became one of the five founding societies of the American Institute of Physics (AIP). Homer Dodge was elected first president of the AAPT, and then became a member of its Governing Board from 1933 to 1939. He served as chairman of the Membership Committee from 1934 to 1937, guiding a very successful membership drive, and was also a member of the Committee on the Training of Physicists for Industry. He was awarded the Oersted Medal in 1944, gave the Richtmyer Lecture in 1947, and received a Distinguished Service Citation for contributions to the teaching of physics in 1977. He was instrumental in setting up in 1932 the
Dodge was a member of the AIP Governing Board from 1932 to 1935; made chairman of its New York headquarters building fundraising committee in 1939; and was a member of the War Policy Committee in 1942 and chairman in 1943. He was active in Sigma Pi Sigma, the physics honor society, serving as national president from 1947 to 1950, and a member of its Executive Council from 1950 to 1955. He was also active in the American Society of Engineering Education (ASEE), formerly the Society for the Promotion of Engineering Education (SPEE). He served as field director for a study on college and university teaching conducted by the American Association of University Professors, and the results were published in 1933. In addition, he was a member of the first educational advisory board for the Merchant Marine Academy in Kings Point, New York, from 1947 to 1952.
From 1942 to 1944, he took a leave of absence from the University of Oklahoma to serve as director of the Office of Scientific Personnel of the National Research Council. In 1944 he accepted the presidency of Norwich University, a military academy in Northfield, Vermont, that emphasized liberal arts as well as science and engineering. In 1950 he resigned as president to take over direction of the Cabot Fund, created by a generous donation from Dr. Godfrey Cabot, a Norwich trustee, to establish an aviation program at Norwich. He acted as director of the fund until 1953 and chairman until 1960.
In 1951 he was the only physicist in a group of engineers who traveled to Japan as part of the engineering education mission organized by ASEE at the request of the American Occupation Force. The group found the Japanese engineers locked into the European lecture tradition where the professor gave one lecture to a huge class, took no questions and made no effort to discover if he was understood, and concentrated on research. The Americans toured their hosts' facilities, met them socially, and conducted sessions that relied upon discussion. They emphasized the diversity and flexibility of the American educational system, the approachability of its professors and instructors, its emphasis on both teaching and research, and the benefits and strengths of this two-way communication. They demonstrated to the Japanese that there was no definitive answer that they could give them to help them improve Japanese engineering education, but that the answers would have to come from the Japanese themselves in response to their knowledge of their own needs, strengths, and weaknesses.
In 1955, Dodge and his son Norton traveled extensively in the U.S.S.R., making the first study of Soviet education after World War II. Dodge returned to sound the alarm over the superiority of the Soviet scientific educational system compared with the American. Under the auspices of Sigma Pi Sigma, he toured many campuses, showing his slides and giving lectures on his experiences and conclusions. The 1950s, in fact, were given over in great part to lecturing and travel. Besides lectures on Japan and Russia, Dodge offered talks and illustrations ranging from his earliest days of travel in the western United States up though his canoeing exploits on the St. Lawrence River in the 1950s. He was thus able to combine into this activity his interests in photography, travel, canoeing, the environment, southwest archaeology and anthropology, topography, and education.
After his official retirement in 1960, Dodge devoted his time primarily to travel and canoeing, attending professional meetings, and giving occasional lectures. He was active in several conservation, whitewater, and outdoors associations, and participated successfully in many canoe races. He remained mentally active until the end, only surrendering grudgingly to physical restrictions in his last few years. His wife died in 1981; on June 29, 1983, he died in his home on his son Norton's estate in Mechanicsville, Maryland, at the age of 95.
The Homer Dodge Papers span the years 1852 to 1994, with the bulk of the materials falling in the time period 1910 to 1960.
The collection encompasses the wide range of Dodge's interests and activities. Most of the material from 1910 to the early 1920s is technical and scientific in nature and consists of lecture and research notes, classroom materials, work on patents, and writings based on his research. After the mid-1920s, Dodge turned his attention primarily to the improvement of teaching in general and the improvement of the teaching of physics and its importance in a well-rounded education in particular. The papers reflect Dodge's contributions to the teaching of physics and the promotion of its significance in education and society. Thus they are particularly detailed on such topics as the founding of the American Association of Physics Teachers (AAPT) in 1930 and the American Institute of Physics (AIP) in 1931 and their governance and development, the establishment of the
Dodge's notes, reports, and correspondence document his work on the two patents he was granted, one in 1920 for an improved rheostat, and the other in 1924 for a porous damper for acoustical instruments; his administrative work during World War II in ensuring the optimum utilization of scientists for the war effort as Director of the Office of Scientific Personnel of the National Research Council; the growth of Sigma Pi Sigma and the establishment of several of its chapters; the itinerary and findings of the American Society of Engineering Education mission to Japan in 1951; and his trip to the U.S.S.R. in 1955 to survey Soviet scientific education.
The Niels Bohr Library received a substantial amount of additional material after the original collection was processed in 1997. Processed in the fall of 1998, the additional 11. 5 linear feet consist primarily of Dodge's personal papers. They include materials that document his childhood and education, his college life, marriage, as well as his passion for canoeing and the outdoors.
The bulk of the additions consist of personal correspondence, spanning from 1891 to 1979. There is an extensive correspondence between Dodge and his mother, Isabella Donaghue Dodge, while Dodge was at Colgate and the University of Iowa. Their close correspondence lasted until his mother died in 1936. The additions also include his collection of Isabella Donaghue Dodge's personal correspondence with other family and friends as well as her writings. Other important personal correspondents in these additions include his wife, Margaret Wing Dodge, and Fletcher Dodge, his older brother. Some additions were made to the Fred W. Kent correspondence file -- most notably photocopies of some of the letters Homer Dodge wrote to Kent.
Dodge's married life is best documented through the personal files and daybooks of his wife, Margaret. Margaret Dodge kept both notes of daily activities as well as clippings in each annual yearbook, from 1917 to 1978.
The personal side of Dodge's life is also seen through the numerous photographs included in the additions. Although Dodge took most of the photographs himself, some are the work of friends and professional photographers Fred Kent and Clyde Smith. There are many shots of Dodge with his parents, with Margaret Wing Dodge and their children, and on various canoeing adventure trips. Also included are photographs of Margaret Wing Dodge's family and her travels before and after her 1917 marriage to Dodge.
The papers include materials such as correspondence, notes, reports, drafts, memoranda, minutes, photographs, negatives, slides, ephemera such as programs and posters, artifacts and instruments, publications, manuals, newspaper clippings, articles, maps, blueprints, cards, and postcards.
Dodge kept careful records relating to his vita; these can be found in Series I, Biographical Material. Master lists of his writings and many of his published works can be found in Series VII, Publications, which also contains notes and drafts for some of them.
Materials relating to the founding of AAPT and AIP can be found primarily in Series IV, Correspondence, and Series V, Organizations and Associations.
Dodge's ideas and research in the field of engineering physics are in Series 111, Career and Professional Activities, Subseries D, University of Oklahoma; Series V, Organizations and Associations, Subseries A, AAPT, and Subseries C, American Society for Engineering Education (ASEE); Series VI, Travel and Lectures, Subseries A, Japan; and Series VII, Publications.
Material relating to his studies and writings on graduate education and the improvement of college and university teaching can be found in Series 111, Career and Professional Activities, Subseries D, University of Oklahoma; Series V, Organizations and Associations, Subseries E, American Association of University Professors (AAUP); and Series VII, Publications.
Significant correspondents include his mother, Isabella Donaghue Dodge, Fred W. Kent and Alfred Bailey, lifelong friends from his tenure in Iowa; Henry A. Barton; Carroll Dodge; Harold Hazen; Paul Klopsteg; Atwood Manley; Charles A. Plumley; Duane Roller; William Schriever; and Marsh White. Since Dodge kept carbon copies of much of his material, the papers often contain both sides of the correspondence.
The Dodge papers are divided into ten series: Biographical Material, Education and Early Life, Career and Professional Activities, Correspondence, Organizations and Associations, Travel and Lectures, Publications, Family and Personal, Artifacts, and Photographs.
Each series is arranged chronologically unless otherwise noted. The series description contains descriptions of arrangement that are other than chronological, along with occasional notes about the contents of the series.
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The Homer L. Dodge Papers were received by the American Institute of Physics in four installments. During the last years of his life, Dodge indicated his intention to donate his papers to the AIP Center for History of Physics, and he was in the process of readying them for transfer at his death in 1983. The first shipment was sent by Dodge's daughter, Alice Dodge Wallace, in 1984. Mrs. Wallace sent two more shipments of papers in 1996. The final shipments were received over 1997-1998 and were processed separately as additions to the original collection. These additions also include a small amount of materials sent from Clyde Smith, one of Homer Dodge's close friends, through Alice Dodge Wallace.
Mrs. Wallace went through the last two sets of papers herself to remove personal items and organize the remainder, then hired M. Susan Barger, Ph.D., to prepare them for shipment. Dr. Barger removed much duplicate material, housed the papers in archival folders, compiled inventories, and boxed them for shipping.
The papers have gone through many hands over the years, and subsequently reflect little of their original order (except for personal correspondence files). Homer Dodge moved several times during his life, and wrote more than once of his attempts to weed and rearrange his files. After his death, his papers were moved once again to his daughter's home in Colorado before coming to AIP. Dodge apparently kept multiple copies of some items, filed by subject. As the original system by which he managed his materials has been lost, it was decided to arrange the collection so as to reflect the activities and interests of its creator.
The additions received during 1997-1998 were mostly placed at the end to avoid reprocessing the entire collection. They have been described, however, in the appropriate series, with locations given by box and folder in the Container List. Some materials, where possible, have been integrated into previously established folders. Because all additions originated with Alice Dodge Wallace, no distinctions have been made between various sets of additions.
During processing, duplicates, rusting staples, and paper clips were removed from the collection. Deteriorating documents were photocopied onto acid-free paper and the originals removed from the collection except where intrinsic value dictated retention. Some photographs of Dodge were photocopied onto acid-free paper, the copies left in the collection, and the originals placed in the Emilio Segrè Visual Archives in the Niels Bohr Library. All other photographs were placed in sleeves and left in their original locations. Photographs from the 1998 additions were numerous enough to merit the addition of Series X. A selection of photos from this series was also added to the Emilio Segrè Visual Archives. Any markings by the processor to aid identification were made in pencil and enclosed in brackets; all other markings were on the materials when received. Oversized materials were removed to oversize storage.
The State Historical Society of Iowa, repository of the Fred W. Kent Collection, reproduced Kent's copies of the extensive correspondence between the two friends. These, with other letters to and from Kent in the additions, were not integrated into the existing correspondence file (Series IV.A. I & 2), but are noted as additions (Series IV.A.3). This may result in overlapping in dates; researchers should look in both places. Because of the original filing system's duplication, and disarray resulting from numerous rearrangements, researchers should look at every possible series and subseries when pursuing specific topics.
rocessing of this collection was completed in May 1997 by Rebecca Fitzgerald. The additions were processed by Coralina Daly in the fall of 1998.
Related collections and oral history interviews in the American Institute of Physics Niels Bohr Library:
Books not written by Dodge were removed to the Niels Bohr Library or sent to Norwich University, with the exception of two books within the additions that contained personal notations.
Materials relating to Dodge's own and his predecessors' tenures at Norwich University were transferred to Norwich in June 1997. Dr. Barger sent a small volume of canoe ephemera, consisting primarily of canoe catalogs, to the Antique Boat Museum in 1996. Western travel ephemera culled from the collection by Dr. Barger will be given to the Western History and Genealogy Division of the Denver Public Library and the Photographic Archives of the History Library, Palace of the Governors, Museum of New Mexico.
Due to deterioration or the acidity of the paper, some materials were photocopied onto acid-free paper. While most of these photcopies were kept with the originals, others were used as replacements. These replaced originals were removed to a separate box (Box 78) in the even that the replacement photocopy is inadequate.
Includes two clipping service files, one from 1914 to 1916 and the other from 1937 to 1942, clippings kept and donated by longtime friend Clyde Smith, articles, newspaper clippings, certificates, programs, and photographic materials.
Includes biographical summaries compiled by Dodge for various publications or other purposes and clippings relating to his family.
The material in this series concentrates on Dodge's youth, especially his attendance at Ogdensburg Free Academy, and his summer employment as a surveyor for the U.S. Geological Survey.
Administrative materials are placed first, then visual materials, and finally the manuals.
Arranged into four sub-series
Contains blueprints (some oversized), studies, reports, photographs, a manual relating primarily to Dodge's work on high-altitude trajectories, and a copy of the book he wrote for the War Department based on his war-time research.
Divided into sub-subseries for each of the two patents for which Dodge filed an application.
Divided into three sub-subseries.
Arranged in five sub-subseries, revolving chiefly around Dodge's appointment as director of the Office of Scientific Personnel (OSP), National Research Council (NRC).
Ephemera and printed material from Dodge's term as president of Norwich University, Northfield, VT.
Correspondence is divided into two sub-subseries, one for outgoing correspondence from Homer Dodge, which Kent saved, and the second containing both incoming and outgoing letters. They discuss family matters and travel, and the folders also contain clippings and photographs. The later addition of several letters, many of which are photocopies forwarded from the State Historical Society of Iowa, are housed separately in folders marked "Additions." These are all included under the second, "Incoming and Outgoing" sub-subseries and span the years 1918-1981.
Apparently started as a new filing system in 1944 when Dodge became president of Norwich University. Although there are a few items from earlier years and considerably more from later years, the bulk of the material falls between 1944 and 1959. This subseries is arranged alphabetically and then in reverse chronological order. The miscellaneous letter folders are also arranged alphabetically and then in reverse chronology. While primarily personal or administrative in nature, some of the material is more substantive and reflects Dodge's professional activities, including Norwich University, OSP, Sigma Pi Sigma, AIP, AAPT, SPEE, Sigma Xi, AAUP, lecture tours, and travel.
Divided into three sub-subseries. Topics covered include the first and second meetings; Klopsteg's account of his efforts to establish an organization devoted to the teaching of physics; the establishment of the Oersted Award and the Richtmyer Memorial Lecture; and plans for the AAPT journal,
Divided into five sub-subseries. Topics cover the inclusion of AAPT as one of the founding societies, new journals, the purchase and furnishing of the headquarters building in New York City, and training and education of physicists.
Arranged alphabetically and then in reverse chronological order.
This series is arranged by subject.
Documents the work of and Dodge's participation in the engineering education mission which was sponsored by ASEE at the request of the American Occupation Force. It is divided into six sub-subseries. Some of the material is in Japanese.
Contains materials relating to the trip Dodge made with his son Norton to survey the scientific educational system in Russia.
Arranged chronologically by trip, but an attempt was made to keep studies, articles, photographs, reports, and lecture drafts relating to each separate trip together.
Arranged in chronological order, and then alphabetically within each year. Master lists of publications, which were compiled in 1941, are at the end. Dodge also compiled lists of papers, addresses and programs from 1911 to 1930, 1931 to 1940, and 1941 to 1950. This subseries contains some reprints, notes, diagrams, drafts, and texts.
Arranged alphabetically by author, with two folders of miscellaneous material at the end.
Contains correspondence and materials relating to Dodge's family and his non-professional activities, including some of his, his mother's and his wife's personal materials and is arranged by subject.
Contains texts, drafts, correspondence, slides and photographs for some of the Christmas cards produced by Dodge with the assistance of his friend Fred Kent, a photographer.
Arranged chronologically for the most part, but an attempt was made to keep folders relating to the same subject together.
Contains material relating to the donation of Dodge's canoe.
Includes material relating to the opening of the museum and the room devoted to Dodge's canoeing exploits.
This series includes a disassembled rheostat and a chloride of silver Faradic battery, as well as various photographic media, such as lantern slides, glass plate negatives, and metal plates, and other miscellaneous material.
This entire series comes from the 1997-1998 additions and is organized as a microcosm of the entire collection, with the subseries headings matching the series headings of the rest of the collection. Very few of the photographs are dated, and thus are arranged primarily by subject, but chronologically where possible. This includes two manuscript boxes of negatives, many of which have corresponding photographs. Dates marked on the photographs range from 1905-1940. However, based on Dodge's estimated age in many of the photos, this series dates well into the 1970s. The last subseries, J, is miscellaneous and includes photos of unidentifiable people, places and other unknown things.
No photographs from the original collection were pulled to fit into this new series, however, therefore researchers should look in all possible locations for relevant photos, including the Emilio Segrè Visual Archives.