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Notable people · Science · Physicist · Nobel

William A. Fowler

Born in Pittsburgh, Fowler grew up in Lima from age two, beside the railroad yards that sparked a lifelong love of steam locomotives. He won the 1983 Nobel Prize in Physics for work on how the chemical elements form in stars.

At a glance

Born
1911-08-09
Died
1995-03-14
Education
Ohio State University, Columbus, OH, to 1933, BA
Caltech, Pasadena, CA, to 1936, PhD, nuclear physics
Known as
Science, Physicist, Nobel
Organizations
Caltech

Life story

William Fowler was born August 9, 1911, in Pittsburgh. His family moved to Lima, Ohio, a steam railroad town, when he was two, and he grew up near the Pennsylvania Railroad yard. That sparked a lifelong love of steam locomotives.

He earned a bachelor's degree at Ohio State in 1933 and a PhD in nuclear physics at Caltech in 1936. He stayed at Caltech for his whole career, rising to full professor in 1946 and directing the Kellogg Radiation Laboratory.

In 1957 he joined Margaret Burbidge, Geoffrey Burbidge and Fred Hoyle in the B2FH paper, Synthesis of the Elements in Stars, which sorted out the nuclear processes that made most of the elements. In 1983 he shared the Nobel Prize in Physics for his studies of the nuclear reactions behind the formation of the elements.

He kept working steam-engine models and in 1973 traveled to the Soviet Union to see steam trains on the Trans-Siberian line. He died in Pasadena on March 14, 1995.

Timeline

  • 1911-08-09: Born (Pittsburgh, PA) source
  • 1913: Family moves to Lima, Ohio (when he was two) (Lima, OH) source
  • 1933: Earns BA at Ohio State University (Columbus, OH) source
  • 1936: Earns PhD at Caltech; becomes research fellow (Pasadena, CA) source
  • 1946: Becomes full professor at Caltech (Pasadena, CA) source
  • 1957: Publishes B2FH paper on the synthesis of elements in stars source
  • 1973: Travels to the USSR to see steam railways (USSR) source
  • 1983: Wins the Nobel Prize in Physics (Stockholm) source
  • 1995-03-14: Dies (Pasadena, CA) source

What William is known for

  • 1983 Nobel Prize in Physics
  • Co-author of the B2FH paper (1957) on the origin of the elements
  • B2FH, Synthesis of the Elements in Stars (1957)

Honors and things named for them

  • Nobel Prize in Physics (1983)

Family

  • wife: Adriane Fay Olmsted (two daughters)
  • wife: Mary Dutcher (m. 1989)

Ohio places

Where William A. Fowler was born, lived, worked and is remembered, with the ZIP code, town and county pages for each.

Further reading

Sources

Confidence. High: the main facts were confirmed in sources we opened.

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