The Michelson Memorial Lecture Series commemorates the achievements of Albert A. Michelson, whose experiments on the measurement of the speed of light were initiated while he was a military instructor at the U. S. Naval Academy. These studies not only advanced the science of physics, but resulted in his selection as the first Nobel Laureate in science from the United States.
Each year since 1981, a distinguished scientist has come to the Naval Academy to present the Michelson Lecture. These scientists have represented a variety of scientific disciplines, including chemistry, physics, mathematics, oceanography, and computer science.
| Year | Speaker |
| 2001 | Dr.
David Donoho, (images) Stanford University "Data! Data! Data! Challenges and Opportunities of the Coming Data Deluge" (download, pdf format) |
| 2000 | Dr.
Vinton G. Cerf Senior Vice President of Internet Architecture and Technology |
| 1999 | Dr. Sylvia Earl Deep Ocean Explorer, 1998-2002 National Geographic Explorer-in-Residence, and Chairman, DOER Marine Operations, Inc. |
| 1998 | Dr. Leon N.
Cooper, Nobel Laureate Thomas J. Watson, Sr. Professor of Science, Brown University Department of Physics and Director, Institute for Brain and Neural Systems |
| 1997 | Dr.
Dudley R. Herschbach, Nobel Laureate Frank B. Baird, Jr. Professor of Science, Harvard University |
| 1996 | Dr.
Aaron Hauptman, Nobel Laureate Hauptman-Woodward Research Foundation |
| 1995 | Dr.
Arnold Penzias, Nobel Laureate Bell Laboratories |
| 1994 | Dr.
Kathryn D. Sullivan NOAH Chief Scientist and Astronaut |
| 1993 | Dr.
Richard E. Smalley, Nobel Laureate Rice University |
| 1992 | Dr.
Michael F. Shlesinger Director of Physics, Office of Naval Research |
| 1991 | Dr.
John H. Conway Princeton University |
| 1990 | Dr.
Richard Hamming Naval Postgraduate School, Monterey, California |
| 1989 | Dr.
Robert Ballard Woods Hole Oceanographic Institute |
| 1988 | Dr.
Stirling A. Colgate Los Alamos |
| 1987 | Dr.
James A. Watson, Nobel Laureate Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory |
| 1986 | Dr.
Ronald L. Graham Bell Laboratories |
| 1985 | Admiral Grace
Hopper United States Navy |
| 1984 | Honorable James M.
Beggs National Aeronautics and Space Administration |
| 1983 | Dr. Arthur L.
Schawlow, Nobel Laureate Stanford University |
| 1982 | Dr.
Charles H.
Townes, Nobel Laureate University of California at Berkeley |
| 1981 | Dr.
Harold C.
Brown Purdue University |
Additional detail of historical significance
behind the
Michelson Lecture Series
...By the 1870’s the program at the Academy had changed significantly. Now midshipmen could expect to be students for four years instead of five (three of these aboard ship), and there was a much greater emphasis on academic subjects rather than at sea training. This new format earned the Academy the award at the Paris Exposition of 1879. The school was rated as having the best educational system in the United States.
The last thirty
years of the nineteenth century saw a flurry of advances in science: physics
came into its own and the experimentation going on would lead Albert Einstein to
postulate his now-famous Theory of Relativity. The Naval Academy played a small
role on the way to Relativity. In the late 1870’s, a Navy lieutenant and
instructor in the Academy’s Department of Physics, Albert Michelson, performed
his now-famous experiments to measure the velocity of light. These experiments
were fundamental to the eventual development, by Einstein, of the Relativity
Theory. In 1907 Michelson, a graduate of the Naval Academy class of 1873, became
the first American to be awarded the Nobel Prize. Today, the science wing
(dedicated in the spring of 1969) at the Academy is named Michelson
Hall.
...Taken from "Annapolis, the United States Naval
Academy," by David Pahl, 1987, Exetar Books.