Arnold Orville Beckman - Education

Education

Beckman attended the University of Illinois, where he earned his bachelor's degree in chemical engineering in 1922 and his master's degree in physical chemistry in 1923. While attending the University of Illinois, he was initiated into the Gamma Alpha Graduate Scientific Fraternity in December 1922. He joined the Delta Upsilon Fraternity.

Beckman decided to go to Caltech for his doctorate. He stayed there for a year, but decided to return to New York and his fiancée, Mabel, who was working as a secretary for the Equitable Life Assurance Society. He found a job with Western Electric's engineering department, the precursor to the Bell Telephone Laboratories.

At Western Electric, Beckman developed quality control programs for the manufacture of vacuum tubes and learned about circuit design. It was here that Beckman discovered his interest in electronics.

Beckman married Mabel on June 10, 1925. The following year, the couple moved back to California and Beckman resumed his studies at Caltech. He became interested in ultraviolet photolysis and worked with his doctoral advisor, Roscoe G. Dickinson, on an instrument to find the energy of ultraviolet light. It worked by shining the ultraviolet light onto a thermocouple, converting the incident heat into electricity, which drove a galvanometer. After receiving his doctorate in 1928, Beckman was asked to stay on at Caltech as an instructor and then as a professor.

Beckman, and his family then built a home in Altadena, in the foothills and adjacent to Pasadena. They lived in Altadena for over twenty seven years raising their family.

During his time at Caltech, he worked at times with Linus Pauling, who had the same doctoral advisor, Roscoe G. Dickinson.