Byline Backstory No. 5: Physic(k)al Pursuits at Ursinus with Mauchly ’s Skateboard, Snyder’s Unicycle…and Einstein’s Bike?

At Pennsylvania ’s Ursinus College, Professor John W. Mauchly, Ph.D. (1907 to 1980,upper left), often taught physics classes from his jet-propelled skateboard. While tinkering with computing components, he had hoped to record and analyze mountains of meteorologic data to, someday, forecast the weather. (After moving to the University of Pennsylvania, Mauchly would invent the ENIAC, the first general purpose computer.) One of Mauchly ’s successors as chair of physics at Ursinus was Manhattan Project scientist Evan S. Snyder, Ph.D. (1923 to 2009,lower left). Rather than a skateboard, Dr. Snyder rode a unicycle to teach his physics students, including premedical students such as myself. From physics at Ursinus, I graduated to studying “physick” or medicine at Johns Hopkins. Fast forward to 2005, when I set aside Wood Library-Museum exhibit designing to return briefly to Ursinus with Evan Bause (right). We cocurated Ursinus ’ “Images& Energies, ” an art gallery salute to a third free-wheeling physicist: bike-riding Albert Einstein. (Copyright © the American Society of Anesthesiologists’ Wood Library-Museum of Anesthesiology.)
Source: Anesthesiology - Category: Anesthesiology Source Type: research