- The classroom and especially the science lab
felt like home to Ted throughout
his 12 years in Park Hill.
Ted was president of the
Future Scientists of America,
and in his junior year,
won first-place awards at
both the Missouri and Kansas
Junior Academy of Science
statewide science competitions.
Ted was also involved in
many other school activities,
including vocal music and
received a Superior rating
for his vocal solo at the
regional music competition
in Maryville, accompanied
by Barbara Bucker on piano.
Ted graduated in December of
his senior year from Park Hill
and left for college that January.
The very next year,
he graduated from the University
of Michigan - Ann Arbor,
with a Bachelor of
Science and Engineering.
Ted then applied to
graduate schools in physics
and in 1971 was accepted
by the California Institute
of Technology (Caltech),
which some consider
to be the most difficult
and competitive science
and technology school
in the country.
Ted earned his master's in physics
from Caltech in 1973
and his Ph.D in theoretical
particle physics in 1977.
The main focus of Ted's research career
was to develop an understanding
of the mysterious strong interaction,
the force that holds protons
and neutrons together
inside the atomic nucleus.
The mathematical theory
of the strong interaction
known as quantum chromodynamics, or QCD,
had just been proposed in 1973.
Most of Ted's work has
involved calculations
of the properties
of strongly interacting
composite particles
like the proton and neutron.
One notable discovery in Ted's Ph.D thesis
was that the special combination
quark-antiquark gluon
was predicted by QCD
to appear as composite particles
known as a hybrid meson.
He predicted that some hybrid mesons
have very unusual properties.
Ted and others continued to search for
and research these exotic hybrid mesons
with intense interest.
The application of this
nuclear physics research
can be seen today in things
like nuclear medicine
and heart-attack patients
who receive radioactive tracers.
After graduation from Caltech,
Ted held several postdoctoral
and research positions
at universities and
laboratories in Europe, the UK,
the Middle East and Canada,
where he continued work on QCD.
He accepted a permanent position
at Oak Ridge National Laboratory in 1989,
with a cross-appointment
as a professor of physics
at the University of Tennessee.
In his 35 years in research,
he has published about
120 scientific papers
and conference reports.
Like many scientists
during his research career,
Ted traveled the world,
speaking at frequent research conferences,
in his case primarily on hadron physics.
In 1997, he even appeared
on CNN to discuss it.
In 2007, Ted was invited to work part time
at the federal government
in a position at the headquarters
of the U.S. Department of Energy,
in the Office of Nuclear Physics.
He was soon promoted to
acting program manager
for the Department of Energy's
Nuclear Theory program.
And in 2011,
he accepted a newly
created permanent position
as the program manager for nuclear data
and nuclear theory computing.
In 2016, Ted received a special award
for carrying out the responsibilities
of three nuclear program managers
during staff shortages.
He received another in 2017
for developing and
implementing a new inter-agency
nuclear data experimental program.
This program combines funding
from several federal offices
and agencies to carry out experiments
that address gaps in our national
nuclear physics databases.
He was there until retiring in 2018
and estimates throughout that time
he distributed $150 million
in research funds to university
and national laboratory
research groups across the country.
In retirement, Ted has
been improving his skills
in astrophotography.
He posts his images on Facebook
and provides short
explanations of the physics
and astronomy involved
for a small group of interested
friends and colleagues,
including his original Park
Hill High School classmates.
Ted and his wife, Agatha, have
been married for 33 years
and are happy to report
that their daughter Sietske
has a bachelor's and master's in chemistry
and is working on her Ph.D in chemistry
at the University of Ottawa.
(soft music)
- It was a marvelous experience.
It was so much work,
but I left there, like I said,
I left early to get away
from all the workload.
So, I left there like a
shot, six months early,
and graduated really in two
years with my bachelor's degree.
Went on to graduate school.
And it was really the work ethic,
as old fashioned as that sounds,
that you pick up at Park Hill.
We were so dedicated and so
hardworking and so energetic
and also such good friends.
I mean, the camaraderie that
I remember from there I just,
you know, I always look back
on that with good feelings.
So, anyway, Park Hill
was a great experience.
It's good to see . . . this
is my first Park Hill
event in 52 years.
So . . .
It's good to see there's still
an awful lot of support for the school.
I'm glad to see that's going on.
And just thank you very
much for this award.
It's a pretty marvelous thing.
(audience clapping)
(children chattering)
