Walter E. Massey
He went on to post-graduate research at ANL near Chicago and joined the physics faculty at the University of Illinois, where African-American students sought his support and guidance in the 1960s struggle for civil rights.
Born on April 5, 1938, in Hattiesburg, Mississippi,[5] Massey displayed a gift for mathematics as a child, and by the middle of high school his academic achievements had earned him a Ford Foundation fellowship to Morehouse College in Atlanta, Georgia.
Initially, he lacked direction at Morehouse until receiving the guidance of Sabinus H. Christensen, a white physics instructor teaching at the traditionally black college for men.
[7] While finishing his doctoral studies, Massey began working in 1966 as a member of the research staff at Argonne National Laboratory, which is operated for the U.S. Department of Energy by the University of Chicago.
Massey's work at Argonne focused on the study of the many-body theory of liquids and solids, which attempts to explain the properties of systems of interacting particles in various states.
[8] While continuing to pursue his own research, Massey's tenure at the University of Illinois was also defined by his commitment to achieving racial and social equality as well as to improving access to science and technology education.
In 1970, Massey was offered an associate professorship at Brown University, which he accepted and would soon after complete some of his most significant academic research to date, collaborating with Humphrey Maris on the study of changes in sound waves in superfluid helium.
In 1979, Massey's demonstrated success as a researcher and administrator at Brown led to his return to Argonne National Laboratory, this time as its director, in addition to which he was also appointed professor of physics at the University of Chicago.
To address these issues, Massey reorganized the governance of the laboratory in the early 1980s, instituting what D. Allen Bromley, President George H. W. Bush's assistant for science and technology, referred to as "participatory democracy" among its scientists.
At the same time, Massey responded to the lack of outside connections by helping form the Argonne National Laboratory-University of Chicago Development Corporation (ARCH), an organization that expedited the transfer of technologies created in the laboratory to industry and the marketplace.
Other initiatives Massey undertook at Argonne include generating support for its nuclear energy programs in a time of drastic cutbacks and providing support and leadership for the funding of major research facilities at the laboratory, including the Intense Pulsed Neutron Source (IPNS), the Experimental Breeder Reactor II (EBR-II), and the initial funding for the Advanced Photon Source (APS).
[13] Massey's efforts to forge a more productive relationship between the scientific community, the U.S. government, and private industry culminated in 1990 with his appointment as director of the National Science Foundation (NSF) under President George H. W.
[11] In this role, Massey embarked on a number of critical initiatives, including efforts to deepen the connection between academia and industry and the establishment of the Directorate for Social, Behavioral and Economic Sciences and the Commission on the Future of NSF.
In February 2016, it was announced that scientists at the advanced Laser Interferometer Gravitational-wave Observatory (LIGO) had observed gravitational waves for the first time ever, confirming Albert Einstein's 1915 general theory of relativity.
[16] In concert with his roles at Argonne and the University of Chicago, in 1987 Massey was named president of the American Association for the Advancement of Science, after having served as a board member for a number of years.
[17] Under Massey's leadership, the AAAS aimed to improve science education in grades K- 12 by sponsoring Project 2061, which attempted to structure curricula that would emphasize major scientific concepts.
As president of Morehouse, Massey created a vision that would take the college into the new century, which involved reinvigorating its campus, refreshing its core curriculum, and reigniting its fundraising efforts.
