Walter
Brown
Walter Brown began working in Shockley's lab several years
after the invention of the transistora time when the lab was extremely
social. Coworkers often spent their weekends together going out at night,
or picnicking during the day. Brown can still sing the song "Hells
Bells Laboratory" that the researchers used to jokingly sing about life
in the Shockley lab. Of course, the young men also worked pretty
hardBrown says that Shockley always demanded the best from his
employees. Working at a time when Bell was fast and furiously trying
to improve transistors, Brown helped the transistor along the road to
its modern-day form.
Brown was born on October 11, 1924 in Charlottesville,
Virginia. He began working at Bell Labs in 1950, just after he
finished his Ph.D. in physics at Harvard. The company seems to
have suited himhe has been there ever since.
________________________________________________
Walter Brown on the transistor's legacy:
"The legacy at the moment is that we
now are living in an era in which absolutely everything that we
do is influenced by the availability of integrated circuits, which
have come out of that first invention, with many other inventions
inbetween. But now, when you have 40,000,000 transistors per human,
or something like that, in the world, you have really changed the
way in which we do things. The whole of the computer revolution,
the whole of our current telecommunications modes, are all influencedreally
determined by, dominated bythe integrated circuit that came
out of the original transistors." |
Walter Brown sings "Hell's Bells Laboratory,"
by Ian Mackentosh:
"We've traveled a
long way to bring you this song,
A brand new calypso we're sure to get wrong,
About the reform school to which we belong,
It's the Hell's Bells Laboratory.
It's the Hell's bells and buckets
of blood at the Hell's Bells Laboratory.
Our silocon's grown at low temperature,
The crystals resulting are not very pure,
We preserve all our lifetimes by using manure at the Hell's Bells Laboratory.
It's the Hell's bells and buckets
of blood at the Hell's Bells Laboratory.
Publication of papers will help
your career,
Promotions assured if you write twenty a year,
They are used in the washroom of the chief engineer at
the Hell's Bells Laboratory.
It's the Hell's bells and buckets
of blood at the Hell's Bells Laboratory.
The economy squeezes pinch more
every day,
Coffee and tea breaks have been taken away,
They are hoping to make the transistor pay at the Hell's Bells Laboratory.
It's the Hell's bells and buckets
of blood at the Hell's Bells Laboratory.
Our walls are all graced by the
periodic chart,
Bill Shockley's picture is sewn over our hearts,
Bardeen and Brattain are our sweethearts at the Hells Bells
Laboratory.
It's the Hell's bells and buckets
of blood at the Hell's Bells Laboratory.
Dislocations and traps are the bane
of our life,
Imperfections can cause you trouble and strife,
But we pick them all out with our scout master's knife at the Hell's
Bells Laboratory.
It's the Hell's bells and buckets
of blood at the Hell's Bells Laboratory."
Resources:
-- American Men and Women of Science
-- Walter Brown, interview for "Transistorized!"
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