Deceased--Margaret Butler

Margaret Butler
March 27th, 1924 to March 8th, 2013

"In memoriam: The remarkable career of Margaret Butler"

March 27th, 2013

Argonne National Laboratory

Margaret Butler was a pioneering scientist who spent her career at the forefront of the development of computer science and nuclear energy. Her spirit, drive, and analytical talents led to a lifetime of scientific contributions during an era when women were a rarity in an R&D setting. As she made her mark, she helped facilitate the careers of many other women in the field of computer science and served as a role model for all women scientists.

Margaret Butler, 89, the first female fellow at the American Nuclear Society and director of the National Energy Software Center at Argonne National Laboratory from 1972-91, died of natural causes Friday, March 8, in La Grange Park, Ill.

Born Margaret Kampschaefer in Evansville, Ind., she attended Indiana University on a scholarship, finding her calling in mathematical statistics and differential calculus. She received her bachelor’s degree in mathematics and statistics in 1944, and went to work for the Federal Bureau of Labor Statistics in Washington and later went to post-war Germany to work for the U.S. Army Air Forces as a civilian employee. She also taught mathematics at the U.S. Department of Agriculture Graduate School.

After returning to the United States, she was hired at Argonne as a junior mathematician in the Naval Reactors Division. Her job involved using a slide rule to perform calculations for the physicists designing the prototype submarine reactor. She attended classes on site to learn more about the new fields of atomic physics and reactor design.

In 1949, Margaret returned to the Bureau of Labor Statistics to work on a project in St. Paul, Minn., and then returned to Argonne in 1951 and married Jim Butler, a fellow mathematician. She became an assistant mathematician in the Reactor Engineering Division and worked on an early computer called AVIDAC.

Margaret also wrote mathematical subroutines, systems software, reactor applications, and utilities for subsequent Argonne-built computers, called ORACLE and GEORGE, and for the first commercially available machine, the UNIVAC, in the mid-1950s. She was named Leader of the Reactor Computing Group in 1957.

From 1959 to 1965, Margaret led the Applications Programming Section in the laboratory’s Applied Mathematics Division, where she developed programming teams for reactor, physics, chemistry, biology, high energy physics, and management applications problems. In 1960, she also organized the Argonne Code Center, which would later expand into the National Energy Software Center.

The National Energy Software Center (NESC) was the software exchange and information center for the U.S. Department of Energy and the Nuclear Regulatory Commission. Computer programs developed under agency sponsorship were collected, tested, and packaged to make them useful to others and were maintained in the center's software library to be distributed upon request. Margaret Butler was the director of NESC from 1972 until 1991.

In 1980, Margaret’s experience and expertise in her field led to her promotion to Senior Computer Scientist.  After retiring in 1991, she continued to work at Argonne as a special-term appointee from 1993 through 2006.

Margaret not only carried out significant work on computers and related areas, she was also very active in supporting women in science and engineering during her many years at Argonne.  Many current and former Argonne employees fondly remember Margaret as an important role model and a welcoming presence when they arrived at Argonne.  Together with other pioneering Argonne women, she initiated formation of the Chicago Area Chapter of the Association for Women in Science (CAC-AWIS).  The AWIS group organized two successful career conferences for junior and senior high school students, teachers, and administrators.  These activities and Margaret’s persistence in keeping tabs on the status of women scientists at Argonne paved the way for today’s programs such as the annual Science Careers Conference and Women in Science and Technology (WIST).

The full story of Margaret’s remarkable career can be found at  semiwiki.com .

She continues to be an inspiration. One early-career scientist commented, after reading Margaret’s biography, “This part was awesome - she was MATLAB in flesh and blood!”

Amusing anecdote concerning the late journalist Paul Harvey and the Argonne National Laboratory

"Paul Harvey gets busted"

by

John R. Schmidt

February 6th, 2013

Argonne National Laboratory

WBEZ 91.5 Chicago

Paul Harvey had a long, distinguished career as a radio news commentator. Yet one mistake almost derailed that career before it got rolling.

In February 1951 Harvey was 32 years old. He’d recently begun broadcasting a daily program out of the Chicago office of the ABC radio network. Now he received a tip about security problems at the Argonne National Laboratory.

Argonne was a top-secret nuclear facility west of the city. The Korean War was on. Atomic spies were in the news. Harvey decided to see for himself whether Argonne’s security was lax.

Shortly after midnight on February 6, Harvey drove out to the lab in his car. Along with him were two men who worked inside Argonne. Parking the car just outside the grounds, Harvey began scaling the ten-foot-high fence. His companions remained behind.

Harvey was just coming down inside the fence when a guard spotted him. The guard ordered him to halt. Harvey stopped, stumbled, and fell. When he got up he was placed under arrest. Meanwhile, the two men outside the fence took off.

Harvey was taken to Chicago FBI headquarters for questioning. Because his driver’s license was in his birth name—Paul Aurandt—at first it was thought that this intruder might be an atomic spy himself! When his identity as a newscaster was established, Harvey was released. 

The FBI determined that Harvey had not broken any federal laws, and dropped the matter.  However, on March 15, the U.S. Attorney’s office announced plans to seek an indictment. The charges involved “conspiracy to obtain information on national security and transmit it to the public.”

Harvey had told conflicting stories when questioned. Papers found in his car suggested that he’d snuck into Argonne to prepare a sensational radio expose. But the worst that could be said was that he’d let his enthusiasm get the better of his judgment—a not uncommon fault of young journalists. The grand jury refused to indict. On April 4 Harvey was cleared of all charges.

Harvey's critics claimed he had gotten off easy, courtesy of FBI chief J. Edgar Hoover. His supporters said that Harvey had been harassed by the U.S. Attorney on orders from the Truman White House. Realizing that he might have wound up in prison—or shot—Harvey promised network executives that he’d be more careful in his pursuit of stories.

Paul Harvey received the Presidential Medal of Freedom in 2005. He died in 2009.

Paul Harvey [Wikipedia]

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"60 Minutes" and the LHC

Argonne National Laboratory

"'60 Minutes' segment to feature high-energy physicists Sunday"

ARGONNE, Ill. (Sept. 25, 2008)—Bob Stanek of Argonne's High Energy Physics Division is one of several scientists to be featured in "The Collider," a segment of CBS' "60 Minutes" TV show, scheduled for this Sunday, Sept. 28, at 6 p.m.

The segment, which focuses on the Large Hadron Collider at CERN, will also feature scientists Monica Dunford from the University of Chicago, Steven Goldfarb from the University of Michigan, Steve Nahn from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, and James Gillies and Austin Ball from CERN.

Archived segment

Beethoven...plumbic poisoning?

Fascinating story about Beethoven, a fellow named Ferdinand Hiller, and 582 strands of Beethoven's head hair purloined the day after Beethoven died known as the "Guevara Lock", and the Argonne National Laboratory. The event took place in 1827...the hair was given to Paul Hiller [Ferdinand Hiller' son] on his birthday in 1883...wound up in the possession of Danish Dr. Kay Alexander Fremming [for his assistance in helping fleeing Jews from Nazi Germany]...sold in 1994 at Sotheby [London] to four members of the American Beethoven Society [Ira F. Brilliant, Caroline Crummey, Alfredo Guevara, and Thomas Wendel]...donated to the Ira F. Brilliant Center for Beethoven Studies [minus 160 strands retained by Alfredo Guevara]...Dr. William J. Walsh from the Health Research Institute and Pfeiffer Treatment Center announced DNA analysis from the "Guevara Lock" lock samples...nonfiction book by Martin, Russell released worldwide. That's most of the story in thumbnail form, but what does that have to do with the Argonne National Laboratory. It was stipulated from the DNA analysis that Beethoven most likely was a victim of plumbism--lead poisoning and was a direct accumulated precipitating factor for Beethoven's illness and demise. In 2000 at the Argonne National Laboratory a hair sample was subjected to Advanced Photon Source [APS] X-ray emissions and confirmed that there was substantial lead content; that the sample contained 60ppm of lead--100 times more than normal human concentrations.


Beethoven's Hair : An Extraordinary Historical Odyssey and a Scientific Mystery Solved

by

Martin, Russell

ISBN: 0767903501