Retirements
Dr. Howard L. Cohen
Howard Cohen came to UF in
1968 after receiving his bachelor's degree from the University of
Michigan, his PhD from Indiana University and spending time as a
visiting astronomer at Lowell Observatory. His initial appointment was
in the University College and he became a member of the Dept. of
Astronomy upon its creation in 1979. Howard received Graduate Research
Awards in 1970 and 1980. He pioneered techniques for searching for
comets with the GEODSS telescopes that are now used in the search for
NEA's. He is the author of a number of refereed publications, mostly on
observations and analysis of binary stars and he and Dr. Oliver
coauthored several popular papers for Sky and Telescope and Astronomy
Magazines. For a number of years, Howard nearly single-handedly
promoted the concept of a planetarium for Gainesville, a dream that may
now become a reality with the imminent acquisition of a projector for
Santa Fe Community College. Howard has long been active in a number of
outreach activities, especially with local astronomy organizations. He
helped found the Florida Astronomical Society and the Alachua Astronomy
Club.
One of Howard's avocations has been traveling to solar eclipses and we have chosen to commemorate his more than thirty-five years of service to UF with photographs of him at the 1984 annular solar eclipse near Greenville, South Carolina.
Mr. Wesley B. Greenman
Wes Greenman came
to UF in 1958 and earned his bachelors degree in Electrical Engineering
in 1963. After a year at Channel 5 as an engineer he went to work for
AG Smith on the NSF grant. By 1968 his job title read "Chief Engineer
of the Radio Observatory". Over the years more duties were added (none
ever get deleted I think) and today Wes has become "chief cook and
bottle washer" responsible for engineering activities at Rosemary Hill
Observatory and the Campus Teaching Observatory as well as supervising
the many moves and room renovations around the department. Few if any
of the members of the department have not benefited from Wes'
activities in this area, especially those with offices on the 3rd or
4th floors or classes in the basement.
Since Wes' primary responsibility for many years was the antennas of the radio observatories, we have put together two images of him, one with the "TeePee"s out in the field and one with Tom Carr, AG Smith in front of the radio observatory building. Thanks, Wes for nearly forty years of service to the program. I honestly do not know how we will survive without you.
Dr. George R. Lebo
George Lebo came to UF
department of Physics and Astronomy in 1960 with a BA from Wheaton
College and an MS from U. Illinois. He initially started research on
electron microscopy optics but soon switched to working with A G Smith
and Tom Carr on Jupiter radio emissions. He got his PhD in 1964 and
stayed with the department and AG, first as a postdoc and then becoming
an assistant professor in 1965. He is coauthor of a series of papers on
planetary radio emissions, most recently the 1997 paper by Higgins,
Carr, Reyes, Greenman, and Lebo "A Redefinition of Jupiter's Rotation
Period".
Dr. Lebo has been involved in a number of service and entrepreneurial activities over the years. He has been a NASA Faculty Research Fellow or Space Grant Fellow every year since 1991. He has served as Vice-President and Treasurer, President, and Chairman of the Board of the Pacemaker Diagnostic Clinic, Vice-President of Biomega Inc., President of Nutri-Products Inc. (who can forget the stocks of Gator Go he provided us), and Director of Phoenix Advanced Technology.
Along the way Dr. Lebo has been willing to roll up his sleeves and pitch in to help with various departmental projects so we thought a suitable momento of 40 years of service would be this photograph of him helping unload the segments of the 30 inch dome at Rosemary Hill Observatory (RHO).
Dr. John P. Oliver
John Oliver received a BS-Physics from Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute
followed by two years as a Research Assistant at the Lick Observatory.
He then attended the University of California,Los Angeles where he
received his PhD. While at UCLA he was a Member of the Technical Staff
of Aerospace corporation and co-authored a number of papers on 3mm radio
astronomy. He came to the UF Department of Physics and Astronomy in
1970.In 1974 he participated in the establishment of the Copernicus
Institute, Warsaw Poland, where he was the first visiting astronomer.
From 1984 to 1988 he visited the South Pole as co-investigator on the
UF South Pole Optical Telescope project. From 1988 to 1994 he had an
joint appointment as Senior Research Scientist at the UF Institute for
Space Science and Technology. During this time he was a co-investigator
on the Long Duration Exposure Facility/ Interplanetary Dust Experiment
and the Clementine Orbital Meteoroid and Debris Counter. In 1995 and
1996 he was a NASA Faculty Research Fellow at the Jet Propulsion
Laboratory where he developed models used to predict meteoroid impacts
on space probes. Refereed publications cover a range of topics including
photometry of binary systems and design and implementation of
astronomical instruments. In addition to his research, he became an
early adopter of technology in the classroom and received a number of
grants from the UF Center for Information Technology.
© 2009
