Memorial Tributes Volume 25 (2023) / Chapter Skim
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DEAN E. EASTMAN
DEAN E. EASTMAN
Pages 92-103
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From page 93... ...
KING, AND THOMAS N THEIS SUBMITTED BY THE NAE HOME SECRETARY D EAN ERIC EASTMAN'S father emigrated from Sweden during the Great Depression to seek an opportunity in the iron-mining industry of Michigan's Upper Peninsula.
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From page 94... ...
got a shock of a different sort when the Soviet Union launched Sputnik. The following day, the high school chemistry teacher told students he was glad he was old and would soon die, and that he pitied the students because they would likely spend their lives living under communist rule!
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From page 95... ...
His academic horizons broadened, though, when his College Board exam scores landed him a full national merit scholarship and his acing of the Michigan Mathematics Exam resulted in a second scholarship to cover his additional expenses. Given the distraction of the rocket fiasco, it was only a month after graduation that Dean belatedly applied to MIT.
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From page 96... ...
He also explored the energy levels at clean surfaces of metals1 and semiconductors. His work on the efficient emission of electrons from the diamond surface generated con tinued interest over the years in the search for a chemically stable electron source.
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From page 97... ...
Having contributed so much to IBM research's reputation as a center of excellence in science and technology, he was named an IBM fellow -- the highest honor that can be bestowed on an IBM technical employee -- in 1974. This status, which comes with substantial freedom and funding to pursue new ideas, allowed Dean to expand his operation in photoelectron spectroscopy by establishing his own IBM beamline at the Tantalus electron storage ring of the Synchrotron Radiation Center (SRC)
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From page 98... ...
Eventually, he moved from the IBM Watson Research Lab to IBM headquarters in Armonk, NY, where he led the Department of Hardware Development and Reengineering. As a leader in technology development, Dean took on the enormous challenges facing IBM at the time.
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From page 99... ...
Thinking Machines, a noted company at the time, was already selling scientific supercomputers that harnessed multiple processors, but these were based on expensive proprietary processor designs. The IBM team used workstation processors that were manufactured in high volume and thus had a low per-unit cost.
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From page 100... ...
He predicted that this development would reduce the value of IBM's lead in chip-packaging technology and render much of the associated manufacturing capacity extraneous. When Dean was appointed director of hardware development and reengineering in 1994, his job was to identify and develop plans to address this new direction and other structural problems that plagued the company.
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From page 101... ...
Dean and his wife Ella Mae purchased the "public wing" of the sprawling former Coonley estate in 2000 and restored it with exquisite attention to detail, chasing down old photographs of the original design, doing an analysis of the original paint, and dealing with the onerous constraints encountered and permits required for renovating a building listed in the National Register of Historic Places. He was on the site daily in order to monitor progress and be available for quick decisions.
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From page 102... ...
After he moved to a house with a three-car garage, he started collecting them -- first a truck, then a big white Cadillac convertible with a huge engine, a Camaro (with a comparable engine) , a BMW, and a classic Corvette.
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