The Washington Post - 31.07.2019

B6 EZ RE THE WASHINGTON POST.WEDNESDAY, JULY 31 , 2019

BY MARTIN WEIL

John Robert Schrieffer, one of
three Americans who shared the
Nobel Prize in physics for their
theory explaining superconduc-
tivity, a near-miraculous process
in which electric current flows
without resistance, died July 27 at
a nursing facility in Tallahassee.
He was 88.
Family members confirmed his
death to the Associated Press but
did not give a precise cause.
Superconductivity, in addition

to being one of nature’s puzzles,
also offered great promise to daily
life when Dr. Schrieffer began his
research in the late 1950s. It
allowed the large-scale transmis-
sion and application of electric
currents without the costs in-
curred in propelling electrons
against resistance, even in con-
ducting materials.
Electromagnets depend on the
creation of powerful electrical
currents. Much modern equip-
ment that requires strong mag-
netic fields, which are induced by
electrical currents, relies on su-
perconducting technology. Even
copper wire, one of the best
known conventional conductors,
can overheat with excessive cur-
rent, constraining the amount of

current it can carry.

Many electrical devices used in

medicine and other fields can

employ extremely high currents,

by use of equipment cooled to

temperatures at which supercon-

ductivity sets in.

Among physicists, the theory

that accounted for the mysteries

of superconductivity became

known as the BCS theory, for its

three creators: John Bardeen,

Leon Neil Cooper and Dr. Schrief-

fer. They shared the Nobel in

1972.

When the theory was devel-

oped in 1957, Dr. Schrieffer was

working on his dissertation at the

University of Illinois under

Bardeen, who had received a No-

bel Prize the previous year as an

inventor of the transistor.

Bardeen also enlisted Cooper,

who had just received his PhD

and was working at the Institute

for Advanced Study in Princeton,

N.J.

Although the phenomenon of

superconductivity had been long

known, it continued to mystify

scientists. A key question in-

volved how and why materials

suddenly transitioned from stan-

dard conductors to superconduc-

tors.

Cooper made a major contribu-

tion involving the coupling of

electrons into what are now

known as Cooper pairs.

In an account prepared by the

American Physical Society, an im-

portant idea came to Dr. Schrief-

fer while riding the New York City

subway to a physics meeting early

in 1957. He realized that all the

Cooper pairs in a superconductor

could be described by just one of

the “wave functions” that charac-

terize quantum mechanics.

(Wave functions are essentially

mathematical expressions of the

idea that matter can exist as both

waves and particles.)

The three protagonists of BCS

then blended all of their ideas,

creating a complete theory.

“Well,” the usually taciturn

Bardeen was said to have de-

clared, “I think we’ve explained

superconductivity.”

Their work was submitted for

publication to the Physical Re-

view, where it appeared in De-

cember 1957 under the straight-

forward title “Theory of Super-

conductivity.”

John Robert Schrieffer was

born in Oak Park, Ill., on May 31,

1931. While he was a boy, the
      family moved to Manhasset, a
      Long Island suburb of New York,
      and then to Eustis, Fla., where his
      father entered the citrus busi-
      ness.
      Dr. Schrieffer explored science
      through work with rockets and
      ham radio, and entered MIT to
      study electrical engineering. Af-
      ter two years, he switched to
      physics, graduating in 1953. He

received his doctorate from Illi-

nois in 1957 and worked overseas

as a researcher at the University

of Birmingham in England and

the Niels Bohr Institute in Copen-

hagen.

He taught at the University of

Chicago, University of Illinois

and University of Pennsylvania,

and in 1980 joined the University

of California at Santa Barbara,

where he was director of the

Institute for Theoretical Physics.

Twelve years later, he moved to

Florida State University, where he

was chief scientist at the National

High Magnetic Field Laboratory

before retiring in 2006.

In 1960, he married Anne Grete

Thomsen, whom he met in Den-

mark when she was 14 and he was

24, according to the Tallahassee

Democrat. Her father reportedly

forbade them to date until she

was 18, when they married. They

had three children, and she died

in 2013. A complete list of survi-

vors was not immediately avail-

able.

A tragic incident shadowed Dr.

Schrieffer’s later life, one that his

friends found bewildering and

difficult to comprehend.

On Sept. 24, 2004, while driv-

ing his Mercedes-Benz from San

Francisco to Santa Barbara, Dr.

Schrieffer slammed into the rear

of a van at more than 100 mph.

One of the van’s passengers was

thrown and killed, and seven oth-

ers were injured. One of the pas-

sengers died a month later. (In a

civil suit, attorneys contended

that his death was caused by the

crash.)

Dr. Schrieffer had nine prior

speeding tickets and was driving

with a suspended Florida license.

He offered a tearful apology in the

courtroom, pleaded no contest to

a charge of vehicular manslaugh-

ter and was sentenced to two

years in prison.

[email protected]

JOHN ROBERT SCHRIEFFER, 88

Shared a Nobel for theory about superconductivity

BY EMILY LANGER

Of all the memories forged at
Disneyland for the generations
of youngsters who have con-
verged upon it, perhaps none
was more fateful than Russi
Taylor’s girlhood encounter with
Walt Disney, the visionary enter-
tainment mogul who built the
California theme park and gave
life to Mickey Mouse and many of
the other animated personages
who populate it.
She had just stepped off the
Mark Twain Riverboat ride with
her family when she spotted the
mustachioed eminence seated on
a bench. Her mother, Ms. Taylor
told the Los Angeles Times dec-
ades later, did not believe her
when she said the man was
Disney.
“Honey, it couldn’t be,” her
mother insisted. But it was, and
her mother sat down beside him.
Ms. Taylor, by her account,
“squished” herself between
them. When Disney inquired
what she wanted to do when she
grew up, she exclaimed, “I want
to work for you!”
“Okay!” he replied.
And so she did, providing the
chirpy voice to Minnie Mouse,
Mickey’s female counterpart, for
more than 30 years.
Ms. Taylor, an Emmy-nominat-
ed voice actress who also helped
bring to life animated television
characters including Huey, Dew-
ey and Louie on “DuckTales,”
nerdy Martin Prince and the
twins Sherri and Terri on “The
Simpsons,” and Gonzo on “Mup-
pet Babies,” died July 26 at her
home in Glendale, Calif., at 75.
The Walt Disney Co. announced
her death in a statement, and
spokesman Jeffrey Epstein said
the cause was colon cancer.
Mickey Mouse, who was
voiced from 1977 to 2009 by Ms.

Taylor’s husband, the late Wayne

Allwine, was one of the most

recognizable characters in the

world. Not far behind him — if

only for their shared discus-like

black ears and prominent wid-

ow’s peak — was Minnie, who

was rendered feminine by her

billowing bow, whisker-length

eyelashes, kitten heels and, of

course, unmistakable voice.

Mickey and Minnie debuted

together in the 1928 animated

short “Steamboat Willie,” with

Walt Disney, who died in 1966,

providing sound for both.

Ms. Taylor was one of several

actresses to voice Minnie over

the decades. She won the role in

1986 when she was selected from

a pool of 200 applicants. She

auditioned with an improvised

recitation of the balcony scene

from the Shakespearean tragedy

“Romeo and Juliet,” she said, and

made her first major appearance

as the mouse in the 1988 TV

movie “Totally Minnie.” She also

played Minnie in the film “Who

Framed Roger Rabbit” (1988)

and the TV series “Minnie’s Bow-

Toons” and “Chip ’n’ Dale’s Nutty

Tales,” among numerous other

appearances.

While her husband had to

jump into the falsetto range to

play Mickey, she had what she

described as a naturally high

voice. Variety magazine com-

pared it to the “lilting tinkling of

bells.”

Ms. Taylor was born in Cam-

bridge, Mass., on May 4, 1944.

She told Variety that she did

film-dubbing in Europe before

returning to the United States to

begin her work in voice acting.

She made her voice-acting de-

but in the 1980 TV movie “The

World of Strawberry Shortcake.”

She and Allwine, then both mar-

ried, met later that decade dur-

ing the making of “Totally Min-

nie.” They wed in 1991 and re-

mained married until his death

in 2009. A complete list of her

survivors was not immediately

available.

A particular skill of Ms. Tay-

lor’s, she said, was a baby’s cry:

She provided wails for babies

including Ted and Georgette’s

infant on “The Mary Tyler Moore

Show” and for baby maggots in

the movie “A Bug’s Life” (1998).

Her other characters over the

years included Pebbles Flint-

stone on “The Flintstone Com-

edy Show” in the early 1980s

and TV movies including “A

Flintstones Christmas Carol”

(1994), various voices on “The

Smurfs” and “Paddington Bear,”

also in the ’80s, and Duchess the

Cat in the movie “Babe” (1995).

But Minnie remained the char-

acter with which she was for-

ever associated.

“You have to bring yourself to

a character,” Ms. Taylor once

said, according to the Disney

statement. “But because of this

particular character, she actually

enhances who I am, she really

does. In a sense Minnie makes

me better than I was before

’cause there’s a lot to live up to.”

[email protected]

RUSSI TAYLOR, 75

Emmy-nominated actress voiced Minnie Mouse for 3 decades

GINA FERAZZI/LOS ANGELES TIMES/AP

Russi Taylor gets a kiss from

Minnie Mouse. Taylor also

voiced characters on “The

Simpsons,” including nerdy

Martin Prince and the twins

Sherri and Terri.

NATIONAL HIGH MAGNETIC FIELD LABORATORY

John Robert Schrieffer is one of three Americans who

shared the 1972 Nobel Prize in physics for their theory

explaining one of nature’s puzzles. He taught at several

universities and did research at major physics labs.

obituaries

Although the

phenomenon of

superconductivity had

been long known,

it continued to

mystify scientists.

ALBERTO E. RODRIGUEZ/GETTY IMAGES

OF NOTE

Obituaries of residents from the
District, Maryland and Northern
Virginia.

Robert Taylor,
Howard medical school dean
Robert Taylor, 76, a Howard
University medical school ad-
ministrator who served as dean
from 2008 to 2011, died July 17 at
his home in Silver Spring, Md.
The cause was a heart ailment,

said his wife, Carmen Paniagua.

Before his appointment as

dean, Dr. Taylor spent three years

as interim dean and had been

pharmacology department chair-

man since 1992. He had also

served as director of Howard’s

Collaborative Alcohol Research

Center, funded by grants from

the National Institutes of Health.

After stepping down as dean,

Dr. Taylor was instrumental in

securing federal grants for How-

ard’s Health Careers Opportunity

Program, an effort to attract

minority students to the health-

care profession, and served as

program director. He was also a

faculty fellow at Fielding Gradu-

ate University in Santa Barbara,

Calif.

Dr. Taylor, a Chattanooga,

Tenn., native, was a member of

the Alpha Omega Alpha Honor

Medical Society and a fellow of

the American College of Physi-

cians and the American Society

of Hematology, among other pro-

fessional affiliations. He was fre-

quently published in peer-re-

viewed journals.

Julian ‘Jay’ Ross,

journalist

Julian “Jay” Ross, 85, a jour-

nalist who held national and

foreign editing and reporting

jobs at The Washington Post in

the 1970s and 1980s and retired

20 years ago as managing editor

of the English-language daily

Moscow Times in Russia, died

June 5 at the home of a son in

New York City. The cause was

leukemia, said the son, Robert

Ross.

Mr. Ross was born in San

Mateo, Calif. At The Post, he was

a deputy foreign editor, assistant

national editor and an Africa

correspondent. He also helped

cover the 1982 Falklands War. At

various times in his career, he

held reporting and editing jobs at

the International Herald Tribune

in Paris, Radio Free Europe in

Munich, United Press Interna-

tional and the Tehran Times in

Iran, where he was managing

editor. In retirement, he lived in

Penedo, Portugal, until returning

to the United States in 2018.

— From staff reports

IN MEMORIAM

DAVID ALLEN MASON

October 16, 1981 ~ July 31, 2001

The love is felt even when the being is gone.

You can still hear the words at the end

of the song. Love is the only thing that is

eternal, and David is eternally loved. Our

memories are a constant reminder of how

much we loved you, and how much you

loved us. We will always miss you and love

you. Memories of David we will pass on

to those we love and touch, carrying you

through the ages. Eternally ours, for our

hearts are eternally yours.

Love, Mom, Dad, Zach, and all the

Family and Friends

MASON

WILLIE JAMES TOMLIN

January 27, 1945 - July 31, 2009

In remembrance of the 10th anniversary

of your passing.

Gone but not forgotten

Your Wife, Margaret

TOMLIN

DEATH NOTICE

The Rt. Rev. Dr. JEFFERY W.ANDERSON

Bishop for the Armed Forces, Episcopal Mis-

sionary Church, died May 29, 2019.A Memorial

Service will be held at All Saints Anglican

Church, 14851 Gideon Dr. Woodbridge, VA

22192 on August 3, at 11 a.m.

ANDERSON

DONALD BROOKS

Departed this life on July 19, 2019. He is

survived by his wife Cynthia Brooks; four sons,

Brian, Cameron, Louis and Jordan; two daugh-

ters Patrice and LaTina; four brothers, Charles,

Jr., Carlton, Sr. (Tammy), Kevin and Aaron; five

sisters, Regina, Gwendolyn, Belinda, Amanda

and Angela; two uncles; three aunts and a host

of nephews; nieces; cousins; other relatives

and friends. Family will receive friends on

Saturday, August 3, 2019 from 9 a.m. until time

of service 11 a.m. at People’s Congregational

United Church of Christ, 4704 13th Street, NW.

Interment Arlington National Cemetery at a

later date.

http://www.StewartFuneralHome.com

BROOKS

KAREN E. DUNCAN

(Age 56)

Passed away Friday, July 19, 2019. Memorial

services will be held at Isle of Patmos Baptist

Church, 1200 Isle Patmos Plaza NE, Washing-

ton, DC 20018 on Friday, August 2, 2019 at 11

a.m.

DUNCAN

IVORY LEVITICUS GADSDEN, JR.

On April 20, 2019, God called Ivory Leviticus

Gadsden, Jr. home to rest surrounded by the

love of his wife, mother, other family members

and friends. Born on July 30, 1943, Ivory was

a truth seeker, who loved life and Family. He

cultivated and enjoyed diverse and multicul-

tural friendships. He also was the Family’s

historian and was fiercely proud of his 50

years of sobriety. His funeral was held on April

30, 2019, in Timmonsville, South Carolina. He

is, and will continue to be, greatly missed.

GADSDEN

DEATH NOTICE

MARGUERITE A. GRAY (Age 96)

Peacefully passed away on Friday, July 26,

2019. Loving mother of Carolyn Stuckey and
      Charles Gray Jr. (Renae). Also survived by four
      grandchildren, two great grandchildren and a
      host of nieces, nephews, other relatives and
      friends. On Friday, August 2, friends may visit
      with the family from 10 a.m. until time of
      service at 11 a.m. at Brightwood Park United
      Methodist Church, 744 Jefferson St. NW. Inter-
      ment at Fairview Cemetery, Frederick, MD.

GRAY

When the

need arises,

let families

find you in the

Funeral Services

Directory.

To be seen in the

Funeral Services

Directory, please call

paid Death Notices

at 202-334-4122.