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Frederik (Rik) Nebeker is
the Senior Research Historian at the
History Center. He received B.A. and
M.A. degrees in mathematics
from, respectively, Pomona College and
the University of Wisconsin.
He received an M.A. in history of
science from the University of
Wisconsin and a Ph.D. in history of
science and technology from
Princeton University. While at
Princeton, he was editor of a major
oral-history project, The Princeton
Mathematics Community in the
1930s (Princeton University,
1985), and worked as instructor in the
History Department. Dr.
Nebeker's dissertation was a study of
computation in meteorology
that focused on the impact of electronic
computers on that science.
Calculating the Weather:
Meteorology in the 20th
Century, a revised form of the
dissertation, was published
by Academic Press in 1995.
Dr. Nebeker was a
postdoctoral researcher at the American
Philosophical Society (APS), where he
studied materials in the
manuscript collections of the APS
Library concerning geodesy,
cartography, hydrography, meteorology,
the study of terrestrial
magnetism, and related sciences, and he
completed a bibliographical
monograph, Astronomy and the
Geophysical Tradition in
19th-Century America, published
by the APS in 1991. He
worked also as historian at the Center
for History of Physics of
the American Institute of Physics (AIP),
where he carried out
research on the history of experimental
high-energy physics. His
work at the AIP included study of the
role of engineering in
high-energy physics.
Since coming to the IEEE
History Center in 1990, Dr. Nebeker has
written several books and numerous
articles on the history of
electrical technologies, including
Sparks of Genius:
Portraits of Electrical Engineering
Excellence (IEEE Press,
1994),The Evolution of Electrical
Engineering: A Personal
Perspective (by Ernst Weber with
Frederik Nebeker, IEEE Press, 1994), and
Signal Processing: The Emergence
of a Discipline,
1948-1998 (IEEE History Center,
1998). With John Bryant,
William Aspray, and Andrew Goldstein, he
was principal investigator
of Rad Lab: Oral Histories
Documenting World War II Activities
at the MIT Radiation
Laboratory (IEEE Center for the
History of Electrical
Engineering, 1993). He edited, and
contributed to, the book From 0 to 1:
An Authoritative History of
Modern Computing, published by
Oxford University Press in 2002.
Dr. Nebeker is adjunct
professor in history at Rutgers
University. The course he teaches
most often is called "The
Electric Century"; it covers electrical,
electronic, and computer
technologies of the 20th
century. Dr. Nebeker has training in
the use of science and technology
archives, and he has extensive
experience conducting oral history
interviews. He is currently
writing a survey history of electrical
technologies in the period
from 1914 to 1945.
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