Interview with Thomas A. Tombrello - Caltech Oral Histories

Tombrello–247
years before, I’d stolen Andy Lange from Berkeley. I said to Buford, “Got him away from you.”
He says, “Yeah. But I got something better.” I said, “What’s that?” He says, “I’m going to hire
Fiona.” I don’t know who Fiona is! But I pretend. I said, “Oh, God. You’re a genius, Buford.
You’re the smartest thing alive. I mean, you’re taking me, you know. You’re going to get
Fiona, and I don’t even have a chance.” And I’m thinking, I have to find out who the hell Fiona
is. We take a break and I come back up here to check something, and I look in my mailbox and
there’s a note from one Fiona Harrison! Oh. And she’s a named postdoc here. She’s beginning
to explore the possibility of applying for a faculty position. So I thought to myself, Oh, Buford,
Oh, Buford. I go back and I don’t mention this, and I said, “Buford, you’re a genius. You got
Fiona, and I don’t have a chance.” I thought to myself, she’s mine. [Laughter] So, first step
was, I meet Fiona Harrison. I realize that she is clearly one of the great experimenters. I mean,
this division is full of extraordinary people who can do experiments: Jeff Kimble, Andy Lange,
Jonas Zmuidzinas, Tom Phillips, Ken Libbrecht. They’re just naturals. The list goes on and on.
You put them in a lab, they can make something work and make something new. I realize,
here’s another one.
ASPATURIAN: And what was she working on?
TOMBRELLO: She was working with Tom Prince, and they were doing X-ray astronomy. I check
with Tom, and he says, “Oh, she’s good. Do you think we can hire her?” I said, “Oh”—to
misuse a phrase from George Tenet—“a slam-dunk!’” I don’t know if I used those words or not,
but I just thought this was a shoo-in. I was as proud of having captured Fiona as I was of
capturing Andrew Lange. She is extraordinary. I’ve always been pleased with how well she
does what she does. I’ve always been extremely pleased that she’s tough-minded about it. Now
she’s got this spacecraft project, this NuSTAR, which has a terrible history as far as she’s
concerned, because a lot of it coincided with the fact that her first baby, Erica, was dying. She
lived for about eighteen months but was born with a terminal illness and was severely
compromised. Fortunately, Joanna, who was born after Erica died, even looks a bit like Erica.
ASPATURIAN: She was a beautiful little girl. Red hair, beautiful little face.
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