Interview with Thomas A. Tombrello - Caltech Oral Histories

Tombrello–iv
TABLE OF CONTENTS
INTERVIEW WITH THOMAS A. TOMBRELLO
Session 1
1-9
Family history and roots in Texas: mother’s youthful acquaintance with Lyndon Johnson;
parents’ respective German and Sicilian backgrounds; impact of Great Depression on family;
mother’s intelligence and strength; father’s drive, business sense, and lifelong love of Texas
countryside. Tombrello’s early years in Austin, Texas, and Memphis, Tennessee. Recalls attack
on Pearl Harbor and war years; war’s impact on immediate and extended family.
9-14
Early affinity for science; elementary school experiences. Recollections of paternal uncles, their
personalities and careers. Experiences of segregation in postwar South: Southern cultural
identity; impact on regional economy; parents’ conservatism.
14-19
Secondary education and decision to attend Rice Institute. Marriage, birth of son, Christopher.
Undergraduate studies in physics. Summer job at Shell Oil and first exposure to work of “peak
oil” proponents. Graduate studies with G. C. Phillips, focusing on light nuclei. Undergraduate
research on early IBM computer.
Session 2
20-24
First impressions (1961) of Caltech’s Kellogg Radiation Laboratory, Pasadena, and Southern
California. Daughter Susan born. Joins Yale as assistant professor (1963); employs W. Houston
teaching methods; ponders return to Caltech. In Dallas shortly after JFK assassination.
24-30
Return to Caltech as postdoc (1964): early teaching experiences; research on nucleosynthesis of
light elements; accelerator design work; appointed to professorial track in 1965. Summer
research at Yale and Los Alamos. Early work with Caltech undergrads T. Weaver and S.
Koonin; recollections of the young Koonin and of colleagues T. and C. Lauritsen. Kellogg
funding climate in late sixties. Illness and death of T. Lauritsen. Named principal investigator
for NSF Kellogg grant (1973) and begins to open lab to applied research. Divorce in midseventies;
life with daughters Karen and Susan.
30-33
Continues expansion of Kellogg programs; identifies Koonin as future “house theorist.”
Caltech’s “miracle year” (1975) sees simultaneous hiring of Koonin, H. D. Politzer, and R.
Blandford during official freeze on new appointments. Tombrello explains hiring strategies.
Marriage to Stephanie (née Merton) in 1976; daughter Kerstin.
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