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JOHN ROUTH LOW, JR
1 909-1 988
.
BY J. E. BURKE AND L. F. COFFIN
JOHN ROUTH Low, JR. was born in Washington, Pennsyl-
vania, near Pittsburgh, on February 19, 1909. In 1937 he
married. His wife, Dolphia, and he had three children:
John R. Low ITI, Susan Low Laing, and Richard A. Low.
He died in Belair, Maryland, on August 28, 198S, and his
wife and children all survive him.
Jack's early exposure to the metallurgical atmosphere of
the Pittsburgh neighborhood had an effect: he worked in
the field of metallurgy all his life. He entered the Depart-
ment of Metallurgy and Mining Engineering at Purdue
University in 1927, and received his B.S. from there in 1931.
Upon graduation he worked as a metallurgist and mill foreman,
for Keystone Steel and Wire Company for two years and for
Republic Steel Corporation until 193S, when he entered
Carnegie Institute of Technology in Pittsburgh as a Carnegie-
Illinois Steel Company fellow. He received his doctor of
science degree in metallurgy in 1943. Upon graduation,
he joined the metallurgy faculty of Pennsylvania State Uni-
versity as an assistant professor, and was a professor and
head of the Metallurgy Division from 1945 to 1948. Through
the war years of 1944 and 1945, he also worked on govern-
ment projects in the laboratories of the Carnegie-Illinois
Steel Company in Pittsburgh, and there first became involved
with the fascinating, and tremenclously important, problem
217
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218
MEMORIAL TRIBUTES
of brittle fracture of ship plate. During that period, many
of the all-welded Liberty Ships sustained severe fractures
upon entering colder waters. Sometimes the fractures were
serious enough to cause the ship to break in half.
In the period immediately after the war, many people
changed jobs, as did lack. In 1948 he joined the metallurgy
group at the Knolls Atomic Power Laboratory of the General
Electric Company as head of the research group. There he
continued to work on brittle fracture in steel but also investi-
gated the then important problems associated with prop-
erty changes induced in metals by neutron bombardment
and other radiation effects encountered in nuclear reactors.
In 1953 he transferred to become a research associate in
the Metallurgy Department of the General Electric Company
Research Laboratory (now the GE Corporate Research and
Development Center). While he continued his interest in
brittle fracture, his interests broadened to include study of
many dislocation processes in metals.
In 1967 he joined the faculty of Carnegie Mellon University
where he continued research and teaching. In 1977 he
became professor emeritus, and subsequently lived with his
wife in Richmond, Virginia, and Belair, Maryland.
Jack Low played an exceedingly important leadership role
in both the science and application of metal deformation
and fracture through the years 1940 to 1977, a period when
physical and mechanical metallurgy underwent a tremendous
forward advance. He has played a major role in that ad-
vance, both through his own research and through careful
and diligent training of those students fortunate enough to
have worked with him. His students particularly remember
his low-key, but extremely penetrating review and critique
of their work and ideas. He was a recognized authority on
the relationship between microstructure and fracture processes
in structural alloys, and his publications on such topics as
temper embrittlement, the role of inclusions and dispersoids,
and cleavage processes in the fracture of high-strength steels
and aluminum alloys are universally cited. He was an early
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JOHN ROUTH LOW, JR.
219
investigator of the role of ctisIocations in deformation and
fracture, from which came the concept of dislocation velocity-
stress relationship. This led to a clearer insight into the
complex behaviors of strain aging and the yield point. His
views, which have always been supported by careful and
precise experimental evidence, have formed the backbone
of our current knowledge of fracture in metals.
A major contribution by Jack Low was through the group
that was to become the American Society for Testing and
Materials (ASTM) Special Committee E24 on the Fracture
Testing of Metals. In response to a request from the Secretary
of Defense in 1959, ASTM formed a special technical com-
mittee to act~ress the problems being encountered with
brittle fracture of high-strength materials used in various
missile and rocket motor cases. Jack chaired that commit-
tee. Their first two reports emphasized the importance of
using the then just-developing analytical technique of frac-
ture mechanics, and it was Jack who clearly presented the
advantage of fracture mechanics technology in his preface
to the first report issued by the committee. Fracture mechanics
is now, of course, a very well-established subdivision of the
materials science and technology field.
Jack Low was not only a good scientist, he was a delight-
fu] person and had many good friends in the various places
he lived. He and his wife Dolphia gave many wonderful
and well-remembered parties in Schenectady, where he spent
the major part of his career. He was also an ardent golfer,
with what was considered to be a beautiful swing, although
its beauty was not always reflected in his score. He greatly
enjoyed sailing and hated winter. He is missed by his many
colleagues and friends.
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Representative terms from entire chapter:
john routh
