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DANIEL EARL NOBLE
1901-1980
BY C. LESTER HOGAN
DANIEL E NOBLE retired Vice-Chairman of the Board of Direc-
tors and active Chairman of the Science Advisory Board of
Motorola, Inc., died in Scottsdale, Arizona, on February 16, 1980.
He is best known for his pioneering efforts in FM mobile communi-
cations, contributing directly to Motorola's strong technical and
marketing capabilities in this field. But, by those who knew him
best, he is at once scientist, engineer, scholar, philosopher, artist,
writer, and friend. His uncanny vision of the future was dearly
evidenced by the fact that he personally founded Motorola's Com-
munications, Government Electronics, and Semiconductor divi-
sions. In so doing he often stood alone in Motorola's Board Room
but always prevailed as a result of the depth of his conviction and the
persuasiveness of his argument. The industry will certainly miss this
man. He has been both an accurate prophet and a practical and
effective builder for the past fifty years of our art.
Dan Noble was born in Naugatuck, Connecticut, on October 4,
1901, and received a bachelor's degree in engineering from the
University of Connecticut in 1929. He remained at the University of
Connecticut after receiving this degree and rose in rank to Assistant
Professor of Mathematics, Electrical and Radio Engineering. It was
during this period that he did much of his pioneering in FM broad-
casting, but more than this, he demonstrated to the entire world that
he was a generalist rather than a specialist during these early years.
The station became such a success that in 1936, stations WTIC
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MEMORIAL TRIBUTES
and WDRC asked him to build a relay station so they could receive
certain of the programs originating at the university for rebroadcast
from their stations in Hartford. He had read Major Armstrong's
pioneering paper on FM and, while many others in this era believed
that it had no practical advantages, Dan Noble knew otherwise, and
used this opportunity to design and build a 100-megahertz FM relay
station linking the University of Connecticut with these two stations
in Hartford. This system worked so well that the owner of WDRC
asked him to design and supervise the construction of an FM broad-
cast station for them in Hartford. This was one of the first commer-
cial FM broadcast stations in the world.
By this time Professor Noble's reputation as a brilliant scientist
and capable, practical engineer was well known, at least in the state
of Connecticut. As a result, State Police Commissioner Edward I.
Hickey came to him in 1938 and asked him to design a statewide
police broadcast system so that all police cars in Connecticut could
be contacted wherever they were. The proposal, as made by the
Police Commissioner, was for one-way transmission only from fixed
broadcast stations to the cars. At this point Dan Noble made a very
daring and visionary proposal to Commissioner Hickey. He was to
design and supervise the construction of mobile units for the police
cars that would use frequency modulation in the 30- to 40-megahertz
band. This was a first. No such statewide system existed anyplace in
the world. He not only had to break new ground in design but also
in manufacture in order to ensure the reliable operation of this
. .
ambitious system.
As with every other system that he had built, this one worked
extremely well, and he established a worldwide reputation as both a
brilliant designer and a superb engineer.
It was at this point that Paul Galvin, who had founded Motorola
just ten years before, got to know Dan Noble and began to try to pry
him loose from the university to come to work for him. At first he
did not want to leave the university. However, in 1940, Galvin
convinced him to use his sabbatical leave to try industry life at
Motorola.
Paul Galvin had a strong personality, but he had the wisdom to
give Dan Noble the freedom he needed to guide Motorola's begin-
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DANIEL EARL NOBLE
225
nings in mobile communications. World War II had just begun, and
Dan Noble was the only person in the United States who had the
expertise to develop and build the famous SCR-300 FM Walkie-
Talkie for the Armed Forces. By 1942 Paul Galvin had Dan Noble in
his camp, and a great love and respect developed and existed
between them until Galvin passed away in 1959. Those were years
when Dan Noble established Motorola as the dominant force in
mobile communications.
At the end of the war, Dan Noble recognized that the company
should be a part of the research and development needed by the
U.S. defense establishment to maintain its lead in electronics sys-
tems. Galvin had faith in Dan Noble and convinced the Board of
Directors that this was a wise decision.
In 1952 Professor Noble established a department within the Mili-
tary Electronics Division that was charged with the responsibility of
developing and building transistors. With this development a reality,
he then split out this department and founded the Semiconductor
Products Division in 1954. Under his leadership the company
became Arizona's largest industrial employer. And it was his pio-
neering research work that helped make Motorola an international
household name in the industry.
He held nine patents on electronics and communication circuitry.
His many awards included the 1966 Greater Arizonan Award; the
1974 Arizona Association of Industries Leadership Award; the 1978
Edison Medal from the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engi-
neers, of which he was a Fellow; and the Franklin Institute's 1972
Stuart Ballantine Medal. He was elected to the National Academy of
Engineering in 1968.
Dan Noble was an artist as well as an engineer, and he took
personal charge of the architectural design of all of Motorola's build-
ings in Phoenix. To this day they are a credit to his artistic eye. He
once commented that he would like to write a blistering essay on
abstract art; he found it to be fraudulent. Until 1965 all of his
paintings were of the classical type. But when he became involved in
abstract art at age sixty-four, he talked eloquently about the fact that
to do something entirely new in abstract art required patience, hard
work, great originality, and maybe even some talent. At age sixty-
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MEMORIAL TRIBUTES
four he still had the vigor and the ability to change his mind when he
learned the facts.
He was always full of vitality, always experimenting, always learn-
ing something new, and when he learned that his original conception
had to be modified, changed, or even totally cast out, he was the first
to admit it. It was this vitality, this honesty, that made him loved by
all who knew him well.
He is survived by his wife, Mary; daughter, Anne Lynch; sons,
Tryson Noble, Talboy Noble, and Richard E. Lynch; and three
grandchildren.
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Representative terms from entire chapter:
paul galvin
