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OCR for page 197
WILLIAM BURDETTE McLEAN
1914-1976
BY DAVID S. POTTER
WILLIAM B. McLEAN, a pioneer in the development of air-
launched guided missiles and advanced torpedoes, died in San
Diego, California, on August 25, 1976, after a long illness.
A talented engineer, inventor, and research physicist, Dr. Mc-
Lean probably is best known for his original concept of the success-
ful SIDEWINDER air-to-air missile, which, at the time of its develop-
ment, represented an unsurpassed level of reliability, simplicity
and low cost, and which provided his guidelines for future missile
. .
systems engineering.
Dr. McLean was born on May 21, 1914, in Portland, Oregon. He
received a Bachelor of Science degree from the California Institute
of Technology in 1935. He then served as a physics instructor at
that institution, while pursuing graduate studies in nuclear physics
in the Kellogg Radiation Laboratory under Charles Lauritsen and
William Fowler. Dr. McLean received a Master of Science degree
(1937) and a Doctor of Philosophy degree (1939) in physics from
California Institute of Technology before accepting a postdoctoral
fellowship in nuclear physics at the University of Iowa from 1939 to
1941.
As a young graduate student, Dr. McLean displayed the inven-
tive design and engineering abilities that would characterize his
career. He designed and built a half-million volt Van de Graff
generator as a pilot project for a larger, one-Mev generator later
built at Kellogg. He then used the generator, coupled with a cloud
197
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chamber built by his fellow student and lifelong friend and col-
league, Robert A. Becker, to complete his doctoral studies of
short-range alpha particles.
During his fellowship at the University of Iowa, Dr. McLean
continued his research into the physics of subatomic particles,
concentrating on the angular distribution of protons from the
D D reaction as a Research Associate under Alexander Ellett.
Dr. McLean entered Government service in 1941 as a Research
Physicist designing weapons fuses for the National Bureau of
Standards. In 1945 he moved to the Naval Ordnance Test Station
(now the Naval Weapons Center) at China Lake, California. During
his twenty-two years at China Lake, he rose to national prominence
in the development of air-launched guided missiles and advanced
torpedoes. He was Technical Director at China Lake for thirteen
years. He then became Technical Director of the Naval Undersea
Center when it was established in 1967, for seven years before his
retirement in 1974.
Dr. McLean was a staunch supporter of a strong Government
program in oceanography. He predicted that significant advances
in underwater detection and surveillance would be made in the
areas of improved acoustical signal processing and display. He also
made notable contributions to the advancement of science and
national defense and to the field of public service in his thirty-three
years of Federal service.
McLean was a superb engineer. His personal hallmark was
artistic engineering design, wherein the parts fit and work together
in a most natural and economical manner. He possessed a facile
and profound synthetic and spatial imagination. As a result, he
customarily invented and perfected complex electronic circuits and
electro-pneumo-mechanical devices on the bench and in the shop
without using diagrams or drawings of any kind. His only use of
such aids, typically, was in trying to communicate his ideas to
machinists, technicians, patent attorneys, or other people.
Since Dr. McLean was educated as a physicist and was by nature a
systems thinker, he paid little attention to the traditional bound-
aries between such disciplines as mechanical, electrical, and fluidic
engineering. And even though he had an excellent ability to use the
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mathematics of all those fields, he put little trust in the analyses or
deductions of such mathematics. His preferred working mode was
to place himself mentally in the position of each element of the
device under consideration in order to "feel" whatever forces or
current flows the element would be required to generate or re-
spond to. Then he would quickly build an example of what he was
thinking about and observe its behavior under various conditions.
Next, he would upgrade his thoughts and the device he was
working with, and then he would test it again it was a highly
dynamic and fluid process.
In addition to his achievements in developing the SIDEWINDER
guided missile, Dr. McLean was busy inventing and developing
hundreds of other systems and devices both great and small. At the
time of his death, he was actively pursuing, as best as he could
under the conditions of his illness, the development of a wave-
powered upwelling pump for application to the vast oceanic sea-
weed production farms that many believe will be a striking feature
of the world of the next century.
In recognition of his outstanding achievement, special awards
included the maximum Federal Government Award of $25,000 for
the development of the SIDEWINDER missile ~ 1956), Naval
Ordnance Test Station's L. T. E. Thompson Award (1956), Reso-
lution of Commendation by the California State Legislature for
SIDEWINDER development (1957), the President's Award for Dis-
tinguished Federal Civilian Service (1958), the American Ordnance
Association's Blandy Gold Medal (1960), the Rockefeller Public
Service Award for Science, Technology, and Engineering (1965),
the Secretary of the Navy Certificate of Commendation (1966),
California Institute of Technology Alumni Distinguished Service
Award ~ 1969), and the IEEE Harry Diamond Award for outstanding
leadership of development in guided missiles and undersea explo-
ration and transport (1972~.
Dr. McLean served on various committees and boards of national
prominence, including the National Inventors Council, American
Physical Society, and American Association for Advancement of
Science. He was a member of Tau Beta Pi and Sigma Xi and served
as a Fellow of the New York Academy of Sciences and of the
199
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Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers. He was elected to
the National Academy of Engineering in 1965 and to the National
Academy of Sciences in 1973 and served on various Academy
committees, panels, and boards. He authored numerous publica-
tions, and there are more than thirty-five patents to his credit.
William McLean is survived by his wife, Laverne (nee Jones); his
three sons, William Robert, Daniel Malcolm, and Mark Alan; and
two grandchildren.
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Representative terms from entire chapter:
ordnance test
