Herald Edgerton was born in Fremont, Nebraska, in 1903, where his father was principal of the high school and coach of the football team. A few years after his birth, the family moved to Washington, D.C., where his father worked as a reporter for the Washington Times and studied law. Washington, however, could not compete with the attractions of Nebraska. The family moved back--residing in Lincoln, on the Winnebago Indian Reservation, and finally in Aurora. At 14, Edgerton bought his first camera, a postcard floding model from a mail order catalog. After receiving a bachelor's degree in electrical engineering at the University of Nebraska, Edgerton spent a year with General Electric in Schenectady, New York. He then enrolled at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, where he won both a master's degree and a doctorate in electrical engineering. It was Edgerton's work in electrical measurements at MIT that first led him to investigate the stroboscope and the possibility of using it for photography. During his doctoral studies, Edgerton needed to find a way to accurately measure the transient changes in the angular displacement of the rotor of a synchronous electric motor. With the stroboscopes then available, measurements had to be recorded visually, and it was difficult to capture with accuracy the transient changes in the turning rotors. To overcome the problem, Edgerton designed the first electronic stroboscope device that would produce enough light in controlled flashes of short duration and of proper actinic quality for "stopping motion" on photographic film. His success in developing this stroboscope, first described in the May 1931 issue of the journal, Electrical Engineering, led to his life-long work in high-speed photography. Two other MIT graduates, Kenneth Germesshausen and Herbert E. Grier, who were to become Edgerton's business partners, made critical contributions in the early 1930's to further development of strobe systems. The pioneering research of these three men led to the realization of today's electronic flash camera. In 1947, the trio organized their informal partnership of thirteen years into a company which has successfully specialized in electronic technology applicable to space exploration, atomic physics, medicine, marine science, electro- optics, and sophisticated testing devices. The industrial/corporate world held no charms for Edgerton, who by this time was affectionately called "Doc" by his students. Leaving the management of the burgeoning enterprise to his partners, he preferred to dedicate his time to his students and research. As his pioneering photographs stirred worldwide interest in strobe photography, Edgerton's MIT laboratory became a mecca for people who wished to learn his techniques or use his equipment for motion analysis. His stroboscope, in a convenient portable form, found wide use in industry for studying such things as the complexities of the automobile crankshaft, a high-speed loom's shuttle, or the meshing of gears. During World War II, Edgerton developed a powerful flash system that was used for night aerial photography over Normandy in Europe. In the later years, Jacques Yves Cousteau, along with the National Geographic Society, enlisted his aid for underwater photography. Cousteau and the crew of the Calypsodubbed him "Papa Flash." More recently Edgerton's inventions include the side -scan device used in the discovery of the ironclad USS Monitor, sunk off Cape Hatteras in 1862 by the Confederate ironclad Merrimac . Robert Ballard and the team from the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institute found the wreck of the Titanic using Edgerton's side- scan sonar. "Nessie," the sea monster supposedly residing in the 700- foot-deep Loch Ness in Scotland, has been another subject of Edgerton's research using the side-scan sonar. Edgerton, as a photographer, was first of all a scientist and an electrical engineer who investigated, measured, and sought new facts about natural phenomenon. His photographic genius, which he always down-played, has captured bullets in flight and athletes in motion; captured the detonation of atomic bombs at a hundred millionth of a second; and produced the renowned coronet picture of the drop of milk as it splattered into a saucer. His photographs, as scientific records, bestow on us comprehension and increase our awareness. They reveal the new forms, subtle relationships of time and space, and the essence of motion. He created a universal visual scientific language for all to appreciate--a unique image of that time world beyond the threshhold of our eyes. Edgerton received the nation's highest awards, including the Medal of Freedom, the National Medal of Science, the International Center for Photography's Lifetime Achievement Award, and the National Medal of Technology. His 1982 New England Inventor of the Year Award reads, "He has pressed back the frontiers of our knowledge of vision and motion with his stroboscopic photography and through his marvelous invention he has captured and revealed new beauty and order in both nature and industry,"--a marvelous citation for a person whose life work has so enriched our lives.   Joan Loria, Curator     Milk-Drop Coronet. Harold E. Edgerton. 1957.