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Nobel physicist's wife has Norwin ties
Editor Note: Jacquelyn Savani is the niece of chapter member, Bernie Sinwell. This is a condensation of an article by Craig Smith of the Tribune Review which was submitted to me by Bernie.
Jacquelyn Savani didn't have much interest in physics when she graduated from Norwin Senior High in 1966. She was on her way to Chatham College as a National Merit Scholar to study English. An aspiring writer, she was editor of the school newspaper her senior year and worked summers at the Irwin Standard Observer. At Chatham, she took an astronomy course... unlocking a passion for physics that would lead her to Princeton University, where she was a science writer for 15 years.
Her husband, David Gross, has been named this year's Nobel Prize winner in physics for his work in Quantum ChromoDynamics, or QCD. Gross is director of the Kavil Institute for Theoretical Physics and the first incumbent of the Frederick W. Gluck Chair in Theoretical Physics at the University of California at Santa Barbara.
The call came from the Royal Swedish Academy of Sciences in Stockholm at 2:30 a.m. Oct. 5. As her husband took hour after hour of telephone calls from the European press (and more than 1,000 e-mails), Savani set about writing press releases and planning coverage of the announcement.
Savani is assistant to the chancellor and executive
chancellor at the University of California at Santa
Barbara and acts as media relations consultant to the
Kavil Institute of Theoretical Physics.
She notified her mother, Genevieve Savani in North
Huntingdon Township. Genevieve Savani was the
Norwin School District's first school psychologist after
serving as principal at Circleville Elementary School.
Before David Gross and wife Jacquelyn head to Sweden in December to receive the Nobel Prize, they'll attend a reception at the White House and travel to France in November to receive France's highest scientific honor, the Grande Medaille D'Or.
Bush Family Singer
Submitted by Jay Garber
Did you know that Prescott Sheldon Bush (1892-1972), father of President George H.W. Bush and grandfather of President George W. Bush, was a lifelong Barbershopper?
As a member of the Yale Glee Club and the Wiffenpoofs(a drinking subsidiary), he formed a quartet called the Silver Dollars in 1922 and continued to sing with them for over 30 years. Prescott and the boys showed up every year at an annual meeting of the Wiffenpoofs (at Morry's, naturally) and peformed for most of the Republican Party Conventions during his years as an investment banker and activist in Connecticut politics.
There is no indication that either "H.W.' or "W" caught the bug (at least the BBS singing part).
(The family, Kitty Kelly '04)
The Christmas carol "Deck the Halls" is from Wales, where there's a harpist on every street corner. The song was originally sung with chorus portions interspersed with a harpist improvising a few bars, hence strike the harp and join the chorus." Now, where the harpist would play, we sing, "fa Ia Ia Ia Ia, Ia Ia Ia Ia.
(Source: PBS radio broadcast)
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