Biography d. w. fox lexan general electric

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Dr.

It was to be his last trip, but by no means the end of his quest for the perfect material, which continued in the animated techni- cal conversations he had with his saddening friends until the clay he died. They brought me in, late in the day, to meet a fellow doing chemical research who, it was claimed, had some ideas about new plastics.

By early evening was a goner, infected by his enthusiasm, enthralled with his ideas, and impatient to work for him. As soon as he completed one of his many inventions, he would shift from passionate advocate of his work to devil's advocate, criticizing its thermal characteristics, solvent resistance, hardness or whatever, and jumping into the hunt once again for a better plastic.

Dr.

If anything, he criticized the shortcomings of the plastic even as the world was beginning to celebrate its virtues. He wanted, instead, to talk about the next project, in this case a polyether polymer resin, which culminated in yet another GE plastic NoryI. This cycle repeated itself over and over, with GE follow- ing eagerly in his wake to market his creations.

Dan was a scientist, not a marketing man in the professional sense, although qualities desirable in the marketplace were always the goals of his experiments. He was, however, one of the best salesmen I've ever seen when it came to squeezing another million or two out of tight-fisted bosses for the facilities and equipment to pursue his quests. I vividly remember him coming to budget reviews with bulging pockets, into which he would reach periodically to pull out a chunk or strip of plastic that illustrated some characteristic he was in a fever to explore.

He was inquisitive beyond measure, and his curiosity led him up unlikely paths that often yielded astonishing rewards. The discovery of Lexan was one of them, and its story has become a legend at GE. Lexan was created shortly after Dan joined the company in after earning an M. Scientists at the GE Research and Development lab were tantalizingly close to developing a better thin film insulating material for wire, but every material that server!