Ramsey, Norman, 1915-2011
Norman Ramsey lecture, My Participation in Responding to Senator McCarthys Attack on Harvard, [videorecording], 1976 January 14.
In this lecture, held at MIT on January 14, 1976, Norman Ramsey discusses his personal experiences with cases against suspected communists at Harvard University and the U.S. Army Signal Corps Laboratory at Fort Monmouth (New Jersey). Subjects include: 5th amendment standard procedures and complications which enabled accusers to manipulate answers or non-answers; The case made against Wendell Furry; How pressure was put on the accused to name friends and colleagues who were also connected to communism. When an accused person refused to name anyone to avoid hurting their friends and colleagues, it was used to make them look guilty; How people came to be known as 5th Amendment Communists ; How Ramsey came to be something of a university lawyer to support Furry during the hearings; The difficulty for the accused to find a lawyer who would help them; Harvards ultimate decision not to fire faculty over 5th amendment refusals; Challenges faced by Nathan Pusey, who was elected Harvard President while Senator McCarthy re-opened the Furry case. At the end of his talk, Ramsey takes questions from the audience.
Norman Ramsey (1915-2011): Ph.D., Columbia University (1940); professor of physics at Harvard University from 1966-1986; 1989 Nobel Laureate in physics for the invention of the separated oscillatory fields method and its use in the hydrogen maser and other atomic clocks.
Furry, W. H. (Wendell Hinkle), 1907-1984-
Purcell, Edward M.
Ramsey, Norman, 1915-2011
Harvard University.
Anti-communist movements -- United States.
McCarthyism.
Science and ethics.
Science and state
Video recordings.
AIP-ICOS
American Institute of Physics. Niels Bohr Library & Archives. One Physics Ellipse, College Park, MD 20740, USA