Thomas Lomar Gray | |
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| Born | (1850-02-04)4 February 1850 |
| Died | 19 December 1908(1908-12-19) (aged 58) |
| Nationality | Scottish |
| Occupation(s) | scientist, educator, foreign advisor to Japan |
Thomas Lomar Gray (4 February 1850 – 19 December 1908) was a Scottish engineer noted for his pioneering work inseismology.
Born inLochgelly,Fife,Scotland, Gray graduated in 1878 from theUniversity of Glasgow with a BSc in engineering. At Glasgow, he awarded theCleland Medal for "An Experimental Determination of Magnetic Moments in Absolute Measurements.".[1]
At the recommendation ofJohn Milne, he was hired by thegovernment ofJapan as aforeign advisor and arrived inTokyo in 1879 to assume to post of Professor of Telegraph Engineering in the Physical Laboratories at theTokyo Imperial University. Later, while working at theImperial College of Engineering in Tokyo, he helped John Milne andJames Alfred Ewing develop the first modernseismometers from 1880 to 1895.[2] Although all three men worked as a team on the invention and use of seismographs, John Milne is generally credited with the invention of the first modern horizontal-pendulum seismograph.[3]
Gray joined Milne and Ewing in founding theSeismological Society of Japan (SSJ) in 1880.[4]
Gray served as Private Assistant toSir William Thomson (Lord Kelvin), Professor of Natural Philosophy in Glasgow University from 1884 to 1887.[5] Thomson also proposed Gray as a Fellow of theRoyal Society of Edinburgh (FRSE)[6]
Among Gray's colleagues in Japan wasThomas C. Mendenhall. Inn 1888, Mendenhall encouraged him to join the faculty of Rose Polytechnic Institute of Technology, nowRose-Hulman Institute of Technology inTerre Haute, Indiana in theUnited States. His title was Professor of Dynamic Engineering. He was vice president of Rose Polytechnic from 1891 through 1908. He died on 19 December 1908[1] and is commemorated in a plaque by the entrance to the old drill hall in Lochgelly[7]
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