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Harry Messel

Australian physicist

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General referenceInterpretive dossier study · Crown Archives visual atlas
Record originEnglish Wikipedia
Text licenseCC BY-SA 4.0
Source revisionAug 22, 2024
Entity authorityQ11171908
Source-derived summary

Harry Messel, , (3 March 1922 – 8 July 2015) was a Canadian-born Australian physicist and educator.

Life and work

Messel was born in Canada to Ukrainian parents. He was born in Levine Siding in Manitoba, and brought up in Rivers, Manitoba. He was accepted into the Royal Military College of Canada. During the Second World War he served as a paratrooper with the Canadian Forces. He entered Queen's University in Kingston, Ontario, in 1946, enrolling in both Honours Engineering Physics and an Honours Degree in Mathematics.

After fellowships at University of St Andrews and Dublin Institute for Advanced Studies, Messel moved to Australia in 1951. He lectured in mathematical physics at the University of Adelaide 1951–52, before being appointed in 1952 as Professor of Physics and Head of the School of Physics at the University of Sydney, a position he held for 35 years until his retirement in 1987. In 1952 he established the Nuclear Research Foundation, later known as the Science Foundation for Physics.

Messel was also Chancellor and CEO of Bond University 1992–1997.

Editorial summary

Begin with the source’s own compact description: “Harry Messel” is australian physicist. The dossier treats that line as a proposition to test through Harry, Messel and Australian, not as a finished interpretation.

Editorial reviewA dependable orientation record for establishing vocabulary, names and a first evidence trail. The current lead gives the account dated anchors—1922, 2015, 1946, 1951—that can be checked directly. The linked authority record independently contributes the date 1922-03-03. For this dossier, Harry, Messel and Australian is the immediate research focus.
Editorial analysis

Why this record matters

The phrase “australian physicist” supplies a clear boundary for inquiry. It also exposes the unanswered questions: who defined that boundary, when it became stable and which sources sit outside it.

Evidence profile

Vocabulary and entity names are the principal evidence signals here, because they determine the precision of every later search. The source revision retrieved here is dated Aug 22, 2024. The linked authority identifier is Q11171908. VIAF identifies the subject as 110347149. The Library of Congress control number is n50036933. 3 of 3 selected statements include explicit references; 0 carry qualifiers and 0 use preferred rank. The first chronological checks are 1922, 2015, 1946 and 1951.

Critical limits

Overview language is designed for orientation and should not be treated as a substitute for the evidence cited beneath it. The lead is largely declarative, so disagreement and counter-evidence require a deliberate search beyond the opening account. Authority statements aid reconciliation but still require their own references, qualifiers and ranks to be checked.

How to read it

Use the entry as an orientation point, then follow its citations and revision history. Names, dates and institutional relationships should be checked against the original record.

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Source & attribution

This entry incorporates text from Harry Messel” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.