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Paul H. Dike

American researcher in the early science of magnetism

Correspondence, annotated notebooks and portrait silhouettes prepared for research
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Record originEnglish Wikipedia
Text licenseCC BY-SA 4.0
Source revisionMay 27, 2025
Entity authorityQ113304591 ↗
Source-derived summary

Paul Harrison Dike (February 22, 1878, Crystal Lake, Illinois – June 25, 1956, Jenkintown, Pennsylvania) was an American physicist who did research on terrestrial magnetism, atmospheric electricity, photoelectricity, pyrometry, and radiation theory.

Biography

Paul H. Dike graduated from Northwestern University in physics with a B.S. in 1901 and an M.S. in 1903. For the academic year 1901–1902 he taught science at a high school in Du Quoin, Illinois. From 1904 to 1905 he was a magnetic observer for the United States Coast and Geodetic Survey. From 1905 to 1909 he was a member of the Department of Terrestrial Magnetism of the Carnegie Institution for Science in Washington, D.C. He studied abroad at Friedrich Wilhelm University in Berlin from 1905 to 1906 and at the University of Cambridge in 1906. Following instructions from the Carnegie Institution's Director of the Department of Terrestrial Magnetism, Dike joined the magnetic survey yacht Galilee at Sitka, Alaska near the beginning of August 1907 and performed experimental observations of atmospheric electriticy during the 1907–1908 voyage in the Pacific Ocean. From 1909 to 1911 he was a graduate student and an assistant in physics at the University of Wisconsin–Madison. There he graduated in June 1911 with a Ph.D. in physics. His Ph.D. thesis "Photo-Electric Potentials of Thin Cathode Films" was published in Physical Review(Series I) 34, 459 – June 1, 1912.

He was from 1911 to 1914 an assistant in physics at Mount Vernon, Iowa's Cornell College and from 1914 to 1915 an instructor at the University of Missouri.

Editorial summary

The public source identifies “Paul H. Dike” as american researcher in the early science of magnetism. This brief keeps that definition visible, then builds a research path around Paul, Dike and American.

Editorial reviewStrongest as a route into the people, institutions and dated events that shaped the subject’s public record. The current lead gives the account dated anchors—1878, 1956, 1901, 1903—that can be checked directly. The linked authority record independently contributes the date 1878-01-01. Its value is orientation rather than verdict, with Paul, Dike and American providing the first useful test.
Editorial analysis

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A short description can identify a subject without explaining its stakes. For “Paul H. Dike”, the useful work is to connect “american researcher in the early science of magnetism” to the records capable of establishing context and consequence.

Evidence profile

Biographical claims are most persuasive when dates, appointments and relationships can be traced to records created close to the events described. The source revision retrieved here is dated May 27, 2025. The linked authority identifier is Q113304591. VIAF identifies the subject as 107377802. None of the 2 selected statements returned an explicit reference. The first chronological checks are 1878, 1956, 1901 and 1903.

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Source & attribution

This entry incorporates text from “Paul H. Dike” 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.