The previous Caltech educator Fred Shair, who established Caltech’s Summer Undergraduate Research Fellowship (SURF) initiative in 1979, passed away on January 16. He was 88 years of age.
Shair held the title of professor of chemical engineering at Caltech during the inception of the SURF program. He transitioned to Cal State Long Beach in 1989, where he served as the dean of the College of Natural Sciences and Mathematics. Subsequently, in the mid-1990s, Shair took on the role of manager of the educational affairs office at JPL, which is overseen by Caltech for NASA, and he continued to provide consultancy for Caltech’s SURF program throughout the 2000s.
In an oral history interview conducted for the Caltech Heritage Project in 2022, Shair reflected on how, in the 1970s, he and several colleagues faced reductions in funding from the National Science Foundation. Hearing their concerns regarding the inability to fund graduate students prompted Shair to contemplate how Caltech could enhance opportunities for students, especially for undergraduates who could engage in laboratory work during the summer. “When I attempted to initiate it at Caltech, not many individuals showed interest,” Shair recalled. “They said, ‘Research is experience. They should learn the basics first, then they can conduct research.’ However, Feynman had a different view. … Once that happened, and [Feynman] took a student on board, the rest of the faculty quickly expressed, ‘I’m on board with that too, Fred.’” Thus began the SURF program.
Shair exhibited typical humility regarding his role in creating SURF. “The irony is that way back when Caltech was founded, there were a few [undergraduates] involved in research, but that gradually faded away,” Shair mentioned. “However, some senior faculty approached me and said, ‘We implemented something akin to this back in 1922.’ But I was fortunate to be in the right place at the right time and surrounded by exceptional individuals.”
Currently, Shair’s creation—SURF—has expanded into a variety of summer programs that provide research opportunities to students not just from Caltech but from numerous other colleges and universities. Candace Rypisi, assistant vice provost and the director of student–faculty initiatives at Caltech, remembers Shair as innovative, enthusiastic, and persistent. “Fred had a passion for mentoring emerging scholars and was continually working to connect students with possible mentors and projects,” Rypisi states.
Born in Denver, Shair grew up in a quaint town in Illinois. Initially, he had no plans to pursue education beyond high school; however, he excelled on a test and received an invitation for a full scholarship to the University of Illinois, where he earned a BS in 1957. Subsequently, one of his instructors at the University of Illinois encouraged Shair to speak with a representative from UC Berkeley, resulting in another full scholarship for graduate studies. As Shair recounted, “I traveled to Berkeley, and it was the best decision I ever made. It was the first time I’d ever boarded an airplane.” He attained his PhD from UC Berkeley in 1963.
During his time at UC Berkeley, Shair began investigating atmospheric fluid dynamics, developing tracers to monitor industrial emissions and other chemical substances. He continued this research stream first at General Electric and then at Caltech, establishing measurement techniques that were significantly more accurate than prior methods. Shair’s innovations enabled him to register how emissions from Los Angeles factories traveled out to sea, only to drift back to the LA Basin in the evening; they were also capable of monitoring chemicals in Earth’s atmosphere moving from the Northern Hemisphere to the Southern Hemisphere. Shair’s research, pedagogy, and administrative contributions garnered accolades from the South Coast Air Quality Management District, the Caltech Alumni Association, and the National Academy of Sciences.
He leaves behind his wife, Constance Shair, three offspring, and six grandchildren.