Hardy/Kraushaar

Professor Arthur Cobb Hardy

So we came to Uno’s lectures and dutifully copied down from the blackboard his rather elegant derivation of statistical mechanics. Until one day, about a month into the process, when he entered the hall with a troubled look on his red face: “You’re going to have to correct every equation of my derivation.” More boos and hisses. “I’ve left out a constant factor on the right side of each equation. Nothing really significant: merely Avogadro’s Number factorial.” I’ll just note blandly here that this is a monstrously big number. The tenth power of the number of discernible particles in the Einsteinian universe, or something of the sort…

Although we could normally cut lectures without incurring administrative grief, we were expected to attend our weekly recitation sessions, and it was these instructors who gave us our grades at the end of the term. In my major subject, my first recitation instructor was Professor Arthur Cobb Hardy (1895-1977), a charming, dapper, courtly gentleman, an eminent pioneer in optics and photography, senior (and, I’d argue, superior) in every way to authors and lecturers Ingard and Kraushaar. His tweed jackets were a trademark. We also recognized him by the flower in his lapel; I regret that they left out that touch in this otherwise-admirable yearbook photo.

Professor Hardy won our hearts with his very first words to us, uttered with a good deal of flair. He stood at the head of the classroom, holding the latest mimeographed chunk of Interactions and Motion. He looked us over in silence. Then his eye fell upon the makeshift document in his hand. Then back to us: “I think… that Ingaahd and Kraushaah…should be hoahse-whipped!”