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Theodore von Kármán was arguably one of the greatest minds of the twentieth century. He was born on May 11, 1881 in Budapest, Hungary, and at an early age showed an aptitude for math and science. In 1908, he received a Ph.D. in engineering at the University of Göttingen in Germany.
Quick Info. Born. 11 May 1881. Budapest, Hungary. Died. 7 May 1963. Aachen, Germany. Summary. Theodore von Kármán was a Hungarian born mathematician, aerospace engineer and physicist who worked in the fields of aeronautics and astronautics. View six larger pictures. Biography.
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Theodore von Kármán (born May 11, 1881, Budapest, Hung.—died May 6, 1963, Aachen, W.Ger.) Hungarian-born American research engineer best known for his pioneering work in the use of mathematics and the basic sciences in aeronautics and astronautics. His laboratory at the California Institute of Technology later became the National Aeronautics and Sp...
Von Kármán was the third of five children of Maurice and Helene von Kármán. His father, a professor at the University of Budapest and commissioner of the Ministry of Education, reformed the secondary-school system of the country and founded the Minta (Model) Gymnasium, which his son attended, as did the atomic physicists George de Hevesy and Leo Szilard. Von Kármán showed a natural mathematical facility at an early age and was well on his way to becoming a child prodigy when his father, fearing that he would become a mathematical freak, guided him toward engineering.
On completing his undergraduate studies in 1902 at the Royal Polytechnic University in Budapest, he decided to pursue his engineering career in the academic world, which would enable him to fulfill his wide scientific interests and to practice the art of teaching, which his father had inspired in him. In later years, he was delighted when engineers to whom he had imparted his scientific attitude and methodological approach acknowledged him as their teacher.
Between 1903 and 1906 he served on the faculty of the Polytechnic University and as consultant to the principal Hungarian engine manufacturer. The research that von Kármán conducted on the strength of materials prepared the way for important later contributions to the design of aircraft structures. He was awarded a two-year fellowship to the University of Göttingen, Germany, in order to obtain a doctor’s degree, but before completing it he went to the University of Paris. There, after an all-night party, a friend suggested that, instead of going to sleep, they watch the French aviation pioneer Henri Farman fly his machine. Farman successfully completed a 2-km (1.25-mile) course, unknowingly providing the inspiration for the young man who was to become a founder of the aeronautical and astronautical sciences.
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Numbers and Mathematics
Shortly thereafter, Ludwig Prandtl, a pioneer of modern fluid mechanics, invited von Kármán to return to Göttingen as his assistant on dirigible research and to complete his degree. The environment at the university was admirably suited to develop von Kármán’s talents. He responded, in particular, to the school of the eminent mathematician Felix Klein, which stressed the fullest use of mathematics and of the basic sciences in engineering to increase technological efficiency. In 1911 he made an analysis of the alternating double row of vortices behind a bluff body (one having a broad, flattened front) in a fluid stream, now famous as Kármán’s Vortex Street. The use of his analysis to explain the collapse, during high winds, of the Tacoma Narrows Bridge in the state of Washington, in the United States, in 1940, is one of the most striking examples of its value.
- Frank J. Malina
Von Karman: I was very close to Runge, and I was very close, if you can be close, to Felix Klein. Runge’s was a real friendship, Karl Runge; maybe the only real close friendship.
Dr. Theodore Von Kármán died at the age of eighty-one in Aachen, Germany on May 7, 1963. He was buried in Pasadena, near the Jet Propulsion Lab he helped found. Von Kármán Crater on Mars is named in his honor.
Jan 1, 2004 · A Prodigy. Theodore von Karman was a third son, born to a middle-class Jewish family in Budapest on May 11, 1881. His father, Maurice von Karman, was a distinguished professor of philosophy and education at the Peter Pazmany University in Budapest.
Theodore von Kármán, (born, May 11, 1881, Budapest—died May 6, 1963, Aachen, W.Ger.), Hungarian-born U.S. engineer.
