Biography:James E. McDonald

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Short description: American meteorologist and ufologist (1920-1971)
James Edward McDonald
Born(1920-05-07)May 7, 1920
Duluth, Minnesota, US
DiedJune 13, 1971(1971-06-13) (aged 51)
Tucson, Arizona, US
Academic background
EducationUniversity of Omaha
MIT
Iowa State University
ThesisRadiation-Errors and Lag-Errors in the Measurement of Turbulent Temperature Fluctuations (1951)
Doctoral advisorJoseph M. Keller
Other academic advisorsThomas F. Malone
Academic work
Disciplinecloud physics
weather modification
ufology
InstitutionsNaval Aerology School
Iowa State University
University of Chicago
University of Arizona

James Edward McDonald (May 7, 1920 – June 13, 1971) was an American atmospheric physicist and meteorologist. He is known for his scientific research in weather modification through cloud seeding, while working as an associate director at the Institute for Atmospheric Physics and a professor of meteorology at the University of Arizona in Tucson.[1]

During the 1960s, McDonald campaigned in support of expanding UFO studies, and promoted the extraterrestrial hypothesis as a plausible explanation of UFO phenomena.[2][3]

Early life and career

McDonald was born and raised in Duluth, Minnesota. He served as a cryptographer in the United States Navy during World War II, and afterwards, married Betsy Hunt. McDonald received a B.A. in chemistry from the University of Omaha in 1942 and an M.S. in meteorology from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology in 1945, where he completed the thesis titled Summer air mass instability and its synoptic representation under the supervision of Thomas F. Malone.[4] He went on to study physics at Iowa State University, where he received his Ph.D. in 1951. His PhD thesis was supervised by Joseph M. Keller and it has the title Radiation-Errors and Lag-Errors in the Measurement of Turbulent Temperature Fluctuations.[5]

After graduation, McDonald taught at the Naval Aerology School and at Iowa State University before moving to University of Chicago for a year. In 1953, McDonald helped establish a meteorology and atmospherics program at the University of Arizona as a professor of meteorology. McDonald joined the Institute of Atmospheric Physics at the University of Arizona in 1954 as an associate director and worked under the founding director Roscoe Braham Jr..[6] McDonald remained at the same institution until his death.[7]

The University of Arizona library keeps a collection of McDonald's publications.[7]

Meteorology research

McDonald was known for his many studies on the formation and aerodynamics of raindrops and on the modeling of the scavenging effects of rain. He examined physical factors influencing raindrop shape, identifying surface tension, hydrostatic pressure, and aerodynamic pressure as the primary contributors to deformation and revealed with high-speed photography the significant role of boundary-layer separation in shaping drops and influencing surface processes.[8] He provided one of the first physical models of the rain-scavenging effect and analyzed the efficiency of raindrops in capturing airborne particles. The research found that larger particles like pollen are effectively removed by most rains, while smaller spores experience lower removal rates, emphasizing the role of rain-scavenging in pollen dissemination.[9]

In 1956, McDonald organized the Conference on the Scientific Basis of Weather Modification Studies at the University of Arizona,[10] an influential event of the day to assess the state of weather modification research using cloud seeding and its future direction.[11] He continued participation in the scientific discourse in weather modification and was a member of the Panel on Weather and Climate Modification headed by Gordon J. F. MacDonald, which was formed in 1963 by the appointment of the Committee on Atmospheric Science of the National Academy of Sciences.[12][13]

UFO studies

In 1967 the Office of Naval Research supported McDonald to conduct his own UFO research, ostensibly to study the idea that some UFOs were misidentified clouds. He was able to examine the files of Project Blue Book at Wright Patterson Air Force Base, and eventually concluded that the Air Force was mishandling UFO evidence. McDonald secured support from United Nations Secretary General U Thant, who arranged for McDonald to speak to the UN's Outer Space Affairs Group on June 7, 1967. Additionally in 1967, McDonald noted, "There is no sensible alternative to the utterly shocking hypothesis that UFOs are extraterrestrial probes".[14]

In his Statement on Unidentified Objects to the House Committee on Science and Astronautics, McDonald made the following remarks regarding types of UFO accounts.

"the scientific world at large is in for a shock when it becomes aware of the astonishing nature of the UFO phenomenon and its bewildering complexity. I make that terse comment well aware that it invites easy ridicule; but intellectual honesty demands that I make clear that my two years' study convinces me that in the UFO problem lie scientific and technological questions that will challenge the ability of the world's outstanding scientists to explain - as soon as they start examining the facts. [...] the scientific community [...] has been casually ignoring as nonsense a matter of extraordinary scientific importance."[15]

The Condon Committee

1968: Congressional UFO testimony

McDonald spoke before the United States Congress for a UFO hearing in 1968.[2] In part, he stated his opinion that "UFOs are entirely real and we do not know what they are, because we have laughed them out of court. The possibility that these are extraterrestrial devices, that we are dealing with surveillance from some advanced technology, is a possibility I take very seriously".[16]

1969: "Science in Default"

In 1969, McDonald was a speaker at an American Association for the Advancement of Science UFO symposium. There he delivered a lecture, "Science in Default",[3] in which he discussed a handful of UFO cases which seemed, he thought, to defy interpretation by conventional science. Ufologist Jerome Clark called the lecture "one of the most powerful scientific defenses of UFO reality ever mounted".[16]

Honors

McDonald was a member of the American Meteorological Society since 1944, a member of the National Academy of Sciences, and American Geophysical Union.[1][17]

Later life and death

On June 13, 1971, McDonald was found dead with a head wound in a desert area of Tucson, Arizona, with a .38 caliber revolver and apparent suicide note found nearby.[18]

Sources

  1. ↑ 1.0 1.1 Battan, Louis J. (1971). "James Edward McDonald 1920–1971". Bulletin of the American Meteorological Society 52 (8): 735. ISSN 0003-0007. https://www.jstor.org/stable/26254491. 
  2. ↑ 2.0 2.1 Berliner, Don. "Congressional Hearings on UFOs". ufoevidence.org. http://www.ufoevidence.org/documents/doc1981.htm. 
  3. ↑ 3.0 3.1 McDonald, James E. (1972). "Science in Default". in Carl Sagan, Thornton Page. American Association for the Advancement of Science, 134th Meeting. Ithaca, New York: Cornell University Press. ISBN 9780393007398. https://archive.org/details/ufosascientificd0000unse_n5n6. 
  4. ↑ McDonald, James Edward (1945). Summer air mass instability and its synoptic representation (Thesis thesis). Massachusetts Institute of Technology. hdl:1721.1/47313.
  5. ↑ McDonald, James (1951). Radiation- and lag-errors in the measurement of turbulent temperature fluctuations (Thesis).
  6. ↑ Braham, Roscoe R. (1956-06-15). "University of Arizona, Institute of Atmospheric Physics, Progress Report No. 3" (in en). Digitized from a Paper Copy Provided by the Department of Hydrology and Atmospheric Sciences.. https://repository.arizona.edu/handle/10150/634444. 
  7. ↑ 7.0 7.1 "James E. McDonald papers | University of Arizona Libraries" (in en). https://lib.arizona.edu/special-collections/collections/james-e-mcdonald-papers. 
  8. ↑ McDonald, James E. (1954). "The shape and aerodynamics of large raindrops" (in en). Journal of Meteorology 11 (6): 478–494. doi:10.1175/1520-0469(1954)011<0478:TSAAOL>2.0.CO;2. ISSN 0095-9634. Bibcode: 1954JAtS...11..478M. http://journals.ametsoc.org/doi/10.1175/1520-0469(1954)0112.0.CO;2. 
  9. ↑ McDonald, James E. (1962-02-09). "Collection and Washout of Airborne Pollens and Spores by Raindrops" (in en). Science 135 (3502): 435–437. doi:10.1126/science.135.3502.435. ISSN 0036-8075. PMID 17791291. Bibcode: 1962Sci...135..435M. https://www.science.org/doi/10.1126/science.135.3502.435. 
  10. ↑ "Meetings and Societies" (in en). Science 124 (3211): 86–90. 1956-07-13. doi:10.1126/science.124.3211.86. ISSN 0036-8075. PMID 17838000. Bibcode: 1956Sci...124...86.. https://www.science.org/doi/10.1126/science.124.3211.86. 
  11. ↑ Harper, Kristine C. (2017) (in en). Make It Rain: State Control of the Atmosphere in Twentieth-Century America. University of Chicago Press. doi:10.7208/chicago/9780226437378.001.0001. ISBN 978-0-226-59792-8. https://www.bibliovault.org/BV.landing.epl?ISBN=9780226437378. 
  12. ↑ MacDonald, Gordon J. F. (1966). "weather and climate modification—problems and prospects". Bulletin of the American Meteorological Society 47 (1): 4–20. doi:10.1175/1520-0477-47.1.4. ISSN 0003-0007. Bibcode: 1966BAMS...47....4.. https://www.jstor.org/stable/26248266. 
  13. ↑ MacDonald, Gordon J. F. (1968). "Science and Politics of Rainmaking" (in en). Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists 24 (8): 8–14. doi:10.1080/00963402.1968.11457717. ISSN 0096-3402. Bibcode: 1968BuAtS..24h...8M. http://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/00963402.1968.11457717. 
  14. ↑ Randles, Jenny (1987). The UFO Conspiracy: The First Forty Years. Barnes and Noble Books. ISBN 978-1-56619-195-1. https://archive.org/details/ufoconspiracyfir00rand. 
  15. ↑ McDonald, James. E. (1968). Statement on Unidentified Flying Objects submitted to the House Committee on Science and Astronautics at July 29, 1968, Symposium on Unidentified Flying Objects, Rayburn Bldg., Washington, D.D.
  16. ↑ 16.0 16.1 Clark, Jerome (1998). The UFO Book: Encyclopedia of the Extraterrestrial. Visible Ink. pp. 368, 370–371. ISBN 978-1-57859-029-2. https://archive.org/details/ufobookencyclope0000clar/page/368. 
  17. ↑ "James E. McDonald papers, (1904-1997)". http://www.azarchivesonline.org/xtf/view?docId=ead/uoa/UAMS412.xml. 
  18. ↑ "JAMES M'DONALD, A CLOUD PHYSICIST". The New York Times. 1971-06-16. https://www.nytimes.com/1971/06/16/archives/jaes-donald-a-gloudphysiclst-leading-scientific-defende-of-ufo.html. 



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