Jack S. Goldstein collection on Jerrold R. Zacharias

Jack S. Goldstein, 1925-2001, was an astrophysicist at Brandeis University. He began his teaching career at Brandeis in 1956, became a full professor of astrophysics in 1966, and continued to teach as a visiting professor until 1999, although he retired in 1992. He also served as dean of the graduate school from 1972 to 1974 and dean of faculty from 1974 until 1981.

Goldstein was a fan of MIT physicist Jerrold Zacharias, and in the 1990s wrote a biography of Zacharias titled A Different Sort of Time: The Life of Jerrold R. Zacharias, Scientist, Engineer, Educator (MIT Press, 1992). The materials that Goldstein collected for the book are the subject of this collection. Goldstein’s interest in Jerrold Zacharias stemmed from both his work as a physicist and his interest in curriculum reform, which Zacharias championed.

Jerrold R. Zacharias, 1905-1986, joined the staff of the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) in 1940 as head of the Division on Radar Transmitter Components of the Radiation Laboratory. Although he left in 1945 to direct the engineering division of the Manhattan Project in Los Alamos, he returned to MIT in 1946 as professor of physics and director of the Laboratory for Nuclear Science, which he headed for ten years.