Abstract
In Irresistible Forces: Australian Women in Science (2004), Claire Hooker has written, “Yet if [Payne-Scott] was a feminine flare in radio astronomy, she was a bright one, both as a physicist and as a woman.” In Fig. 1.1, a photograph of Payne-Scott as a young student in the 1930s is displayed. The field of radio astronomy in Australia grew out of the radar research carried out during World War II at the Council for Scientific and Industrial Research (CSIR) Radiophysics Laboratory (RPL; see Appendix A). Payne-Scott joined the new institute in 1941 (Chap. 4), as one of the first scientific staff as well as one of the first woman scientists (Joan Freeman had joined a few months earlier). RPL played a key role in the War effort, producing numerous copies of the aircraft warning radars that were used so successfully in the Southwest Pacific Area by both US and Australian military personnel from 1942 to 1945 in the war against Japan. Payne-Scott made major contributions to this top secret radar research; she became the Australian expert on the theory of the detection of enemy aircraft using the display system that had been invented in the UK, named the PPI or Plan Position Indicator (Chap. 5). She was also an experienced radio engineer; her experience with B.Y. Mills in the development of an experimental high frequency (25 cm) aircraft warning radar contributed to her success as an experimental radio astronomer starting in mid-1945.
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Notes
- 1.
Curiously, Payne-Scott soon lost confidence in the reality of the important Type II outbursts, associated with large optical flare events on the sun and delayed (by about a day) aurora and magnetic storms on the earth.
- 2.
There is a temptation to evaluate these issues with the viewpoint of the more egalitarian society of the early twenty-first century; as a number of correspondents have pointed out to the authors, the draconian treatment of Payne-Scott in the mid-twentieth century was consistent with practices in many walks of life. The characteristic that distinguished Payne Scott was her resistance to these inequalities.
- 3.
One source claims erroneously that “She was obligated to resign when her marriage was exposed”. (See also the Preface.) Another source suggests that her resignation when pregnant in 1951 was a protest against the marriage bar; we have found no evidence for this. An ASIO report (Chap. 13) of 2 March 1959 “… identified a Ruby Payne-Scott, a Research Officer at Radio Physics [sic], NSW, whom [BLANK-redacted] had referred to as ‘a Red’ and who was dismissed from CSIRO for failing to give notification of her marriage”. At a subsequent location in the file, the correct reason for her resignation “because of her child birth” was stated.
- 4.
The transition from the CSIR to the CSIRO (Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organisation) occurred in the period March–May 1949 with the passing of the Science and Industry Research Act 1949 by the Australian Parliament. The change from “Council” to “Commonwealth” was chosen to emphasise the national character of the new organisation and the word “Organisation” was used to highlight the changed character of the administration by the new CSIRO Executive of five members (including three scientists) (Schedvin 1987).
- 5.
D.B. Melrose and H.C. Minnett (1917–2003) have written a Bibliographical Memoir (1998) of Jack H. Piddington (1910–1997), who worked at RPL and then the Division of Physics for much of his career. He had played an important role in the Darwin anti-aircraft radar events of February 1942. Melrose and Minnett have quoted a colleague at RPL as mentioning that there was “a triangle of antagonism between John Bolton, Ruby Payne-Scott and Jack Piddington” at RPL in the late 1940s. Minnett also acknowledged these antipathies and described them as “creative tensions between very different personalities”. RPL was blessed with some strong personalities!
- 6.
Collis, in a history of CSIRO, Fields of Discovery: Australia’s CSIRO (2002), has described this controversy. As an example, the CSIR Division of Aeronautics was moved in 1949 from the CSIR to the Department of Supply and Development of the Australian Government (then Aeronautical Research Laboratories). The Chairman of the CSIR, Sir David Rivett, resigned on 18 May 1949; Rivett had been the founding CEO of CSIR (from 1927 to the end of 1945, then Chairman until May 1949)
- 7.
Peter Murphy, the Sydney Secretary of the Social Education and Research Concerning Humanity (SEARCH) Foundation, has been of considerable assistance (Chap. 13) in sorting out Payne-Scott’s connections with the CPA. Her redacted ASIO file is in NAA: A6119/83, 1679, with the title “Payne Scott, Ruby Violet a.k.a. Hall”.
- 8.
Rachel Makinson, February 2007.
- 9.
Payne-Scott experienced a miscarriage earlier. The date is uncertain; based on attendance at meetings of the radio astronomy group we surmise that this event may have occurred in late 1946 (see Chap. 7).
- 10.
The most famous colleague of the RPL during the War was certainly Dame Joan Sutherland, the famous opera singer. Although she may have heard of Payne-Scott while she was a clerical assistant at the RPL from April 1944 to January 1945, she never met Payne-Scott (Letter from Sutherland to Goss, 23 April 2007). In 1944, Sutherland was the typist of a report written by E.G. Bowen concerning the meteorological effects on radar reception. The most famous story about Joan Sutherland concerns the Musical Revue, Hush-Hush, in late 1944, staged by Robert Coulson. This was a spoof of the Mikado with a skit involving the “Lord High Clerical Officer” draped in red tape. Joan Freeman was in the chorus together with Sally Atkinson. The 18 year old Sutherland auditioned for a part and was rejected (confirmed by a letter from Dame Joan to Goss, April 2007). It appears that this rejection had no adverse effect on her career; already in 1947 she had made her concert debut in Sydney as Dido in Purcell’s Dido and Aeneas.
- 11.
Amalgamated Wireless (Australasia) Ltd., formed in 1913 from the merger of Marconi’s Wireless Telegraph Co. Ltd. and the Australian Wireless Company.
References
Schedvin CB (1987) Shaping science and industry: a history of australia’s council for scientific and industrial research, 1926–1949. Allen and Unwin, Sydney
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(2010). Introduction: The Life of Ruby Violet Payne-Scott – 28 May 1912 (Grafton NSW, Australia) to 25 May 1981 (Sydney, Australia). In: Goss, W.M., McGee, R.X. (eds) Under the Radar. Astrophysics and Space Science Library, vol 363. Springer, Berlin, Heidelberg. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-642-03141-0_1
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