Robert Jack (physicist)
Robert Jack (4 November 1877 – 1 May 1957) was a Scottish-born physicist, professor and Dean of the Faculty of Arts and Science, University of Otago, and pioneer of radio broadcasting, New Zealand.
Early life and education
Robert Jack was born in the village of Quarter, near Hamilton, Lanarkshire, Scotland, on 4 November 1877 and was educated at Hamilton Academy and the University of Glasgow, graduating MA with Honours in mathematics and natural philosophy. Thereafter he attended the University of Paris and the University of Göttingen for postgraduate study and as a result of this research, including that into the effect of magnetic fields on atoms (the Zeeman effect), Jack was awarded a DSc from Glasgow.
University career
Following fours years as a lecturer in physics at Queen’s University, Belfast, in 1914 Robert Jack took up the post of professor of physics at the University of Otago, Dunedin, New Zealand. During his subsequent 33 years there he was to become Chairman of the university’s professorial board, a member of the university Council and Dean of the Faculty of Arts and Science. In 1920 Robert Jack was joined on the university's faculty by another former pupil of Hamilton Academy, Scotland, and near contemporary, Robert Bell who had also graduated M.A. with Honours in mathematics and natural philosophy from Glasgow and who had arrived at Otago to take up the appointment as Professor of Pure and Applied Mathematics. Robert Jack and Robert Bell were to serve out the rest of their careers at the University of Otago which had been built by another former pupil of Hamilton Academy, Robert Forrest of McGill and Forrest, contractors, Dunedin.