"Meredith Charles Gourdine"(November 26,1929-November 20,1998)

A physicist and engineer,was an inventor with dozens of patents with gas dispersion and conversion.He was also a star athlete who won a silver medal in the long jump in the 1952 Olympics in Helsinki Finland.He was born in Newark,New Jersey,and raised in Brooklyn,New York.His father,  a laborer,advised him to stay in school so he would have better opportunities in life.After graduation from Brooklyn Tech High School,he turned down an athletic scholarship (for swimming)from the University of Michigan and chose to attend Cornell University.At Cornell,he earned the nickname "Flash"as an intercollegiate track champion,competing,in sprints,low hurdles,and long jumps.He received a B.S. in engineering from Cornell in 1952,the same year he won his Olympic medal.Meredith served as an officer in the U.S. Navy and did graduate work engineering at the California Institute of Technology,supported by a Guggenheim fellowship.He worked as a senior research scientists the Caltech Jet Propulsion Laboratory for two years and was awarded his doctorate in 1960.In 1964,after working in private industry,Meredith founded his own research and developed firm Gourdine Systems,in Livingston New Jersey.In 1973,he founded another company,Energy Innovations,in Houston,Texas.Energy Innovations produced direct energy conversion devices from his patented designs.The devices converted low grade coal to high-voltage electrical energy.A pioneer in the field of electrogas dynamics,he invented an engineering technique known as incineraid to disperse smoke from buildings;it was later adapted to disperse fog from airports.Another of his inventions,Focus Flow Heat Sink,was used to cool computer chips.Meredith married twice.He is survived by his wife Carolina Bailing;one son,Meredith Jr.,daughters (rom a previous marriage)Teri,Traci,and Toni,at the time of his death they were five grandchildren.