ht. J. Hear Mass Transfer.
Vol. 27, No. 9, pp. 1435-1436,
PergamonPress Ltd.Printed
inGreatBritain

Professor

1984

Emeritus Sir Owen Saundersan appreciation

Portrait by Michael Noakes
OWEN ALFRED SAUNDERS, who celebrates
his 80th
birthday on 24 September
1984, was the son of anengineer deflected from his natural engineering bent by
a number of early influences. All of us rely to someextent on chance meetings, people whose impacts
change our whole life, yet, in so many cases lead to theultimate niche in which we make the final contribution.
So long as we find that final niche the devious paths
which such chance and opportunity
force us to follow
can be of enormous value in enriching our lives and ourservice to others.
Such is the case of Owen Saunders:
academic
abilities far above the average, an aversion for games
that condemned him by his fellow pupils to loneliness atschool; an urge to study science subjects whichalienated him from school masters whose only view ofacademic prowess was the classics : a chance meetingwith Professor Barrow on the stairs that got him into anotherwise over subscribedcourse in ChemistryatBirkbeck College. Add to this the inspiring influence ofoutstanding
men such as Professor Searle, Horace
Lamb and Lord Rutherford (an adventitious privilege
very few could claim!) and the path which Sir Owen was
to follow began to map itself.
His path to engineering
was through a regularscience course: first at Birkbeck College of London
University from 1921 where he took a general science
degree and afterwards at Trinity College, Cambridge

1435

1436

PROFESSOREMERITUS
SIRHUGH FOKV

(on a Sizarship he won in 1922) achieving First Class
Honours in the Mathemati~lTripos at Part I andUpper Second Class Honours in Physics at Part II.
With two years of a Senior Scholarship still to run atTrinity, Owen Saunders was offered research under
Lord Rutherford who, it is said, was taken aback by his
request for a branch of Physics other than atomic
research!
It was Professor R. V. Southwellin theend whomade
the next link in the chain by offering a mathematicalproblem in elasticity, but soon afterwards (in 1926)
Saunders decided to leave Cambridge to undertake
applied research in the Fuel Research Division of thethen Department of Scientific and Industrial Research,under Dr C. H. Lander. Astonishingly enough, at thesame time he took (June 1927) the London University
External B.Sc. in Mathematicsand gained First Class
Honours in Parts I and II, later topping this out with anM.Sc.
The move to the Fuel Research Station set the final
course to engineering that Sir Owen was to follow. Sir
Henry Tizard and Dr Lander asked him to look into thedesign and performance of industrial furnaces. He soon
found that little science was involved and this set
Saunders-withDr Fishenden who was already at theStation-on
collecting together such information
asthere was on applied heat transfer. The now world
famous book Cu~c~fati~n of Heat Tr~ns~is~io~ waspublished under their joint authorship in 1932.
In that year, Lander became Professor and Head of
Mechanical Engineering at Imperial College (of which
Tizard was Rector), Saunders and Fishenden moved to
the College with him and that long and fruitfuldevelopment of the fundamentals
and applications offluid flow and heat transfer was set fairly on its course.
(Interestingto note that Sir Richard
Southwellfollowed Tizard in the Rectorship of Imperial College.)
From Lecturer in 1932, to Reader in 1937, toProfessor of MechanicalEngineeringand Head ofDepartment
in 1946, Sir Owen Saunders’ active
participation
in a wide range of major engineering
technologies continued unabated until 1964 when thehigher echelons ofuniversity management called him to
the Pro-Rectorshipof Imperial College, then Acting
Rector and finally Vice-Chancellor
ofthe University ofLondon.
During all this he was active on Government
Committees, as Consultant to major companies and to
the Admiralty
and Deputy
Chairmanof 1RD
Newcastle, a post he still holds. His outstanding
contribution and leadership in thelnternational
Flame
Research Group is well known.
It was as a final year undergraduatethat I came under

Sir Owen’s influence when I attended his course oflectures on Heat Transfer. Like him a Scholarship
holder, with a year to run after a first degree, I wasinspired to join him as a research student. As asupervisor,
Sir Owen was concerned
to get thespecification of the problem clear and the method of
attack well laid, but then expected his students to show
initiative and determination
to carry through the work.
We went to him when difficulties arose or equipment
was needed when his insight and understanding
showed to advantage. So his group ofresearch students
and assistants prospered and formed their own caucus
and helped each other-excellent
work was done-but
we also developed our own lunchtime occupations. By
putting four desks together a reasonable approach to atable tennis top resulted. Usually play was restricted tolunchtime but once enthusiasms ran away with us andat three o’clock the battle was in full cry when, to ourdismay, Saunders walked in. “Ah, table tennis!-1
haven’t played for a long time-canI join in?” Despite
his professed aversion to games he turned out to be no
insignificant player!
Many of us remember his Christmas parties and theconjuring tricks---he was a member of the Magic
Circle-hisinterest in music and the arts all of which hemanaged to keep alive in an exceptionally busy life.
Public honours have followed one another in steadysuccession.
Fellowshipof the Royal Society 19.58,
KnightBachelor
1965, Founder
Fellow,
The
Fellowship of Engineering 1976, President (1961) andHonorary
Fellow(1965) of the InstitutionofMechanical Engineers and Honorary membership ofthe ASME, Japan Society of Mechanical Engineers,Honorary Doctorates, and the Max Jakob Memorial
Award of the ASME, an honour of which he is rightly
proud.
Professor Emeritus Sir Owen Saunders can lookback with satisfaction on a long life of outstanding
contribution
to the progress and well being of many
aspects of mechanical engineering and of academicwork.
Max Jakob once said ‘“There is scarcely a corner (ofheat transfer) in which something he has written is not
to be found.” As this issue will show, this comment iswell proven and we are the better for it.

PROFBOREMERITUSSIR HUGHFORD
D.Sc.F.Eng.FRS