Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1930-08-31
CHARLES BUCKLEY
ENDS U. S. SERVICE
Reaches Age Limit of 10, but
Viii Enter Private Bust
ness Next Week.

When a man arrives at the age OF
20 years in the Government service,
he is retired by law But If. at that
age, he feels as a man of so ought to
feel, there can be no retirement Such
was the philosophy of Charles Buckley
Of 14o1 Twelfth street.
When learned men in the Bureau of
Standards gathered around Mr.. Buckley
one day last week and shook his hand
on the occasion of his retirement, he
observed that some might find salts
faction in Willing away a ripe old age
in idleness but not he. Whereupon the
70-year-old master mechanic entered
upon brief period of negotiating and
next week he enters private business
in the employ of a. well known Wash
ington firm Of electrical engineers
II know the Government has to
have retirement age limit" he COM
fnented But 1t doesn't make me feel
any older / am in good health and
can work as hard and as long as did
is years ago."
Began Work at Age of Is.
Since 1873. when he went to work in
the Rock Island Arsenal at the age of
Is, Mr.. Buckley mas worked on mechani-
cal apparatus and machines ranging
from great locomotives to fine tools
used in the manufacture of watches.
He repaired locomotives for the old
Chicago. Burlington g. Quincy Rail
road and during a period Of 20 years
made tools for the Illinois Watch Co
In 1918 he wrote a letter to the
Government and volunteered his Serv-
fees as war worker and the Govern
fnent, glad to draft skilled mechanic
called him to the Bureau OF Standards
He had been In the bureau since that
year, and for the last seven years had
been at work on the electronometer
which DR.. H. B. Brooks of the bureau
invented
This device, which in its perfected
stage will compute accurately the volt
Up to 800 900 volts, has afforded Mr..
Buckley the most interest Experts IN
the bureau have devised a machine
which computes the voltage by weighing
a form of attraction between two alum
mum disks and Mr.. Buckley constructed
the greater part of it under their di-
rection.
Commenting on his work, Mr.. Buckley
recalled the manufacture of platinum
weights, each weighing 90 Kilograms,
or one-flfteenth of a gram, for tnser-
ton in one of the delicate instruments
in the complicated machinery Of the
electrometer.
Nothing Like Early Work.
In making the weights, each of which
was smaller than q pinhead he was
allowed an infinetesimal variance TIE
only way he could compute the variance
WIS to weigh a piece of paper the size
OF q finger nail Then he made a
pencil mark on the paper and weighed
it, and computed the weight of the
lead mark In making the weights Re
was to turn them out so that no two
of them would vary more than one
tenth the weight of the lead on the
tiny piece of paper.
That is work, he said, but nothing
compared with what l did as a youth.
Why, I've worked 10 hours with great
file saving away broken parts on a
locomotive" he said, gone home,
bathed my face and hands, and taken
my girl to dance. We'd dance until
4 O'Clock and I'd go home, sleep an
hour and one-half and then 60 back
for another ID hours. That was work,
not matchmaking or platinum weight
making, but work
At 20, Mr.. Buckley has one message
for the younger generation. Tell all
OF them who are thinking of entering
the mechanical world. TO make a game
of their work" he said. That's what
counts