Wilbur Charles Bigelow

Bigelow, Wilbur Charles, of Novi, died on March 7th after a brief illness. Son of Harry and Eva (Lutes) Bigelow, he was born in Bowman’s Creek, Pennsylvania, and graduated from Beaumont High School in 1940. He received a B.S. in Agricultural and Biological Chemistry from the Pennsylvania State College in 1944, then spent the next two years as an Ensign in the U. S. Naval Reserve at the U. S. Naval Research Laboratory in Washington, DC. He remained active in the Naval Research Reserve for several years, retiring with the rank of Lieutenant Commander. In 1946 he entered the University of Michigan's Rackham Graduate School, where he received an M.S. in Chemistry in 1948, and a Ph.D. in Physical Chemistry in 1952. In 1950 he married A. Carlene Friedley, who was then a Lecturer in Chemistry at the University of Illinois College of Pharmacy in Chicago. In 1955 he joined the faculty of the Department of Chemical and Metallurgical Engineering as an Assistant Professor of Science, and was promoted to Professor in 1962. From 1967 until his retirement in 1993, he served as Program Advisor for undergraduate students in Materials Engineering. His principal technical interests were in the fields of electron microscopy and electron microbeam analysis. A pioneer in his field, he took his first electron micrographs on the second electron microscope sold in the United States, an RCA Model EMB. He was a member of the Electron Microscopy Society of America throughout his career, serving as National Program Chairman in 1961, Membership Secretary in 1966, and President in 1969. He was also a member of the American Chemical Society and a Charter Member of the Microbeam Analysis Society. He was elected to Fellow of the Microanalysis Society and Microscopy Society of America in 2018 and 2019, respectively. In addition to teaching, he was instrumental in acquiring U-M's first electron microprobe analyzer, scanning electron microscope, and analytical transmission electron microscope, which were housed in the Electron Microbeam Analysis Laboratory (EMAL), a facility he founded in 1968 to make such instruments available for use by researchers throughout the university. He served as Director of EMAL until 1987. He is the author and co-author of more than 75 journal articles and author of Vacuum Methods in Electron Microscopy (1994). After retiring he served as a consultant to the Oak Ridge National Laboratory and to several companies and universities. He also traveled to more than twenty different countries. He often remarked on how very fortunate he was to have lived in the United States during the twentieth century, and on how much he enjoyed his life in Ann Arbor and his career at the University of Michigan. He was predeceased by his wife of 41 years, Carlene, son Douglas, and brothers Charles and Merl. He is survived by his son, Andrew (Debby) Bigelow, granddaughters Natalie and Alena Bigelow, and sister, Louise Devine. Memorial contributions can be made to the Michigan Materials Society (MMS) - 935830 at giving.umich.edu, or Brighton Hospice, 26075 Woodward Ave, Suite 300, Huntington Woods MI 48070.