James U. Lemke

James U. Jim' Lemke February 22, 2019 San Diego Live life to the fullest, do no harm, help when you can. That was the life philosophy of Jim Lemke, physicist, entrepreneur, inventor, non-conformist, rule-breaker, mentor, aviator, and all-round good and generous guy. He lived by these guiding principles until his death at home in the early hours of Feb. 22. During his 89 years, James U. Lemke, Ph.D. started 6 high-tech research & development companies, owned and flew multiple airplanes, mentored numerous young people, blew the eyebrows off his fourth grade teacher in Princeton, IL, with homemade gunpowder (not intentionally, it was the teacher's fault), and was awarded more than 114 U.S. and foreign patents in the fields of information theory, magnetic materials, information storage devices, aviation, and internal combustion engines. He was a member of the National Academy of Engineering, Fellow of the Institute of Electrical and Electronics Engineers, Fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science, Fellow of Eastman Kodak Research Laboratories, Senior Fellow of the California Council on Science and Technology, and a Member of the American Physical Society. In 1993 he was awarded the Revelle Medal by UCSD for conceiving of the Center for Memory and Recording Research and raising the money from a consortium of U.S. companies to fund it. He loved solving partial differential equations, piloting airplanes, classical music, a good martini, dirty jokes, one-liners, and hearing, telling, and writing limericks. He was a loyal friend and mentor, and he excelled at surrounding himself with smart, skilled, talented people who helped him fulfill his visions for all the companies he started. In 1968 he chose San Diego as the city in which to found his first company, Spin Physics, Inc. After acting as CEO and CTO and building it to a workforce of 650 over the course of 15 years, he sold the company to Eastman Kodak. At one time 50% of the broadcast hours on television worldwide were recorded on SPI magnetic heads, and 90% of the recorders at the National Security Agency used SPI heads. He founded his latest company Achates Power, Inc., in 2004 to develop a lightweight, environmentally clean, compression-ignition engine. To learn more about Achates Power and see a video about Jim, visit http://achatespower.com/our-team/dr-james-lemke-founder-and-chief-scientist/ At the time of his death, he was working on a revolutionary non-invasive way to detect breast cancer. He was an avid believer in education and in the R.L. Moore discovery method of teaching mathematics. He earned a Ph.D. in Theoretical Physics from UCSB, an M.S. in Physics from Northwestern University where he was a Woodrow Wilson Fellow, and a B.S. in Physics from IIT. Along with fellow mathematicians trained in the Moore Method, he spent many hours traveling to universities in the U.S. to help establish the Moore Method in their mathematics departments. He is survived by his wife of 65 years, Ann; daughters, Cate Bell (Barry) and Susan; son Michael; grandchildren Aurelia Bell, Johnna Williams, and Natasha and James Lemke; older brother Andy; and younger brother Joel (Joan). He was predeceased by his parents, Andrew and Frances Lemke, and sister Lois Dahl. Jim Lemke is still helping when he can and furthering his dedication to science and education prior to this death he made arrangements to donate his body to the UCSD School of Medicine for research. He was a champion of protecting human rights and civil liberties. Donations in his honor may be made to the ACLU (https://action.aclu.org/give/make-gift-aclu-someones-memory) or Amnesty International (https://donate.amnestyusa.org/page/37908/donate/1). Gatherings to honor his life will be held at the White Sands of La Jolla on March 15 and at the UCSD Faculty Club on April 6. Please contact Cate Bell at cate@foundimage.com for more details.