Sir Edward Appleton
A Bradford lad who won a Nobel Prize for reaching higher than anyone had — and mapped a layer of the sky that still bears his name.
From a Bradford warehouse clerk's family to the Nobel stage
Edward Victor Appleton was born in Bradford on 6 September 1892 and educated at Hanson Grammar School. In 1911 he won a scholarship to St John's College, Cambridge, where he studied physics under J. J. Thomson and Ernest Rutherford.
After serving in the Royal Engineers in the First World War, he turned to the puzzle of why radio signals faded — and in doing so proved there were electrified layers high in the atmosphere reflecting the waves back to Earth.
He was knighted in 1941 and, in 1947, awarded the Nobel Prize in Physics. He later served as Principal and Vice-Chancellor of the University of Edinburgh until his death in 1965.
- Born
- 6 September 1892 · Bradford
- Educated
- Hanson Grammar · St John's, Cambridge
- Knighted
- 1941
- Nobel Prize, Physics
- 1947 · the Appleton layer
- Died
- 21 April 1965 · Edinburgh
The layer that carries his name
By bouncing radio waves off the sky and measuring how they came back, Appleton showed the ionosphere was real — and that above the lower layers sat a higher, denser one that reflected even short waves around the curve of the Earth.
That upper band — the F2 layer — became known as the Appleton layer. It made long-range shortwave radio possible and fed directly into the development of radar.
A Bradford man who reached higher than anyone had.
The Appleton layer — the high band of the ionosphere.
"Rise to high places." We took it literally.
USS Appleton, NCC-97001 — crewed out of his home city.
"I rate enthusiasm even above professional skill."
His enthusiasm-over-skill spirit is exactly the welcome we try to keep.