Dr. Charles Clayton (C.C.) Perry, PE
Dr. C.C. Perry, a long-time professional colleague of mine, died Tuesday of natural causes. His exact age I do not know but I believe him to have been an octogenarian.
Dr. Perry was a private man and what little I know of him personally was learned from impressions he left in the shroud under which he lived his public life. He liked classical music, Manhattans and Coca-Colas. He collected likenesses of Don Quixote in both two and three forms. He was colorblind and tended to dress conservatively in shades of brown that would match in any combination. He knew the irrational number pi to two dozen decimal places. He shared my distaste for neckties.
He was a solitary man with few apparent interests outside the application of mathematics and science for obtaining solutions to engineering problems. Science was, I believe, his greatest friend. Indeed, in the twenty-five years I knew him, I am unaware of his ever having developed a social friendship with anyone. Where he stood on politics or religion is a mystery to me. He showed no interest in sports as either participant or spectator. He did tell me that he once owned a small aircraft — a Piper Cub or something of that nature — and that earning his private pilot's license was the most satisfying moment of his life.
He grew up, as I recall, in a rural setting in the Midwest and, after attending college, worked as an engineer at General Motors before becoming a professor at Wayne State University. He also was employed by a company that produced bimetallic materials used in thermometers and thermostats at some point in time before becoming an employee of the Skunk Works. It was my daunting task when I first met him in 1982 to take up the work he had begun in educating students and educators alike in schools, colleges and universities around the world about strain gage technology. Indeed, should you Google his name, C. C. Perry, the first link will be to a book he wrote, "The Strain Gage Primer", with used copies still being sold on amazon.com today. Long out of print, it remains the strain gage Bible.
Dr. Perry was a man of great intellect and little tolerance for fools. He could seem intimidating and often was. He did not like to be found wrong and seldom was. Highly skilled in mathematics and engineering mechanics he was left-brained to a fault and thought in a logical, linear and systematic fashion. He wrote in whole but somewhat Spartan sentences that he simply hung on highly structured outlines. (Although we collaborated on many publications, my stream-of-conscious writing style drove him nuts and, as a result, we authored only one paper together. He wasn't about to change and neither was I.) As an accomplished linguist, he sought to preserve the integrity of the English language. Indeed, he was one of the few I've known who needed not consult Fowler on the proper use of "which" and "that".
Dr. Charles Clayton (C.C.) Perry, PE is survived by a few distanced siblings and his devoted wife Gloria. He left no children.
Vale, CCP. Pax tecum.
Dr. Perry was a private man and what little I know of him personally was learned from impressions he left in the shroud under which he lived his public life. He liked classical music, Manhattans and Coca-Colas. He collected likenesses of Don Quixote in both two and three forms. He was colorblind and tended to dress conservatively in shades of brown that would match in any combination. He knew the irrational number pi to two dozen decimal places. He shared my distaste for neckties.
He was a solitary man with few apparent interests outside the application of mathematics and science for obtaining solutions to engineering problems. Science was, I believe, his greatest friend. Indeed, in the twenty-five years I knew him, I am unaware of his ever having developed a social friendship with anyone. Where he stood on politics or religion is a mystery to me. He showed no interest in sports as either participant or spectator. He did tell me that he once owned a small aircraft — a Piper Cub or something of that nature — and that earning his private pilot's license was the most satisfying moment of his life.
He grew up, as I recall, in a rural setting in the Midwest and, after attending college, worked as an engineer at General Motors before becoming a professor at Wayne State University. He also was employed by a company that produced bimetallic materials used in thermometers and thermostats at some point in time before becoming an employee of the Skunk Works. It was my daunting task when I first met him in 1982 to take up the work he had begun in educating students and educators alike in schools, colleges and universities around the world about strain gage technology. Indeed, should you Google his name, C. C. Perry, the first link will be to a book he wrote, "The Strain Gage Primer", with used copies still being sold on amazon.com today. Long out of print, it remains the strain gage Bible.
Dr. Perry was a man of great intellect and little tolerance for fools. He could seem intimidating and often was. He did not like to be found wrong and seldom was. Highly skilled in mathematics and engineering mechanics he was left-brained to a fault and thought in a logical, linear and systematic fashion. He wrote in whole but somewhat Spartan sentences that he simply hung on highly structured outlines. (Although we collaborated on many publications, my stream-of-conscious writing style drove him nuts and, as a result, we authored only one paper together. He wasn't about to change and neither was I.) As an accomplished linguist, he sought to preserve the integrity of the English language. Indeed, he was one of the few I've known who needed not consult Fowler on the proper use of "which" and "that".
Dr. Charles Clayton (C.C.) Perry, PE is survived by a few distanced siblings and his devoted wife Gloria. He left no children.
Vale, CCP. Pax tecum.
88 Years. A true loss. :-(
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