Albert Baez: SF Chronicle obit
Hyfler/Rosner
March 25, 2007 Sunday
Peter Fimrite, Chronicle Staff Writer
Albert Baez -- scientist, author, father of Joan Baez
Albert Vinicio Baez loved classical music and opera and
encouraged his children to enjoy the arts.
Little did he know that the concerts he took his daughters
to when they were young would inspire them to a stardom even
greater than his own.
Mr. Baez was a scientist, a physics professor and a pacifist
who refused to use his considerable expertise to advance the
nuclear arms race during the Cold War.
But he was best known as the father of folk singers Joan
Baez and the late Mimi Fariña.
A resident of Greenbrae for 25 years, he died Tuesday of
what his family described as "natural causes" at the care
home in San Mateo County where he had been living for the
past three years. He was 94.
Mr. Baez co-invented the X-ray reflection microscope, which
has been an indispensable tool for almost 60 years in the
study of living cells and, more recently, in the study of
galaxies.
Known by friends and family as "Professor Al," "Abo" or
"Popsy," Mr. Baez was born in Puebla, Mexico. His father was
a Methodist minister who moved the family north when his son
was 2. Mr. Baez grew up in Brooklyn and flirted with the
ministry before turning to math and physics.
He met Joan Chandos Bridge, the daughter of an Episcopalian
priest, in high school. They later married and became
Quakers. Joan Baez was born in 1941.
Mr. Baez received a bachelor's degree in mathematics from
Drew University in Madison, N.J., and a master's degree in
physics from Syracuse University. The family then moved to
California, where Mr. Baez earned a master's degree in
mathematics and a doctorate in physics from Stanford
University.
The invention in 1948 of the X-ray reflection microscope
vaulted Mr. Baez into the upper echelon of American
physicists. When the Cold War arrived in the 1950s, he had
to choose between a career in education or a lucrative
career developing weapons of mass destruction.
Mr. Baez was a lifelong pacifist who chose a career in
education and humanitarianism.
James Cavener, a onetime student and longtime friend, said
Mr. Baez may have inspired Joan Baez's musical career with
the purchase of a ukulele.
"I remember when Joanie was about 12 and was a very unhappy
girl," Cavener said. "She was half Mexican and that was a
stigma and she didn't feel attractive. In her solitude, in
her reclusiveness, she played the ukulele."
Mr. Baez began working for the U.N. Educational, Scientific
and Cultural Organization in 1951 and lived in Baghdad,
where he taught at Baghdad University. He was director of
science teaching for UNESCO in Paris from 1961 to 1967.
He opposed the Vietnam War and embraced the 1960s protest
movement alongside his daughters, Cavener said.
"He was very much a pacifist, and his daughters were often
jailed for speaking out in opposition to the war," Cavener
said. "He was quietly very proud of them."
Over the years, he served on the faculties of the
Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Harvard, Stanford, UC
Berkeley and other universities.
He served as president of Vivamos Mejor, an organization
founded in 1988 that provides education and community
development projects for impoverished villages in Mexico. He
endowed the Hispanic Engineer Albert Baez Award, which is
given for Outstanding Technical Contribution to Humanity.
In 1967, he wrote "The New College Physics: A Spiral
Approach," widely considered a leading American physics
textbook. He co-authored "The Environment and Science and
Technology Education," published in 1987, and the memoir "A
Year in Baghdad" in 1988.
The Albert V. Baez Award for Technical Excellence and
Service to Humanity was established in 1995 by the Hispanic
Engineer National Achievement Awards Corp. Mr. Baez was
inducted into its Hall of Fame in 1998.
"He was a very, very gentle, very soft-spoken man who was
intense but warm," Cavener said. "He was honorable. He led
by example and, as a Quaker, he wasn't worried about anybody
frying in hell."
In addition to Joan Baez of Woodside, he is survived by his
wife, Joan Bridge Baez of Woodside; a daughter, Pauline
Bryan of Carmel Valley; three grandchildren and one
great-granddaughter.
A Quaker memorial is planned in May.