After elementary schooling in various towns in the Deep South, Bob graduated with a BS in Electrical Engineering (Duke ’61) and spent a year studying meteorology and oceanography as an Air Force Lt. (NYU ’62). A Weather Officer assigned to Strategic Air Command (RAF Fairford and Brize Norton, England), he experienced the Cuban Missile Crisis (’62-65) leaving the Air Force as a Captain. He returned to USA and pursued his graduate studies at Colorado State University (MS ’67, PhD ’73) specializing in air-sea interaction and field science. Bob was a National Center for Atmospheric Research (NCAR) Advanced Study Program Post-Doctoral Fellow (’74) then a member of the scientific staff (’75-’81). He was seconded from NSF/NCAR to the World Meteorological Organization and managed a large international expedition to observe the 1979 monsoon season (WMO FGGE MONEX) based in New Delhi, Mumbai, and Kolkata, India (’77-81). Upon return, he spent a year at NCAR and joined the Cooperative Institute for Research in the Environmental Sciences (CIRES) as a Visiting Fellow then as scientific staff (’83-’87). Bob was invited to join the University of Colorado Astrogeophysics Department as one of five atmospheric scientists who eventually formed the Program in Atmospheric and Oceanic Science, which in turn became the Department of Atmospheric and Ocean Sciences. Bob was part of the department from 1987-2002, after which he retired. He has specified a Mars climate observing system and published articles on air-sea interaction, land-atmosphere interaction, basic atmospheric turbulence, atmospheric waves, instrument technology, parameterization testing, drainage winds, frontogenesis, stratospheric-tropospheric exchange, reservoir evaporation, monsoon dynamics, and monsoon forecasting. His current interest is light pollution monitoring from cloud reflection. He is an AMS Certified Consulting Meteorologist.
Bob lives in Norwood, Colorado and enjoys canyon walking, mountain walking, backcountry skiing, gardening. He is managed by a cat.