ELWYN B. ROBINSON DEPARTMENT OF SPECIAL COLLECTIONS
CHESTER FRITZ LIBRARY
UNIVERSITY OF NORTH DAKOTA
GRAND FORKS, NORTH DAKOTA

HARRY NYQUIST PAPERS

COLLECTION: OGL#1176

DATES: 1917-2003

SIZE: .25 linear feet

INTRODUCTION

ACQUISITION: The Harry Nyquist Papers were deposited in the Orin G. Libby Manuscript Collection by Kay Olesen, Engineering Department, UND on November 1, 1988 (Acc. #88-1625). An additional deposit was made by Amanda Hvidsten, UND Alumni Association, in January, 2004 (Acc. #2004-2668).

ACCESS: Available for inspection under the rules and regulations of the Department of Special Collections.

BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCH

Harry Nyquist was born February 7, 1889 in Nilsby, Sweden and emigrated to the United States in 1907. He spent the next ten years completing his education, including a B.S. in electrical engineering in 1914 and a M.S. in 1915 from the University of North Dakota, as well as a Ph.D degree in physics from Yale University in 1917. Upon graduation he was employed by the A.T. & T. Company and spent the rest of his life working with the Bell System. Nyquist was an expert and pioneer in high speed telegraphy and is best known for inventing the Nyquist diagram and Nyquist interval. Nyquist received many honors for his contributions in the communication and control field, including: NAE Founders' Medal of Honor (1969), the Ballantine Medal of the Franklin Institute (1960), the IEEE's Medal of Honor (1960), and the ASME Oldenburger Medal (1975). Nyquist retired formally in 1954 and died April 4, 1976 in Harlingen, Texas.

SCOPE AND CONTENT NOTE

The Harry Nyquist Papers consist primarily of photocopied journals written by Nyquist and other scientists relating to his research, arranged chronologically. Additional materials include biographical material and a listing of selected publications by Nyquist.

The addition to the Harry Nyquist Papers is a 36-page booklet honoring Nyquist's career, which was produced by the Royal Swedish Academy of Engineering Sciences and entitled A Tribute to the Memory of an Outstanding Scientist: Harry Nyquist (1889-1976).

BOX AND FOLDER INVENTORY

Box 1
Folder

1. Biographical Material
2. Nyquist Papers Publication Listing
3. "On the Stark Effect in Helium and Neon" Yale Dissertation, 1917
4. "The Stark Effect in Helium and Neon" Published in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, 1917
5. "Certain Factors Affecting Telegraph Speed" 1924
6. "Voice Frequency Carrier Telegraph Systems for Cable" 1925
7. "Measurement of Telegraph Transmission" 1927
8. Discussion Paper of Nyquist, Shanck, and Cory on Measurement of Telegraph Transmission, 1927
9. "Certain Topics in Telegraph Transmission" 1928
10. "Thermal Agitaton of Electric Charge Conductors" 1928
11. "Measurement of Phase Distortion" 1930
12. "Regeneration Theory" 1932
13. "Stabilized Feedback Amplifiers" 1934
14. "Effect of Quadrature Component in Single Sideband Transmission" 1940
15. "The Distribution of Random Determinants" 1954
16. "The Regeneration Theory: an explanation of circumstances that led Nyquist to write 1932 paper" 1956
17. "Some Extensions of Nyquist's Telegraph Theory" Gibby and Smith, 1965
18. "Sampling, data, and the Nyquist Rate" Landau, 1967
19. A History of Engineering and Science in the Bell System: Physical Sciences (1925-1975), 1983
20. Åström, Karl Johan. A Tribute to the Memory of an Outstanding Scientist: Harry Nyquist (1889-1976). Stockholm: Royal Swedish Academy of Engineering Sciences, 2003.

SEPARATIONS RECORD

Two books were separated and added to the North Dakota Book Collection

A History of Engineering and Science in the Bell System: Transmission Technology (1925-1975)
A History of Engineering and Science in the Bell System: Communication Sciences (1925-1980)

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