otherwise ..read on...

Physicist John William Strutt was born near Maldon, Essex. He studied at Cambridge, and was elected a fellow of Trinity College in 1866. He succeeded his father as third baron in 1873. He became professor of experimental physics at Cambridge (1879-84), professor of natural philosophy at the Royal Institution, London (1888--1905), and president of the Royal Society (1905-08).

His work included valuable studies and research on vibratory motion, the theory of sound, and the wave theory of light (Rayleigh scattering). With Sir William Ramsay he was the discoverer of argon (1894). He was awarded the Nobel Prize for Physics in 1904, and became Chancellor of Cambridge University in 1908.

Source: Cambridge Biographical Encyclopedia

In January 2000 I received the following eMail regarding John William Strutt's brother, Edward Gerald. It is reproduced here with the permission of the author Barbara L. Wyman

"...We farm 1,280 acres of land in the province of Saskatchewan, Canada that was origonally owned by John William Strutt's brother The Honorable Edward Gerald Strutt. Edward hired a land agent, Mr. L. E. Rose in western Canada, who in 1909-1910, purchased 10,000 [acres] of land in the south central part of Saskatchewan, just north of the small village of Harwell, Saskatchewan (later renamed Flaxcombe).

Construction began on four "working camps" all within 2-3 miles of each other. We own the land upon which "Camp 2" was established. The 100' x 34' (30 double stall) barn was used to house the horses that broke the land. In 1996 we had the barn historically designated through our province with the receipt of a formal plaque.

Edward and his son John travelled back and forth between the farm and Terling, Essex County on numerous occassions. With Edward's experience in working with the Department of Agriculture in London, many of us suspect that he had great forsight. He sold the 10,000 [acres] that made up The Big Four Farm in 1928 for $250,000, an astromonical amount of money at the time, with the largest auction ever held in western Canada at the time, attracting buyers from across western Canada and the northern United States. In 1930 the Canadian economy plummented in the "Dirty Thrities" with grain prices falling from $1.20/bushel to .17 cents a bushel.

Although the farm name was legally registered as "Eagle Lake Farm", the locals give it the nickname "Big Four". Strutt imported the latest in tractors from Minnesota, bearing the brand name "Big Four" and in combination with four working camps the name stuck.

It maybe noted that at the time, Edward operated the Big Four Farm in Saskatchewan he also owned and operated "The Syndicate Farm", 9,000 acres of farmland east of Winnipeg, Manitoba. He passed away March 8, 1930 and is buried in Terling, Essex County, England. I received a copy of his obituary which indicates his accomplishments throughout this life as well as how much he was repected by those who made his aquaintance."

Respectfully,
Barbara L. Wyman

John William Strutt (Born: 12 Nov 1842 in Langford Grove (near Maldon), Essex, England Died: 30 June 1919 in Terling Place, Witham, Essex, England) suffered from poor health and his schooling at Eton and Harrow was disrupted and for four years he had a private tutor. He entered Trinity College, Cambridge in 1861, graduating in 1864.

His first paper in 1865 was on Maxwell's electromagnetic theory. He worked on propogation of sound and, while on an excursion to Egypt taken for health reasons, Strutt wrote [his] Treatise on Sound (1870-71). In 1879 he wrote a paper on travelling waves, this theory has now developed into the theory of solitons. His theory of scattering (1871) was the first correct explanation of why the sky is blue.

In 1873 he succeeded to the title of Baron Rayleigh. From 1879 to 1884 he was the second Cavendish professor of experimental physics at Cambridge succeeding Maxwell. Then in 1884 he became secretary of the Royal Society. Rayleigh discovered the inert gas argon in 1895, work which earned him a Nobel Prize, in 1904.

He was awarded the De Morgan Medal of the London Mathematical Society in 1890 and was president of the Royal Society between 1905 and 1908. He became chancellor of Cambridge University in 1908.

Source: http://www.vma.bme.hu/mathhist/Mathematicians/Rayleigh.html

John William Strutt was the 3rd Baron Rayleigh. The Rayleigh title was originally given to his grandmother, Charlotte, on her husband's suggestion because Joseph Holden Strutt had declined personal honours throughout his life, and perhaps didn't wish to be raised to the peerage as he should have to resign as an MP. The title had been proffered by George III for Joseph's duties in the army and in Parliament. On his wife's death in 1836, the title passed to their only son John James Strutt, 2nd Baron Rayleigh.

John James, a deeply religious man, led the life of a country squire in Essex, north-east of London. He married when he was 46, Clara, who was only 17 at the time. John W Strutt was born on 12th November 1842 into a loving and protective family. He showed early promise in mathematics, and studied under Routh at Cambridge becoming Senior Wrangler (top of the year in the math exam). He also had an abiding interest in photography from his youth.

J W Strutt became a fellow of Trinity College Cambridge in 1866. He travelled widely for that time, including the US and Egypt. On returning from a visit to the United States, where he met President Andrew Johnson, he purchased some laboratory equipment for Terling. The laboratory at Terling was the centre for many of Rayleigh's experiments on sound, and also where he finally tracked down the gas argon, for which he was awarded the Nobel Prize for Physics. He married Evelyn Balfour, the sister of the future Prime Minister Arthur Balfour, in 1871.

Following a serious attack of rheumatic fever, Strutt decided to take a trip up the Nile river where he started work on what was to become the famous book, The Theory of Sound. He became the 3rd Baron in 1873 on the death of his father, and continued experimental work in the laboratory wing at the family home in Essex. His experimental notebooks were the record of many years' work in his laboratory, and indicate his deep interest in the phenomenon of resonance.

According to Arthur Schuster interest in acoustics and vibration may have followed on from optics, and the work in optics "has been done perhaps more con amore than any other". Rayleigh's papers go straight to the heart of the problems under investigation, using the minimum of mathematics for the solution. See, for example, On the Amplitude of Sound Waves.

Rayleigh became Cavendish Professor of Experimental Physics after Maxwell until 1884 and did much to establish the link between experimental and theoretical physics at university level. His experimental work was meticulous, and this is exemplified by the famous discovery of argon which was largely due to the pursuit of a tiny apparent discrepancy in density between atmospheric nitrogen and chemical nitrogen.

The Strutt family in Essex were corn millers and farmers, only specializing in dairy farming in the late 19th century. Lord Rayleigh's Dairies had several London shops until 1929. Rayleigh's son and biographer, Robert John, succeeded to the title in 1919 and continued in his father's footsteps being a Fellow of the Royal Society and professor of physics.

Despite his many gifts Rayleigh remained a modest man all his life, and carried the banner of science which places humanity above material gain.

Source: http://www.measure.demon.co.uk/docs/Strutt.html

John William Strutt, third Baron Rayleigh, was born on November 12, 1842 at Langford Grove, Maldon, Essex, as the son of John dames Strutt, second Baron, and his wife Clara Elizabeth La Touche, eldest daughter of Captain Richard Vicars, R. E. He was one of the very few members of higher nobility who won fame as an outstanding scientist.

Throughout his infancy and youth he was of frail physique; his education was repeatedly interrupted by ill-health, and his prospects of attaining maturity appeared precarious. After a short spell at Eton at the age of 10, mainly spent in the school sanatorium, three years in a private school at Wimbledon, and another short stay at Harrow, he finally spent four years with the Rev. George Townsend Warner (1857) who took pupils at Torquay.

In 1861 he entered Trinity College, Cambridge, where he commenced reading mathematics, not at first equal in attainments to the best of his contemporaries, but his exceptional abilities soon enabled him to overtake his competitors. He graduated in the Mathematical Tripos in 1865 as Senior Wrangler and Smith's Prizeman. In 1866 he obtained a fellowship at Trinity which he held until 1871, the year of his marriage.

A severe attack of rheumatic fever in 1872 made him spend the winter in Egypt and Greece. Shortly after his return his father died (1873) and he succeeded to the barony, taking up residence in the family seat, Terling Place, at Witham, Essex. He now found himself compelled to devote part of his time to the management of his estates (7000 acres). The combination of general scientific knowledge and acumen with acquired knowledge of agriculture made his practice in estate management in many respects in advance of his time. Nevertheless, in 1876 he left the entire management of the land to his younger brother.

From then on, he could devote his full time to science again. In 1879 he was appointed to follow James Clerk Maxwell as Professor of Experimental Physics and Head of the Cavendish Laboratory at Cambridge. In 1884 he left Cambridge to continue his experimental work at his country seat at Terling, Essex, and from 1887 to 1905 he was Professor of Natural Philosophy in the Royal Institution of Great Britain, being successor of Tyndall.

He served for six years as President of a Government Committee on Explosives and from 1896 to 1919 he was Scientific Advisor to Trinity House. He was Lord Lieutenant of Essex from 1892 to 1901.

Lord Rayleigh's first researches were mainly mathematical, concerning optics and vibrating systems, but his later work ranged over almost the whole field of physics, covering sound, wave theory, colour vision, electrodynamics, electromagnetism, light scattering, flow of liquids, hydrodynamics, density of gases, viscosity, capillarity, elasticity, and photography. His patient and delicate experiments led to the establishment of the standards of resistance, current, and electromotive force; and his later work was concentrated on electric and magnetic problems.

Lord Rayleigh was an excellent instructor and, under his active supervision, a system of practical instruction in experimental physics was devised at Cambridge, developing from a class of five or six students to an advanced school of some seventy experimental physicists. His Theory of Sound was published in two volumes during 1877-1878, and his other extensive studies are reported in his Scientific Papers - six volumes issued during 1889-1920. He has also contributed to the Encyclopaedia Britannica.

He had a fine sense of literary style; every paper he wrote, even on the most abstruse subject, is a model of clearness and simplicity of diction. The 446 papers reprinted in his collected works clearly show his capacity for understanding everything just a little more deeply than anyone else. Although a member of the House of Lords, he intervened in debate only on rare occasions, never allowing politics to interfere with science. His recreations were travel, tennis, photography and music.

Lord Rayleigh, a former Chancellor of Cambridge University, was a Justice of the Peace and the recipient of honorary science and law degrees. He was a Fellow of the Royal Society (1873) and served as Secretary from 1885 to 1896, and as President from 1905 to 1908. He was an original recipient of the Order of Merit (1902), and in 1905 he was made a Privy Councillor. He was awarded the Copley, Royal, and Rumford Medals of the Royal Society, and the Nobel Prize for 1904.

In 1871 he married Evelyn, sister of the future prime minister the Earl of Balfour, and daughter of James Maitland Balfour and his wife Blanche, the daughter of the second Marquis of Salisbury. They had three sons, the eldest of whom was to become Professor of Physics at Imperial College of Science and Technology, London.

Lord Rayleigh died on dune 30, 1919, at Witham, Essex.

Source: http://www.nobel.se/laureates/physics-1904-1-bio.html

and finally to show that all physics and no play could have made Lord Rayleigh a dull chap - an excerpt from John Grepstad's premier Pinhole Photography page on the net.

"The British Nobel Prize winner Lord Rayleigh (John William Strutt, 1842-1919) worked on pinhole diameter formulas for ten years and published his work in Nature (1891). Lord Rayleigh's formula is still one of the formulas used to today. A number of others have been published since the 1880s.

Lord Rayleigh's formula for subject distances above 1 meter may be written as follows:

d = 1.9 * sqrt (l * f), where d = pinhole diameter, l = wavelength of light and f = focal length or distance from pinhole to light-sensitive material."

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