President Valerie Smith shared the following message with the campus community on November 12, 2024: 

Dear Friends,

With deep sadness, I write to share the news that John Eldon Gaustad, the Edward Hicks Magill Professor Emeritus of Astronomy, died in Northampton, Mass., on Oct. 18. He was 86.

John, who served on the faculty for 18 years, is remembered as a brilliant and caring teacher, creative researcher, and generous mentor to students and colleagues alike who took as much joy in explaining a new concept as he did playing his piano for holiday singalongs.

John is survived by Gail, his wife of 44 years; daughters Maya (Patrick) and Carma (Jiri); five grandchildren; and several nieces and nephews. The family welcomes contributions in John’s memory to the Unitarian Society of Northampton and Florence, where he served in several capacities, and to the John and Gail Gaustad Scholarship at Swarthmore College. A memorial service will be held at the Unitarian Society on Sunday, Nov. 24, at 2 p.m.; an online option will be available.

I invite you to read more below about John and his many contributions to our community. 

Sincerely,

Val Smith
President

In Honor of Retired Astronomy Professor John Gaustad

Edward Hicks Magill Professor Emeritus of Astronomy John E. Gaustad died Friday, Oct. 18, at age 86. 

“John was a dedicated teacher, productive researcher, and exemplary member of the College community,” says Morris L. Clothier Professor Emeritus of Physics Peter Collings.  

“One of the things that stands out for me is John’s great care for his students,” says Eric Jensen, the Walter Kemp Professor in the Natural Sciences and Professor of Astronomy. “He held them to a high standard while still creating a welcoming environment in the department and the classroom. He was also just an incredibly kind person who clearly took a lot of joy from his teaching, research, and mentoring of students and colleagues.”

Born and raised in Minneapolis, Minn., the youngest of five, Gaustad always loved music. He learned to play the piano at age seven and the organ while in high school. He enjoyed singing and joined local choral groups wherever he lived, including at Swarthmore, where he sang with the College choir. He also had a fascination with words and their origins, and studied several languages. 

After graduating as valedictorian of Roosevelt High School in Minneapolis, Gaustad attended Harvard University. As a junior there, he saw the Sputnik 1 satellite from the roof of the observatory on the first night it was visible over the U.S. Gaustad graduated cum laude from Harvard in 1959 with a concentration in astronomy.

Gaustad continued his study of astronomy at Princeton University, ultimately receiving a Ph.D. in 1962. Two post-doctoral years followed — one at Princeton, during which he published his dissertation, “The Opacity of Diffuse Cosmic Matter and the Early Stages of Star Formation,” and another at the California Institute of Technology. The latter gave him the opportunity to conduct research at the observatory on Mt. Palomar. 

In 1964, Gaustad began his teaching career at the University of Nigeria, Nsukka, a decision inspired by the idea of the Peace Corps. For the next three years, he taught mathematics, physics, and astronomy there. 

After a military coup precipitated a civil war during his third year, Gaustad returned to the U.S. Of that time, he once recalled, “The students and teachers were looking over their shoulders, wondering when the soldiers would come.”

Gaustad next joined the UC-Berkeley Astronomy Department, ultimately serving as professor and chair. For 15 years, he and his research team of graduate students and postdocs published widely in the then-new field of observational infrared astronomy. 

Berkeley is also where Gaustad met Gail Manwell Reed and her two daughters. The couple married in 1980; two years later, they came to Swarthmore.

Gaustad arrived at Swarthmore as chair of the Astronomy Department, attracted to the College’s small but well-known program. He was also excited by the opportunity to examine phenomena such as double stars and star spots by long-term observation, which is often not possible at larger observatories because of the heavy demands on their facilities.

At the time, the campus hosted two complementary telescopes: a long-focus refractor at the Sproul Observatory, used for astrometry, and another one used for spectroscopy on the roof of Papazian Hall, now the site of Singer Hall. 

“John adored being the director of Sproul, and he ran it in a traditional way with lots of outreach and camaraderie,” says Edward Hicks Magill Professor Emeritus of Physics Frank Moscatelli. The Peter van de Kamp Observatory, dedicated in 2009, now serves the College’s research, teaching, and outreach needs.

During his career, Gaustad co-authored a textbook Astronomy: The Cosmic Perspective (Wiley, 1990), as well as 45 research papers. He also took considerable satisfaction in his teaching, particularly in the development of new courses and methods of teaching science to non-majors. 

“I admired John’s willingness to leave a big research job and come to Swarthmore in order to teach,” Jensen says. “He was very generous to me as a new faculty member, both in sharing his ideas about teaching and research when I asked, and in being open to my ideas about new directions for the curriculum.”

Gaustad arrived on campus as the College was considering how to combine the Physics and Astronomy Departments. “This was not an easy task, as the two departments differed in both size and culture,” Collings says. “John was intimately involved in this effort, demonstrating professional insight and personal engagement throughout the transition. Years after the two departments were combined, he served as chair.”

“I started at Swarthmore at the same time as John, although he was far more advanced in his career than I,” Moscatelli says. “After Astronomy merged with Physics, John became a colleague at departmental meetings. I recall his principled stance on many issues.” 

In 1999, Gaustad joined a team of astronomers from across the country to map the southern sky using a newly-installed robotic telescope at Cerro Tololo Inter-American Observatory in Chile. The project made it possible to map the intricate structure of the interstellar medium — the gas and dust between stars. 

“There is a lot in our galaxy that we haven’t known about before,” Gaustad said at the time. “Even where the robotic camera sees nothing, the data are still of great scientific value [because] astronomers can now be certain that their observations are not contaminated by radiation coming from interstellar gas in our own galaxy.”

“I really admired his work as a researcher, putting together an innovative project with a robotic telescope in Chile,” Jensen says. “He was a model for me, in terms of his creative thought about what was possible at a small college, finding a scientific niche where he could make a difference both by harnessing technology and by staying connected with scientists at other institutions.”

Gaustad admitted that nothing compared with the “thrill” of observing the dark sky away from bright city lights. “But as far as the scientific data are concerned,” he said, “the images are viewed on a computer anyway, no matter where they come from. So you may as well be home where it’s warm and dry.”

Gaustad’s influence on campus extended well beyond his department. Soon after their arrival, his interest in other countries led him and his wife to open their Swarthmore home during College holidays to international students. Years later, many still consider them surrogate parents. 

“I would say 120 international students have stayed in our house over the years,” he once said. “Many became good friends of ours.” 

Gaustad retired from Swarthmore in 2000. During a surprise retirement party over Easter weekend that year, he learned that several of those students had established a scholarship in his and Gail’s name. The scholarship, expressing appreciation for the Gaustads’ generosity and dedication, is awarded annually to a promising student who demonstrates financial need and academic excellence.

“I walked in on a lot of people I hadn’t seen in years,” Gaustad said at the time. “I was very touched. The scholarship is a wonderful thing — much more meaningful to me and Gail than any material object they could have given me.”