The Optical Society of America History Archives

Since 1916, the Optical Society of America (OSA) has grown from a local organization of Rochester. NY, USA based optical scientists and instrument-makers into an international association representing physicists and engineers around the world. Over the years, the enthusiasm and commitment of OSA’s members has help to guide and develop the Society into the vital institution it is today.  Notably, OSA’s growth and evolution are a direct result of the dedication of its members. The following articles and publications emphasize the Society’s rich history and pay tribute to the many volunteers who have contributed to its success.

We encourage you to share documents you might have highlighting the history of OSA and its members, or if you have pictures or other historic memorabilia you would be willing to donate to our archives, please contact Chad Stark at cstark@osa.org or +1.202.416.1416.

New! Call for Memoirs: Share your memories and stories with OSA.

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OSA would like to acknowledge the exceptional contributions made by John N. Howard, founding editor of Applied Optics and our unofficial, never-tiring historian for researching and writing the majority of articles in this collection.

OSA General History

OSA Member Profiles

Men and Milestones in Optics Series

OSA Journals and Publications

OSA Conferences and Meetings

Education Outreach Efforts

History Advisory Committee*

OSA General History

Why 1916? A Look Back at OSA’s Roots
A look back at the formative years of the Society and its founders.

Journal of the Optical Society of America—History of the Optical Society of America, 1916-1966
Fifty years of history as recorded by OSA officers and committee chairs.

A Legacy of Leadership: Celebrating 90 Years of OSA
OSA began with a small gathering of 30 scientists in Rochester, NY, USA. Ninety years later it has evolved into the professional home for 14,000 optical physicists and engineers around the globe.

An Executive Office for OSA
The Optical Society of America boasts an exciting history intertwined with many of the key scientific advances of the 21st century.

An Executive Secretary for OSA
The appointment of the Society’s first executive secretary signals the beginning of a new era.

An Executive Director for OSA
Two important milestones in OSA’s history—appointment of the Society’s first executive director and the purchase of the headquarters building—are highlighted in this column.

OSA’s Financial History: The 1960s and 1970s
A look at the Society’s financial ups and downs in the years following the founding of the executive office.

OSA's Finances in the 1980's
OSA finds a home in Washington, DC and slowly builds its reserves.

OSA’s Treasurers through the Years
The Society has had only eight treasurers. They each had their own style and faced unique challenges, but all helped OSA to become the sound operation it is today.

The SOAP Committee Sparks Controversy
One of the most controversial actions ever taken by an OSA governing body was that of the Committee on Society Objectives and Policy (SOAP) to recommend a name change for the Society.  Like all good soap stories, this one ends with a cliffhanger.

The Name Change Controversy
OSA’s Committee on Society Objective and Policy (SOAP) convinced the Board to recommend a name change for the Society.  How the membership learned of the board’s action—and how they reacted to it described.

OSA Member Profiles

OSA’s Early Members
A look at the careers of some pioneering charter members.

Honorary OSA Members of the 1920s and 1930s
Profiles of four optical pioneers.

Memories of OSA and Optics in the 1920s
Professor George Harrison of MIT, a well-known spectroscopist who had been a member of OSA since the early 1920s, had served as editor of JOSA for 10 years and had been OSA president in 1945-46.

Honorary OSA Members of the 1940s and 1950s: Five Optical Physicists Who Made History
This column highlights the careers of five optical pioneers who became honorary members in the 1940s and 1950s: Theodore Lyman (1941), C. V. Raman (1941), R. W. Wood (1944), R.A. Millikan (1950) and Arnold Sommerfeld (1950).

Honorary Members of the 1950s
From its beginnings in 1916, the Optical Society has dedicated a special category of membership to individuals who have made unique, unparalleled contributions to the field of optics. This column highlights the careers of four optical pioneers who became honorary members during the 1950s

Men and Milestones in Optics

Men and Milestones in Optics—I. George Gabriel Stokes
Those great men who laid the foundations on which modern optics has erected its imposing structures are all too often either entirely unknown to their beneficiaries or known only by name attached to a law or the like. It would be difficult to find a person more suitable to be introduced than Sir George Gabriel Stokes, Baronet, for a wide variety of topics in optics received his attention.

Men and Milestones in Optics—II. Thomas Young
People concerned chiefly with physical optics will probably agree the one outstanding optical discovery which the world owes to Thomas Young was that two rays of light incident upon a single point can be added together to produce darkness at that point.

Men and Milestones in Optics—III. Galileo Galilei
While Galileo’s only direct contributions to optics were the perfection and construction of the first useful telescopes, there is also justification for saying that—aside from the use of lenses to correct defective vision—Galileo’s introduction of the telescope as a scientific instrument may be considered the first example of applied optics.

Men and Milestones in Optics—IV. The First Fifty Years of the Optical Society of America
This article contains excerpts highlighting some of the distinguished people to whom the Optical Society of America owes so much, and to get at the same time something of the flavor of the era during which the Society was developed.

OSA Journals and Publications

OSA’s First Journal—JOSA 1917-61
OPN Contributing Editor, John N. Howard describes another milestone in OSA history:  the Society’s first foray into journal publishing.

JOSA, 1961-1983
Under the stewardship of a series of competent editors, the Journal of the Optical Society of America (JOSA) enjoyed growing popularity among authors and readers, even in the face of competition from an increasing number of specialized journals.

The Launch of JOSA A:  Optics and Imaging Sciences
Throughout the 1960s and 1970s, the Optical Society’s Publications Committee continually discussed the scope of each journal, and how scientific articles should be allocated between them.

Advertisements in JOSA
The year is 1959, and a new revenue-generating strategy is introduced to strengthen the Society’s finances. In a move that would ultimately prove to have controversial repercussions, the OSA Board of Directors decides the Society’s journal, JOSA, may accept advertising.

The Translation Journal Optics and Spectroscopy
Efforts to help the Optical Society of America survive and grow in the post-World War II years began with the formation of the Committee on Future Policies, which a few months after its creation, recommended that OSA publish the translation of a Russian optics journal.

The Launch of OSA’s Second Journal: Applied Optics is Born
The OSA Board of Directors, meeting in New York City in 1959, decides the time has come for a second journal. The decision is motivated in part by a desire to meet the competition of commercial publications, chief among them Infrared Physics.

JOSA B: Optical Physics
When the series of the Journal of the Optical Society of America (JOSA) ended in December 1983 and the first issue of JOSA A appeared in January 1984, Robert Terhune had achieved only half of his grand scheme to revamp JOSA. Now it was time to focus on JOSA B.

Optics Letters: OSA Gets the Word Out on Optics—Fast
By the mid-1970s, the Optical Society had entered a relatively stable period: The Journal of the Optical Society of America (JOSA) was running about 1,700 pages per year and slowly growing, and Applied Optics (AO) was developing even more rapidly at about 3,200 pages per year.

Post-War European Optics Journals
It’s a tale of international intrigue that includes the outbreak of war, a special arrangement with the Vatican, Soviet Scientists in the Cold-War era, and the birth of a publishing empire.

The Beginnings of OPN
When Optics News was first published in 1975, it was a quarterly publication that was largely intended as a vehicle to announce the events of the Optical Society of America (OSA). Over the years, it evolved into Optics & Photonics News, or OPN—a colorful monthly magazine and a bona fide source of insight and information relevant to our field.

Membership Directories and JOSA Indexing
As OSA grew from a small group of opticians into a thriving society, how did it manage to keep track of all its members and journal articles? Lists, lists and more lists.

OSA Conferences and Meetings

Creation of the OSA Technical Council
The OSA Board of Directors, on suggestion of Lucien M. Biberman, created the Technical Council to oversee special meeting sessions devoted to emerging optics subfields that had sparked particular interest among members.

OSA Meetings Through the 1960s
A review of the first OSA meetings and their impact on the membership and the Society.

OSA Meetings in the 1970s
In the January 2004 issue of OPN, Contributing Editor John N. Howard described how the first OSA meetings were launched and managed. In this column he shows how OSA refined its meeting format to meet the needs of the growing society.

OSA Meetings in the 1970s and 1980s
Too big? Too small? Too many? Too Few? Throughout the 1970s and 1980s, OSA worked to get its meeting mix just right.

Education Outreach Efforts

Early OSA Efforts in Optics Education
How did OSA evolve from a trade association of optical practitioners into a diverse group of scientists with a strong focus on education?

Optics—An Action Program
How did the Society translate its goal to make optics education an important priority into reality?

History Advisory Committee*

Joseph H. Eberly, Univ. of Rochester, USA
Steven D. Fantone, Optikos. USA
John N. Howard, retired, USA
Erich P. Ippen, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, USA
Paul L. Kelley, Tufts Univ. USA
Elizabeth Rogan, Optical Society of America, USA

*If you have an interest in participating in OSA’s efforts to document its history by serving on a subcommittee focused on publications, meetings or general theoretical/technological advances in optics, please contact Chad Stark at cstark@osa.org or +1.202.416.1416.