Jed Buchwald

{{short description|American historian}} {{Use mdy dates|date=July 2025}} {{more footnotes|date=August 2017}} {{Infobox scientist | honorific_prefix = | name = Jed Z. Buchwald | honorific_suffix = | native_name = | native_name_lang = | image = Cropped - Jed Buchwald - Bacon Prize introduction 2009.jpg | image_size = | image_upright = | landscape =  | alt = | caption = J. Buchwald in 2009. | birth_name =  | birth_date =  | birth_place = | death_date =  | death_place = | death_cause =  | resting_place = | resting_place_coordinates =  | other_names = | siglum = | pronounce = | citizenship =  | nationality =  | fields = History of science, philosophy of science | workplaces = California Institute of Technology | patrons = | education = | alma_mater = Princeton University (BA)<br />Harvard University (MA)<br />Harvard University (PhD) | thesis_title = Matter, the Medium, and the Electrical Current: A History of Electricity and Magnetism from 1842 to 1895 | thesis_url = https://wellcomecollection.org/works/myp28x7s | thesis_year = 1974 | doctoral_advisor = {{ill|Erwin Hiebert|fr}} | academic_advisors = | doctoral_students = | notable_students = | known_for = | influences = | influenced = | awards = | author_abbrev_bot = | author_abbrev_zoo = | spouse = Diana L. Kormos-Buchwald | partner =  | children = | parents = | father = | mother = | relatives = | signature =  | signature_type =  | signature_alt = | website =  | footnotes = }} '''Jed Zachary Buchwald''' is an American academic and historian. He currently serves as the Doris and Henry Dreyfuss Professor of History at Caltech. He was previously director of the Dibner Institute for the History of Science and Technology at MIT. He won a MacArthur Fellowship in 1995 and was elected to the American Philosophical Society in 2011.<ref>{{Cite web|title=APS Member History|url=https://search.amphilsoc.org/memhist/search?creator=Jed+Buchwald&title=&subject=&subdiv=&mem=&year=&year-max=&dead=&keyword=&smode=advanced|access-date=2021-03-31|website=search.amphilsoc.org}}</ref>

==Education== Buchwald graduated from Harvard University with a Ph.D. in 1974, under supervision of Erwin Hiebert.<ref>{{url|https://mathshistory.st-andrews.ac.uk/Extras/Hiebert_doctoral_students}}</ref><ref name=AIP_interview>{{url|https://www.aip.org/history-programs/niels-bohr-library/oral-histories/46513}}</ref> His dissertation was entitled ''Matter, the Medium, and the Electrical Current: A History of Electricity and Magnetism from 1842 to 1895''.<ref name=phd> {{cite thesis |type=Ph.D. |publisher=Harvard University |publication-place= |last=Buchwald |first=Jed |date=1974 |title=Matter, the medium, and the electrical current: a history of electricity and magnetism from 1842 to 1895 |oclc=12779717 |hdl= |doi= |osti= |url=https://wellcomecollection.org/works/myp28x7s }} </ref>

==Works== Buchwald's publications include several full books and edited history-of-science essay collections:

* 1985 – ''From Maxwell to Microphysics: Aspects of Electromagnetic Theory in the Last Quarter of the Nineteenth Century'' * 1989 – ''The Rise of the Wave Theory of Light: Optical Theory and Experiment in the Early Nineteenth Century'' * 1993 – ''Einstein Papers Project'' Vol. 3 (one of nine contributing editors) * 1994 – ''The Creation of Scientific Effects: Heinrich Hertz and electric waves'' * 1995 – ''Scientific Practice: Theories and Stories of Doing Physics'' (editor) * 1996 – ''Scientific Credibility and Technical Standards in 19th and Early 20th Century Germany and Britain'' (editor) * 2000 – ''Isaac Newton's Natural Philosophy'' (editor, with I. Bernard Cohen) * 2001 – ''Histories of the Electron: The Birth of Microphysics'' (editor, with Andrew Warwick) * 2005 – ''Wrong for the Right Reasons'' (editor, with Allan Franklin) * 2010 – ''The Zodiac of Paris: How an Improbable Controversy Over an Ancient Egyptian Artifact Provoked a Modern Debate Over Religion and Science'' (with Diane Greco Josefowicz) * 2012 – ''Newton and the Origin of Civilization'' (with Mordechai Feingold) * 2020 – ''The Riddle of the Rosetta: How an English Polymath and a French Polyglot Discovered the Meaning of Egyptian Hieroglyphs'' (with Diane Greco Josefowicz)

Buchwald is also the general editor of the book series ''Dibner Institute Studies in the History of Science and Technology'' and of the book series ''Archimedes: New Studies in the History and Philosophy of Science and Technology'', as well as managing editor of the book series ''Sources and Studies in the History of Mathematics and the Physical Sciences''. Buchwald, together with Jeremy Gray, serves as editor-in-chief of the Springer journal ''Archive for History of Exact Sciences''.

==Personal life== Buchwald's wife Diana L. Kormos-Buchwald is the Robert M. Abbey Professor of History and the director of the Einstein Papers Project at Caltech.

==References== {{Reflist}}

==External links== * [https://www.hss.caltech.edu/people/jed-z-buchwald Buchwald's home page] at Caltech's Division of the Humanities and Social Sciences * [https://www.aip.org/history-programs/niels-bohr-library/oral-histories/46513 Oral history interview transcript for Jed Buchwald on 29 July 2020, American Institute of Physics, Niels Bohr Library & Archives] * [https://www.pbs.org/wgbh/nova/video/newtons-dark-secrets/ Newton's Dark Secrets], ''NOVA'' show on which Buchwald is one of the historians discussing Newton's life and work

{{DEFAULTSORT:Buchwald, Jed Z.}} Category:American historians of science Category:Harvard University alumni Category:Massachusetts Institute of Technology faculty Buchwald, Jed Z. Buchwald, Jed Z. Category:California Institute of Technology faculty Category:MacArthur Fellows Category:Place of birth missing (living people) Category:21st-century American historians Category:21st-century American male writers Category:American male non-fiction writers Category:Members of the American Philosophical Society