Mildred Allen

Mildred Allen (March 25, 1894 – November 4, 1990) was an American physicist and professor. Her research interests included mechanics, electricity, heat, and optics. She worked primarily on the tension coefficients of resistance of single crystals, and thermal emission and evaporation from water.

Biography

Early life and education Mildred Allen was born in Sharon, Massachusetts to MIT professor of railroad engineering C. Frank Allen and Caroline Hadley Allen. She had one younger sister, Margaret Allen Anderson. A second younger sister died in early childhood. As a child, Mildred studied the piano and performed at social events. In high school, she opted for carpentry over cooking classes, and was interested in photography. Their measurements, and similar anomalies earlier observed by Allais using a paraconical pendulum, have not been accepted by the physics community as in need of unconventional explanation, and subsequent experiments have not succeeded in reproducing the results.

Allen was an active member of the American Association of Physics Teachers, the American Association of University Women, the American Meteorological Society, the American Physical Society, especially the New England section, and the Optical Society of America. She died in 1990 at Holyoke Hospital in Holyoke, Massachusetts, at the age of 96. Fellow, American Physical Society (1936)