One Hand Playing -- Lewis Spencer, You have to believe...

Lewis Spencer, expert on radiation

Physics professor, who grew up in Franklin, also was an inspiring example for disabled
WASHINGTON -- Lewis Spencer, a physics professor and leading authority on measuring the effects of radiation, became an inspiring figure for the disabled after a childhood accident caused him to lose his right arm and right leg.
He died of dementia Nov. 11 at age 80.

Spencer was a promising student and musician, while growing up in Franklin, Ind.
But on Aug. 2, 1937, as he was bicycling to the train station to pick up the afternoon papers for his delivery route, 12-year-old Lewis Van Clief Spencer was run over at a railroad crossing by a coal car. The accident severed his right arm at the shoulder and his right leg above the knee. He was in critical condition for days, but he survived with a witty, cheerful resilience that amazed his doctors and remained part of his character throughout his life. Spencer learned to play the piano and type with just his left hand. Always a good student, after the accident he became exceptional, concentrating on mathematics and science.

"He realized he was going to have to make his way in life by using his mind," his daughter Dorothy Wagener, Reston, Va., said.

After graduating from Franklin College, he went on to Northwestern University, where he received a master's degree at age 21 and a doctorate in physics at 23. Spencer married in 1948 and became a research physicist at the old National Bureau of Standards, now called the National Institute of Standards and Technology, where he became a leading authority on measuring the effects of radiation. Spencer's findings were incorporated into federal guidelines for building standards, fallout shelters and civil defense planning in the 1950s and 1960s and some of his theories have had applications in such far-flung fields as medicine and submarine design.

For 12 years, Spencer also was a physics professor at Ottawa (Kan.) University while continuing to hold his position and supervise research at the Bureau of Standards. He came back to the bureau full time in 1969, staying until he retired in 1984. As remarkable as Spencer's career was, the man himself was even more impressive. While attending graduate school, he taught a typing class to disabled students. Later in life, he taught Sunday school and sang bass in the church choir.

"He never really considered himself handicapped," Wagener said. "He just thought he had problems to overcome."

Spencer required his five children to study mathematics at least through calculus, but he also taught them to bowl, play pingpong and throw a Frisbee. There was one other thing Spencer taught his children. When another daughter, Mary Ellen Goree, now a violinist with the San Antonio Symphony, told her father she wanted to be a professional musician, he gave her advice that had helped him overcome the obstacles he had faced in his life: "You have to believe you are the best in the world at what you do."

By Matt Schudel: The Washington Post