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AMS Secretary-Treasurer
Rick Rosen didn't start out wanting to be a meteorologist. In his freshman year at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT), however, his undergraduate advisor insisted he take an elective subject to fill out his second-term program of classes. Rick picked "Descriptive Meteorology," taught by Hurd Willett, not knowing much about meteorology other than thinking it might prove to be a field to which he could usefully apply his mathematics major.
"It didn't hurt, either, that I could impress my advisor by taking a class that met at eight o'clock in the morning," Rick confesses. "My advisor didn't know that I'm a 'morning person'; he decidedly was not."
MIT didn't offer an undergraduate degree in meteorology, and Rick found himself as one of the only ' undergraduates in "Doc" Willett's class.
"I enjoyed the subject matter and competing with the graduate students in the class, most of whom were, like my advisor, also not morning people," Rick explains. "They, therefore, struggled with the surprise quizzes Doc would give to ensure his students arrived on time for class."
Rick continued taking meteorology subjects throughout his undergraduate career, graduating in 1970 with both a bachelor's degree in mathematics and a master's degree in meteorology. He stayed at MIT to complete a Ph.D. in meteorology in 1974.
His thesis advisor, Victor Starr, was looking to retire, and one of his earlier doctoral students, Norman Gaut, invited Starr to spend his retirement years at the company Norman had founded with Jim...