Rita Dorothy Guggenheim Lerner (May 7, 1929 – July 16, 1994)[1] was an American physicist, librarian, editor, and science communicator who worked for many years at the
American Institute of Physics. With
George L. Trigg, she was co-editor of the Encyclopedia of Physics (Addison-Wesley, 1981).[2]
Life
Rita Guggenheim was born in
New York, New York, in 1929,[1][3] and was a 1945 graduate of
Fiorello H. LaGuardia High School.[4] She earned a bachelor's degree from
Radcliffe College in 1949,[3] and was managing editor of the college yearbook.[5] She went to
Columbia University for graduate study, earning a master's degree in 1951 and (as Rita G. Lerner) completing her Ph.D. in 1956;[3] her dissertation was Microwave Studies of Molecular Structure.[6]
She came to the American Institute of Physics in the 1960s, hired as part of a program funded by the
National Science Foundation for the improvement of scientific communication.[7]