Howard Vollum
Howard Vollum, (1913-1986) an engineer, scientist, and philanthropist, was the co-founder of
Tektronix Corporation, and endowed the
Vollum Institute.
Howard Vollum was born on May 31,1913, in
Portland, Oregon. He attended Portland's Catholic Columbia University (now
University of Portland) from 1931 to 1933, but transferred to
Reed College in 1934, where in 1936 he received a Bachelor of Arts in Physics. His undergraduate thesis was the creation of a new kind of
cathode-ray oscilloscope.
Upon graduation from college, he spent several years servicing and installing radios and experiementing with electronic devices, and from 1940 to 1941 he was Supervisor of the Radio Project,
NYA, in Portland. Vollum served as an officer in the
U.S. Army Signal Corps from 1942 to 1946, serving in England and New Jersey on artillery fire control radar. He was later awarded the
Legion of Merit for this work.
Vollum died in 1986 and is survived by spouse
Jean Vollum and five sons.
In 1945, Vollum co-founded Tektronix with
Jack Murdock, stating its purpose in the articles of incorporation as: "to install, repair, service and sell, purchase, manufacture and otherwise acquire and deal in radio and other instruments." By 1951, the company had 300 employees and sales of $4 million; by 1959, there were 3,000 employees with sales at $32 million. Tektronix had become the leading oscilloscopes and test equipment manufacturer, a position that held up until the 1970s.
Vollum's innate interest in science also drew him to the neuroscience laboratories at the
Oregon Health and Science University (OHSU) where he knew his oscilloscope could be applied to healthcare research. He developed an interest in experiments measuring bio-electrical phenomena, and this ultimately provided his philanthropic motivation and led Vollum to endow an institute for advanced biomedical research at OHSU.
Vollum supported many other Oregon educational institutions icluding
Reed College in Portland, Oregon. Vollum helped found the
Oregon Graduate Institute (now part of OHSU) in 1965 with a $2 million grant, and upon his death in 1986, he bequeathed $14.8 million to the college as an endowment.
*
Information Age Oral History*
OHSU Vollum Institute website*
Vollum Biography by Bill Hewlett on National Academy Press website
