Date of Birth
Mar 21,1930
Date of Death
Feb 04,2008
THOMAS F. DROEGEAge 77 of Batavia, passed away at his home, Monday, February 4, 2008 , after a long battle with cancer.BORN / EARLY YEARSHe ws born March 21, 1930 in Park Hills, Kentucky. As a young man he studied engineering at the University of Kentucky and went on to earn his Master’s Degree at M. I.T (Massachusetts Institute of Technology). His early years included work with the original astronauts, (Lovell, Shepard and Glenn) on centrifuge. As the science of particle began, he first worked at the Princeton Accelerator in Princeton, NJ. Then, following a year at Argonne National Laboratory, he came to Fermi Lab, Batavia, in 1974. As head of the Particle Instrumentation Group, he designed the accelerator power supply which was named after him and became known simply as the "Droege Box". Colleagues recall Tom not only as a pioneer, but as someone a man who was "fun" to work with; a man whose sense of science, also had a sense of humor. He spent years enjoying himself, building cameras, solving puzzles and adding to the astronomical community’s collective knowledge. If part of Tom’s life was concerned with accelerating the smallest particles of matter, another part of him was equally concerned with accelerating the process of identifying the stars of the northern hemisphere. The project acronym was TASS (The Amateur Sky Survey) and he began it in 1994 when he built the Mark I telescope. Over the next five years he built the Mark II, III and IV and, in the process created an equally ingenious network of like minded scientists whom he challenged to join him by appealing to their sense of "game". To quote one of his essays: \\
A memorial service to celebrate his life and honor his work will be held Saturday, March 1, 2008 at 1pm at the Salvation Army Tri-City Corps Headquarters, 1710 So. 7th Avenue, St. Charles, IL.
A memorial has been established in Tom’s name to benefit the Tri-City Salvation Army Corps as well as other favorite charities. Memorials checks may be made and mailed directly to the corps at the above address or made simply to the Tom Droege Scholarship Fund and mailed to the family in care of P.O. Box 66, Elburn, IL 60119. Tributes and memories may also be forwarded to the family at the same address or through his obituary at www.conleycare.com.