It's all about love.
- Alan
Obituary
Alan Charles Gallagher, of Boulder, Colorado, passed away November 20th, 2024, at age 88, in Cherry, AZ, of pulmonary fibrosis.
Alan was an accomplished physicist and long-term faculty member at the Joint Institute for Laboratory Astrophysics (JILA) at CU Boulder. He was distinguished by his inquisitive and exacting intellect, his fierce independence of mind and will, and his passion for nature and the outdoors. He worked tirelessly through many years to support and train junior colleagues, and he actively participated in causes of democratic and environmental justice. Alan is remembered for his deep sense of fairness, his unwavering honesty, and his love and care for his family members and for innumerable friends from many walks of life.
Alan was born on June 14, 1936, in Oak Park, IL, to Lucile (Nussle) and Charles Gallagher. Alan and his elder brother, Kent, grew up in the first Chicago-area home built during the Great Depression, a Tudor-style house in Elmhurst, IL. As teenagers, Alan and Kent attended boarding and public school in Switzerland and dependents' high school in Germany while their father, Charles, served as a court recorder for the Nuremberg (Nürnberg) trials.
Alan met his first wife, Jean (Weil), at Purdue University while completing an engineering degree. They were married August 13, 1958, in Greenwich, Connecticut. Subsequently, he and Jean both completed PhDs in physics, he at Columbia University and she at New York University. Shortly thereafter, they moved to Boulder, Colorado, where Alan was a postdoc and then adjunct professor (CU Boulder) at the Joint Institute for Laboratory Astrophysics (JILA), a research partnership between the National Institute of Standards and Technology and the University of Colorado. Alan and Jean divorced in 1980.
Alan remained at JILA throughout his career, studying gas discharges (atomic and molecular physics). He mentored many graduate students and postdocs, keeping in shape by climbing seven flights of stairs between his laboratory and his office. His work contributed to advances in the technology of high intensity light sources such as arc lamps used for highway illumination and high-powered lasers used for defense and nuclear fusion. During a sabbatical, he helped with setting up a physics department in Christchurch, New Zealand. Later in his career, he consulted on silicon deposition from silane gas, as part of solar panel manufacturing. In retirement, he focused his scientific abilities on humanitarian contributions with no motive for profit, designing efficient condensation devices and solar stoves to be used in developing countries. As the Boulder Daily Camera wrote, “Gallagher’s work caps 50 years of less successful efforts by other researchers and has been adopted by laboratories throughout the world.” JILA recently published a remembrance of Alan's work as a groundbreaking physicist: https://jila.colorado.edu/news-events/news/remembering-jila-fellow-alan-gallagher
Alan had a compelling lifelong love of the outdoors that he passed on to his four children. As a youth, he loved to climb, scaling an immense cottonwood in Elmhurst, castle ruins along the Rhine, and the Gornergrat descent to the Rhone Glacier. During adulthood in Colorado, he was an avid skier, bicycler, rock climber, and hiker. From the time his children were young, he took them on technical climbs in El Dorado Canyon, fishing in Grizzly Creek, and on an annual week-long backpacking trip in the Utah desert country. His friend Alan Dunwell of Nederland, CO, was his frequent compadre on his various canyoneering exploits. He served as chairperson of the Boulder Audubon Society and was actively involved in organizing against industrial sprawl in the Denver-Boulder corridor. In 1980, Alan went on a several-month mountaineering trip to Nepal during which he was the fittest of his life. Later in life, as aging and degenerative spine disease robbed him of this former strength, he turned (not always quietly) to less ambitious outdoor exploits and boat-accessible canyoneering in Lake Powell.
After nine years of courtship, Alan married his second wife, Constance (Christiansen), in May, 1989. Connie was a dedicated Nurse Practitioner and diabetes nurse educator. During their enduring love affair, he and Connie lived in Louisville, CO, in a house on the edge of Harper Lake. Later in life, they spent summers in Colorado and winters in Phoenix, AZ, where it was easier for Connie to breathe. Their home narrowly escaped the Marshall Fire. When Connie passed away in 2022, Alan moved back to Louisville full time.
In his twilight, Alan was fortunate to stay with Connie’s son and daughter-in-law, Rolf and Luana Christiansen, of Cherry, AZ, for whose loving care he and his other children will be forever grateful. Alan is survived by his brother, Kent (Sonja), by his children, Catherine Gallagher (Seth) of Madison, WI, Larry Gallagher (Shirin) of Seattle, WA, Patricia Gallagher (Jose) of Boulder, CO, and Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, Jeff Gallagher (Angela) of Brighton, CO, and Lu and Rolf Christiansen of Cherry, AZ, as well as his six grandchildren, Gil, Rosalyn, Mack, Caetano, Kamal, and Zia.
Regarding advanced planning for a celebration of his life, Alan wrote, “A gathering of friends and family, all free to speak if they wish. Good food and drink; it is not sad to end a good life.” A celebration of Alan’s life is planned for Saturday, January 4th, in the Louisville/Boulder area.
Please leave remembrances and photos on the Memory wall. If you would like to make a contribution in Alan's name to one of the many causes Alan supported in the name of environmental and social justice, please see the Donate page.
“A gathering of friends and family, all free to speak if they wish. Good food and drink; it is not sad to end a good life.”
- Alan
Gallery
Memory wall
I will remember Alan in several ways. I will remember Alan’s forthright demeanor, matched by his high intensity, intelligence, and scholarship. I will remember the bigness of his heart and what I saw as his uncanny resemblance to the young Richard P. Feynmann. I will remember Alan by his quirky sense of humor and signature “full body laugh”, that would often explode into our discussions and be heard throughout the second floor B-wing. With Alan’s passing, we have lost yet another of the “JILA giants.”
My husband and I had the pleasure of meeting Alan and wife Connie 15 years ago through business and soon became friends. We admired him, his wit, his humor, his intelligence and genuine kindness; qualities rare to find in one person these days.
We send our deepest condolences to the families and know you must find solice in a life well lived by such a remarkable man.
Micki and David Henningsen
I can’t recall that Alan and I ever discussed basic research ethics. There was no need – Alan's baseline exuded scientific integrity and honesty and the standard practice of his students and post-docs every day was at a very high level. Beyond representing your own work with integrity, honesty includes making clear errors in what others are saying or writing. Alan always provided exemplary guidance on professional conduct that advances physics and promotes a responsible scientific community.
One’s years in graduate school are important formative years. As are many of his students, post-docs and colleagues, I too am so grateful to Alan for his guidance and mentoring that has stayed with me throughout my life and career in physics.
He was passionate about taking science outside the “ivory tower” and using it to benefit society. This is an example I have tried my best to follow. I last saw Alan and Connie about 10 years ago when dropping in for tea in Louisville with my family, on vacation to visit old haunts. Alan was as sharp as ever, and I was suitably grilled on the science underlying my work using lasers to improve performance in the wind energy industry.
Thank you Alan, I owe you so much.
Service
Donate
The Southern Utah Wilderness Alliance:
https://secure.suwa.org/site/Donation2?df_id=3860&mfc_pref=T&3860.donation=form1
The Natural Resources Defense Council:
https://action.nrdc.org/donation/
The American Civil Liberties Union:
https://www.aclu.org/
