I recruited a few old friends this year to help judge the Science Fair at Merlo Station High School. It was good to spend time with Hal Smith, Matt Davis, and a number of other local science professionals, while examining a wide variety of student research.

A few weeks later, I got a copy of this lovely article, written by a young OMSI volunteer to celebrate Hal's commitment and contribution to the OMSI Chem Lab.

Design and layout by Johnny
V.I.P.S.- Volunteers in Promoting Science

Share the Excitement of Discovery

February 2008

Volunteer Spotlight on Hal Smith

Hal Smith began volunteering in OMSI's Chemistry Lab more than seven years ago after he retired. According to Hal, he decided to start volunteering because his wife was tired of him sitting around the house and suggested that he do something useful! A tall, quiet guy, Hal is originally from
Massachusetts, and has lived in various parts of New England and the Pacific Northwest. Professionally, Hal started as a surfactants chemist, and then moved on to working with plywood adhesives and glues. He eventually settled down as a clean room engineer at Tektronix and Boeing.

During two weekends in October each year, OMSI’s Chemistry Lab celebrates National Chemistry Week, and Hal is always heavily involved. This year, in an incredible effort, Hal organized an extra lab's-worth of experiments for the event! Outside the Featured Hall, Hal and his staff of volunteers invited visitors to test the effectiveness of sunscreen, stencil crystalline stars, make chromatography butterflies, or take part in one of several other experiments. Hal organized volunteers from the University of Portland and the American Chemical Society, and wrote directions for and set up all of the experiments. National Chemistry Week was a great success due to Hal’s efforts.

As part of his Chemistry Lab volunteering, Hal does water quality testing on the Willamette River. He is working on starting a collaboration with Willamette River keeper to share the results of the water testing.

One of the best things about volunteering at OMSI, says Hal, is getting to work with all of the kids. He also likes getting to meet and work with so many different people. They “are a good bunch of people to know,” he said. Hal’s favorite memory of volunteering at OMSI was when he helped cause an evacuation of the building. In 2001 or so, Hal
and another staff member were working with thermite in the lab. As they were mixing different substances together with the thermite, they found one that reacted quite well! All this happened just below the smoke detector. Needless to say, the fire alarm went off and the building had to be
evacuated!*

In his retirement, Hal says he's the kind of guy who likes to keep busy. In addition to volunteering in the Chemistry Lab at OMSI, he also leads kids to monitor fish numbers for Oregon Trout (12 years), and keeps track of supplies for Medical Teams International (12 years). In his spare time, Hal judges science fairs (about 10 a year) and is an active member of the Portland chapter of the American Chemical Society. Each year at the Northwest Science Expo, Hal gets to award the Portland Industrial Chemists Association award for the most useful chemistry experiment. He is also on the Volunteer Advocacy Council here at OMSI.

When Hal’s not volunteering, you can find him gardening, square dancing with his wife, or traveling. He likes to visit anyplace that has good scenery, hospitable people, and
comfortable weather. Hal loves lobster and believes that “no man is an island.”

The Chemistry Lab has greatly benefited from all of Hal’s efforts, and applauds Hal's dedication! Stop by and say hello to Hal on Tuesday mornings!


* As I recall, the unusual explosiveness of that mix was due to a very fine powder, possibly even magnesium, instead of the coarser powder we had used in prototyping the pie-tin Thermite reaction. As I recall, Hal reassured us that there wasn't any "real smoke;" the smoke detectors were probably set off by the shimmering cloud of powdered metal dust rising to the 20-foot ceiling.

What Johnny doesn't say (and probably doesn't know) is the sheer panic that Thermite fire alarm caused.

While everyone else evacuates the building, the safety team's job is to check the panel and see where the fire is. It so happens that all the Chem Lab fire alarms are on one circuit, see. On the main panel with its little indicator lights, that circuit is labeled "Chemical Store Room."
That may have been the only time I ever saw or heard of our (rather large) Safety Officer actually running during a fire alarm. I never did find out whether he was running _toward_ us to salvage our mangled bodies, or _away_ to wait in relative safety until the HazMat bunny suits arrived. He sure did get ahold of us on radio awful quick, though.

-Erica