Ralph Belknap Baldwin papers

Ralph Baldwin was born in Grand Rapids, Michigan and graduated from the University of Michigan. While working as a part-time planetarium lecturer, he developed an interest in lunar topography. During World War II, Ralph Baldwin was a senior physicist in the Johns Hopkins Applied Physics Laboratory, where he helped develop the radio proximity fuze, a crucial secret weapon of the war. His work on the project earned him the Presidential Certificate of Merit, among other honors. During the 1940s he formulated the principles of current lunar geology. His first book The Face of the Moon (1949) was the generating force behind modern research in both terrestrial impact craters and lunar surface features. He is highly regarded in the scientific community even though his primary employment was, for many years, as an officer and then president of a manufacturing company, the Oliver Machinery Company in Grand Rapids. He was a past-president of the Wood Machinery Manufacturers of America.