van Duuren

Hendrik C. A. Van Duuren was born on November 24, 1903 in the Hague. He graduated in Electrical Engineering in 1926 and received the Doctor's degree in 1941, both at the Technical University of Delft, the Netherlands.

He joined the Netherlands Postal and Telecommunications Services in 1928, where he was charged with the development of radio receivers and later, on with complete radiocommunication systems. During his investigations concerning the reliability of radiotelegraph communication, he came upon the idea of not only applying the synchronous mode of transmission, but also adding the facility of automatic request for repetition of signals received mutilated (error correction by ·means of automatic retransmission). In 1949 the Veder Foundation offered him an Award for his work on this A.R.Q. equipment.

In 1954 Dr. van Duuren became Director of the Dr. Nehr Laboratory of the Dutch Postal and Telecommunications Services, a post he kept till his retirement in 1968. He is still active in several special fields of telecommunication. Since 1937 he has taken an active part in I.T.U. conferences. In 1947 he was elected Chairman of Study Group III of C.C.I.R. (fixed service systems and communication theory). Under his chairmanship (1947-1970) a number of recommendations concerning antennas, radiotelephony, radiotelegraphy and facsimile were promulgated. Dr. van Duuren is also chairman of the Advisory Committee on Radio Interference of the Ministry of Transport, and he participated in the work of C.I.S.P.R. (International Special Committee on Radio Interference). He wrote several papers on the subject of error control in radiotelegraph circuits and holds more than 30 patents, mainly in this field.

In 1953 the honor of Officer of the Order of Oranje-Nassau was conferred on Dr. van Duuren in connection with his important work in the field of the development of protected radiocommunication systems and in 1968 the Knighthood of the Order of the Nederlandse Leeuw (Dutch Lion) was conferred on him for distinguished service. In 1960 he received the Dr. de Groot Plaquette for his work in radiotelegraphy. He was a member of the Royal Institute of Engineers of the Netherlands, and of the Netherlands Electronics and Radio Society. He was a Fellow of IEEE.

Dr. van Duuren's favorite sports were tennis and badminton. He had taken up painting as a hobby. Mrs. van Duuren had a special interest in languages. She accompanied her husband to many international meetings. Their two sons, John and Albert, both graduated in Electrical Engineering at the University of Delft.