Perception, 2014, volume 43, pages 1135 – 1138
doi:10.1068/p4310ag
Obituary
Adam Gelbtuch (1921– 2014) Adam Gelbtuch, Chairman of Pion Ltd Publishers, or Mr G, as he was known to many of his work colleagues, was born in Krakow in Poland on 30 January 1921. When he was 17 he came to Imperial College London to study aeronautical engineering; but on returning home for the summer after his first year, he was captured by the Russians and held in a labour camp for two years in the Gulag, where his father died. He then ended up in Tashkent in Uzbekistan, where many Russian academics who had been evacuated in 1941 formed a university. Adam studied at this university under Abram Ioffe, who was known as the father of Soviet physics, a pioneer not only in measuring the charge of electrons but also in semiconductor research. Ioffe was a gifted teacher and mentor, attracting the most talented and brightest Russian minds to study under him, and Adam thrived in this stimulating environment, where he became fluent in Russian and made many Russian friends. At this time he also ran a successful ice cream business, where he was able to indulge his talents both for gourmet cooking and for business. In 1947, at the age of 26, Adam came back to England, and he worked in the R&D department of the British Oxygen Company. At this time Adam was translating Russian science and technology papers into English, as he was known to many Russian scientists through the contacts he had made while in Tashkent. In 1959 he formed a partnership with John Ashby, a biochemist, and set up the publishing company Pion. The name Pion reflected his time studying particle physics with Abram Ioffe. Adam and John were keen to publish translations of Russian-language journals; this they did with the British library,
1136 Obituary
which ran a government-sponsored programme. In 1991, as the USSR broke up, Adam founded Turpion Ltd, a joint venture between Pion and the Royal Society of Chemistry, to produce high-quality English translations of leading Russian scientific journals under contracts with the Russian Academy of Sciences and others. Later, the London Mathematical Society also became involved as the subject range of the journals widened. Turpion continues today with the Institute of Physics in place of the Royal Society of Chemistry. Adam and John also wanted to publish academic journals and books. In 1969 they founded their first journal, Environment and Planning, and in 1972 they founded Perception. They published several academic books and also two large-format leather-bound illustrated books on plants and birds. The latter were collectors’ items priced well into four-figure territory, with copies numbered individually, the printing of which involved up to seven stages, each colour requiring precise registration. In 1972 Richard Gregory had just moved from the Department of Machine Intelligence in Edinburgh University, to the Brain and Perception Laboratory in the Department of Anatomy in Bristol University. At this time Richard was approached by two publishers to start a journal on perception. One was a prestigious and well-established publisher, and the other was Pion. Richard described how glad he was to have made the right decision to go with Pion. Adam had done his homework well and booked the best, local to Bristol, restaurant at that time— The Hole in the Wall, Bath—to have their first meeting. Here the journal Perception was conceived, inspired by highly pleasurable gustatory perceptions. They wanted Perception to be different from other journals; to give authors a chance to revise their submissions rather than receive straight rejections; to be eclectic, with topics including physiological mechanisms and clinical neurological disturbances, and psychological data on pattern and object perception in animals and man; and also to have editorials and jokes. The first issue had this cartoon reproduced by special permission of Playboy magazine (© 1971 by Playboy):
Perception had a very high print quality and could include micrographs, Julesz’s randomdot stereograms (in both colour and black and white), photographs, and stereo pictures. This followed on from Richard’s Eye and Brain and was way ahead of other publications at the time. It was expensive but encouraged a much greater range of submissions and made the journal an aesthetic pleasure to read apart from the science. Adam and Richard were complementary and respected each other’s talents immensely. Richard greatly enjoyed
Obituary 1137
writing his Perception editorial essays, which were published as Odd Perceptions, with Even Odder Perceptions following as a second volume. He also would rally round when editorial judgment was required and was the first to say that he left most of the hard work to others. Adam would personally vet these editorials for word length and accuracy, and Richard would modify his text until it fitted the required page space. Adam took great trouble for all the papers in Perception to be as accurate as possible. John Harris recalls an incident in which some mathematical notation had been changed in the proofs of a paper which he published in Perception, so he changed them back again with a brief note of complaint. When the paper appeared in Perception, Adam’s version rather than his had been included. At that point John checked his version more carefully before firing off a scathing letter to Pion. They were in fact equivalent, but Adam’s conformed as it should to SI standards, whereas John’s didn’t. Adam had been too polite to be explicit about John’s error. Adam had high standards in many areas of his life, especially where his culinary expertise was concerned. Richard was once leaving a Royal Society meeting on a Saturday afternoon when he bumped into Adam, who had just been doing his weekly grocery shopping in Fortnum & Mason. Adam also liked to give gastronomic reward to his editors. John Harris recalls that, in the early days of the ECVP, before the Perception lecture was set up, Adam would get in touch with him beforehand, suggest a very good restaurant near to the conference venue (or sometimes a reasonable drive away), and encourage him to take a friend there at his expense. This led to several memorable meals—he really knew how to choose a place to eat and drink. John was clear that Adam didn’t have to do this, as he was already getting paid for editorial work, but Adam insisted. Later, Adam initiated a similar reward for the editorial board of Perception who attended the ECVP. Adam liked to have a Pion Christmas card each year, which conveyed greetings in the context of perceptual phenomena. One year Nick Wade made one showing Adam’s face, but he rejected it strongly as he did not want his face to have pride of place. This is shown here:
1138 Obituary
Adam exacted high standards from his workers; and the designers of the Pion Christmas card experienced a new side to Adam when, owing to circumstances beyond their control, it was not available until Christmas eve. Adam had a keen business mind and was able to find solutions to problems that produced successful business partnerships and arrangements for all parties concerned. He had a full life in all respects. He was married to his wife Helen for over 65 years, and together they enjoyed not only good food and wine but also music and the arts, and a beautiful house including garden and a panelled library. He greatly enjoyed taking his family on skiing trips, as he and Helen enjoyed not only the skiing but also the beauty of the mountains, and did so well into their 80s. Skiing was one of the many attributes Adam shared with Tom Troscianko, who was also born in Poland, was a physicist, and was a good linguist. Adam and Helen enjoyed welcoming their friends from overseas to their home in North London, and one time when Abram Ioffe visited, the Chelsea Flower Show was on. Ioffe was absolutely delighted by the experience. Richard, too, stayed with Adam and Helen and spoke of the wonderful swimming pool with wave machine maintained at 80 degrees all through the year, which Adam swam in every day. Adam maintained good health until his later years, attending his office daily into his 90s. He leaves his wife Helen, his daughter Maya, and his grandson Misha, as well as many friends and colleagues around the world. He also leaves his journal Perception without its founder. Priscilla Heard
doi:10.1068/p4310ag
Obituary
Adam Gelbtuch (1921– 2014) Adam Gelbtuch, Chairman of Pion Ltd Publishers, or Mr G, as he was known to many of his work colleagues, was born in Krakow in Poland on 30 January 1921. When he was 17 he came to Imperial College London to study aeronautical engineering; but on returning home for the summer after his first year, he was captured by the Russians and held in a labour camp for two years in the Gulag, where his father died. He then ended up in Tashkent in Uzbekistan, where many Russian academics who had been evacuated in 1941 formed a university. Adam studied at this university under Abram Ioffe, who was known as the father of Soviet physics, a pioneer not only in measuring the charge of electrons but also in semiconductor research. Ioffe was a gifted teacher and mentor, attracting the most talented and brightest Russian minds to study under him, and Adam thrived in this stimulating environment, where he became fluent in Russian and made many Russian friends. At this time he also ran a successful ice cream business, where he was able to indulge his talents both for gourmet cooking and for business. In 1947, at the age of 26, Adam came back to England, and he worked in the R&D department of the British Oxygen Company. At this time Adam was translating Russian science and technology papers into English, as he was known to many Russian scientists through the contacts he had made while in Tashkent. In 1959 he formed a partnership with John Ashby, a biochemist, and set up the publishing company Pion. The name Pion reflected his time studying particle physics with Abram Ioffe. Adam and John were keen to publish translations of Russian-language journals; this they did with the British library,
1136 Obituary
which ran a government-sponsored programme. In 1991, as the USSR broke up, Adam founded Turpion Ltd, a joint venture between Pion and the Royal Society of Chemistry, to produce high-quality English translations of leading Russian scientific journals under contracts with the Russian Academy of Sciences and others. Later, the London Mathematical Society also became involved as the subject range of the journals widened. Turpion continues today with the Institute of Physics in place of the Royal Society of Chemistry. Adam and John also wanted to publish academic journals and books. In 1969 they founded their first journal, Environment and Planning, and in 1972 they founded Perception. They published several academic books and also two large-format leather-bound illustrated books on plants and birds. The latter were collectors’ items priced well into four-figure territory, with copies numbered individually, the printing of which involved up to seven stages, each colour requiring precise registration. In 1972 Richard Gregory had just moved from the Department of Machine Intelligence in Edinburgh University, to the Brain and Perception Laboratory in the Department of Anatomy in Bristol University. At this time Richard was approached by two publishers to start a journal on perception. One was a prestigious and well-established publisher, and the other was Pion. Richard described how glad he was to have made the right decision to go with Pion. Adam had done his homework well and booked the best, local to Bristol, restaurant at that time— The Hole in the Wall, Bath—to have their first meeting. Here the journal Perception was conceived, inspired by highly pleasurable gustatory perceptions. They wanted Perception to be different from other journals; to give authors a chance to revise their submissions rather than receive straight rejections; to be eclectic, with topics including physiological mechanisms and clinical neurological disturbances, and psychological data on pattern and object perception in animals and man; and also to have editorials and jokes. The first issue had this cartoon reproduced by special permission of Playboy magazine (© 1971 by Playboy):
Perception had a very high print quality and could include micrographs, Julesz’s randomdot stereograms (in both colour and black and white), photographs, and stereo pictures. This followed on from Richard’s Eye and Brain and was way ahead of other publications at the time. It was expensive but encouraged a much greater range of submissions and made the journal an aesthetic pleasure to read apart from the science. Adam and Richard were complementary and respected each other’s talents immensely. Richard greatly enjoyed
Obituary 1137
writing his Perception editorial essays, which were published as Odd Perceptions, with Even Odder Perceptions following as a second volume. He also would rally round when editorial judgment was required and was the first to say that he left most of the hard work to others. Adam would personally vet these editorials for word length and accuracy, and Richard would modify his text until it fitted the required page space. Adam took great trouble for all the papers in Perception to be as accurate as possible. John Harris recalls an incident in which some mathematical notation had been changed in the proofs of a paper which he published in Perception, so he changed them back again with a brief note of complaint. When the paper appeared in Perception, Adam’s version rather than his had been included. At that point John checked his version more carefully before firing off a scathing letter to Pion. They were in fact equivalent, but Adam’s conformed as it should to SI standards, whereas John’s didn’t. Adam had been too polite to be explicit about John’s error. Adam had high standards in many areas of his life, especially where his culinary expertise was concerned. Richard was once leaving a Royal Society meeting on a Saturday afternoon when he bumped into Adam, who had just been doing his weekly grocery shopping in Fortnum & Mason. Adam also liked to give gastronomic reward to his editors. John Harris recalls that, in the early days of the ECVP, before the Perception lecture was set up, Adam would get in touch with him beforehand, suggest a very good restaurant near to the conference venue (or sometimes a reasonable drive away), and encourage him to take a friend there at his expense. This led to several memorable meals—he really knew how to choose a place to eat and drink. John was clear that Adam didn’t have to do this, as he was already getting paid for editorial work, but Adam insisted. Later, Adam initiated a similar reward for the editorial board of Perception who attended the ECVP. Adam liked to have a Pion Christmas card each year, which conveyed greetings in the context of perceptual phenomena. One year Nick Wade made one showing Adam’s face, but he rejected it strongly as he did not want his face to have pride of place. This is shown here:
1138 Obituary
Adam exacted high standards from his workers; and the designers of the Pion Christmas card experienced a new side to Adam when, owing to circumstances beyond their control, it was not available until Christmas eve. Adam had a keen business mind and was able to find solutions to problems that produced successful business partnerships and arrangements for all parties concerned. He had a full life in all respects. He was married to his wife Helen for over 65 years, and together they enjoyed not only good food and wine but also music and the arts, and a beautiful house including garden and a panelled library. He greatly enjoyed taking his family on skiing trips, as he and Helen enjoyed not only the skiing but also the beauty of the mountains, and did so well into their 80s. Skiing was one of the many attributes Adam shared with Tom Troscianko, who was also born in Poland, was a physicist, and was a good linguist. Adam and Helen enjoyed welcoming their friends from overseas to their home in North London, and one time when Abram Ioffe visited, the Chelsea Flower Show was on. Ioffe was absolutely delighted by the experience. Richard, too, stayed with Adam and Helen and spoke of the wonderful swimming pool with wave machine maintained at 80 degrees all through the year, which Adam swam in every day. Adam maintained good health until his later years, attending his office daily into his 90s. He leaves his wife Helen, his daughter Maya, and his grandson Misha, as well as many friends and colleagues around the world. He also leaves his journal Perception without its founder. Priscilla Heard
