Mike Horne

Mike Horne

Mike passed away on January 19, 2019.

Michael Horne
January 18, 1943 to January 19, 2019

HORNE, Michael of Dorchester died on January 19, 2019, a day after his 76th birthday. He was born and raised in Gulfport, Mississippi and attended the University of Mississippi, where he met his wife, Carole. After receiving his B.S. in 1965, he studied at Boston University with Abner Shimony, where he completed his Ph.D. in Physics in 1970. That fall he joined the faculty of Stonehill College where he taught until his death.

He loved teaching, especially courses for non-Physics majors. One such course was Quantum Mechanics and Relativity, where he took joy in revealing the beauty and simplicity of physics to this broader community. When he received Stonehill's Distinguished Faculty Award in 2001, the title of his address to the College was "Quantum Mechanics for Everyone." From his dissertation on, he was interested in the foundations of physics, especially of quantum mechanics. He first became known for his work in developing the CHSH (Clauser, Horne, Shimony, Holt) Inequality, an empirically testable form of a theorem by the Scottish physicist, John Bell. Bell's work countered arguments by Albert Einstein and others that "hidden variables" were required to explain the apparently strange predictions of quantum mechanics. Throughout his career, he collaborated with leading physicists in America and Europe – especially at Boston University, M.I.T (in Clifford Shull's lab), CCNY (with Daniel Greenberger), and the University of Vienna (with Anton Zeilinger) – exploring the mysteries of quantum entanglement and challenging Einstein's contention that what happens to one object could not be linked with what happens to another object at a distance. The term GHZ (Greenberger, Horne, Zeilinger) is now a standard designation for the fundamental entangled state of three quantum particles that is often cited in quantum mechanics textbooks. This research was described in the widely-praised book, "The Age of Entanglement: When Quantum Physics Was Reborn" by Louisa Gilder. Mike had a lifelong passion for music, especially jazz, and from his high school days he played jazz drums. He also loved cooking, movies, especially classic movies, and traveling.

He is survived by his wife, Carole Horne, his sister Miriam Northrop of Memphis; his brother-in-law Paul Robinson, the widower of his sister Patsy Robinson, of Culman, AL; his sisters and brother-in-law Lynda (Hank) Thompson of Birmingham; Jennifer McKeown (Alice Defler); Larry McKeown (Paula Bright); Kate McKeown (Michael Bills), all of Boulder, CO; along with many nieces and nephews. There will be a private gathering at a later date. Donations in his memory can be made to The Jazz Foundation of America's program, The Cause, helping jazz musicians in need of services: jazzfoundation.org/the-cause For online condolences: www.dolanfuneral.com

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Tim Medley & Mike Horne

On 9/14/11 Tim Medley wrote regarding his visit with Mike Horne:

Earlier this summer, I mentioned to Carolyn Eason Peterman that I planned to go to New England in August and that I would try to see Mike Horne while I was in Boston. Carolyn encouraged me to send a note updating all of you on Mike.

Many of you know that Mike teaches Physics at Stonehill College, a Catholic college in Easton, Massachusetts, south of Boston. When I called him, the school year had not yet started, so he suggested that we meet for lunch in Cambridge, where his wife works as the manager of the Harvard Book Store. Unfortunately, she was unable to join us, but along with my wife, Jean, I met Mike at a small Chinese restaurant at Harvard Square.

Mike has grown a beard . . .in fact, a large beard! Had he not been waiting on us, I would not have recognized him. But of course, you’ll remember Mike’s distinctive voice, and I would have known it anywhere. And like most of us, there is a little bit more of him now.

Interestingly, Mike told me that the summer after our graduation, he was taken with a series of student books on science and mathematics that had been encouraged by our government in response to the Soviet Union’s launch of Sputnik, and he was persuaded that physics was to be the direction of his education at Ole Miss.   After college graduation, Mike and his wife, Carol McKeown of Meridian, headed for Boston where he had been admitted to the graduate program in physics at Boston University. “I didn’t do particularly well on the GRE tests,” said Mike, “but once in the program, I seemed to do better than most of my classmates who had scored much higher.” I thought about our senior math teacher, Mr. Robert Winstead.

Mike and Carol met during his sophomore year at Ole Miss and since he finished ahead of her, she accompanied him to Boston and completed her degree in English at Boston University. One look at the Harvard Book Store tells me that she has a lot of responsibility.

All of you would remember Mike’s playing the drums, and he talked about music on the Gulf Coast during the early sixties. “The music in Biloxi was as good as in New York City. The Chez Joey, Gus Stevens. It was amazing. And New Orleans.   I played a lot with Randy Fagan during the summers of our college years. I remember one night driving over to a club and saying to Randy, ‘Maybe I need to learn how to play another instrument. What about the bass guitar?’” “Sing a few chords,” said Randy. I did, and he said, “Yeah, you can play the bass.” It was as if Randy had given him a 36 on his ACT. Today, Mike plays the drums and the bass guitar regularly in a band with a few other Stonehill professors.

“Gulfport was a wonderful place in the 40’s and the 50’s. . .growing up on 38^th street. We went to First Baptist Church. My dad was a much older man and a former school superintendent in Lucedale (who built the first black school in Greene County) and during my years, he taught at Keesler. My mom and dad were progressive people.” Mike remembered my house where seven children were raised. “You had that separate house where you and your brothers slept, and there was a television room. And that room had school chairs for watching the TV.” I reminded him of the talent show at West Side Junior High where the band was Randy Fagan on accordion, Bert Adams on cornet, Mike on drums, and I sang. (There was someone else, but his name escapes me.) We did “The Banana Boat” song which Harry Belafonte made famous around 1957.

“Tell me about Harby Kreegar,” said Mike, “and Bert Adams and Don McGavock . . .I always liked Pat Reed (How many more of you had a thing for Pat Reed?), and who was the girl whose dad had a hardware store downtown?” Vicki Barber. “And Wayne Dowdy and Ward Van Skiver.” He asked about five or ten others (“I lost track of Danny Lassiter.”), but my notes fail me.

Stonehill College has been Mike’s only employer, and he is much celebrated in physics. Jean and I asked him about his work, and he said it was in quantum physics. I said, “Try to explain it to us but go slow.” Didn’t work.  It was as if the waiter had described my Chinese dish in Mandarin.  Go to this website for the writeup. http://www.stonehill.edu/x16056.xml

Here are portions of two reviews of Professor Mike Horne from a website which rates professors:
Mike is awesome. The class starts whenever he feels like it (sometimes 20 minutes late, never early), and he's a funny guy. Attendance is not mandatory, neither is staying awake in class. Labs get boring after a while, but the class is a must take.

Excellent professor, especially for math majors. Three tests, no papers, no homework, no midterms, no finals. Likes jokes. No email address, no office hours except at lunch, . . . The tests are long, but can be done with tools provided (and written on the board.) No numbers o tests. Overall, a very good professor.

Outside the restaurant, we said our goodbyes.  These partings are always awkward for me because I wonder if we will ever see each other again.  But I should be more optimistic because Mike said, “I need to go to the next reunion.”

Tim Medley