Transistor Museum Library Rossof Page4 Transistor Electronics

Transistor Museum Library

“TRANSISTOR ELECTRONICS”

by David DeWitt and Arthur L. Rossoff

Author’s Comments (Continued)

Art Rossoff

I set up a weekly lecture at RR, starting in the Fall of 1954. This continued for about a year. I had developed extensive course notes during this time, and then had the idea of writing a book. I contacted several publishers and discovered that there was a tremendous demand for books on transistors.

I went to my boss at RR, Dave DeWitt, and discussed the idea I had for writing a book. He was not initially receptive to this project because of the heavy workload at RR, and even though I had planned on writing the Transistor Book on my own time, Dave was not very enthusiastic. In the end, I suggested a collaboration, with each of us taking on the responsibility for writing specific chapters in the book. He agreed, at that’s how we proceeded. This worked out pretty well; for instance, we split the royalties were divided based on number of pages written. Generally speaking, I wrote the first part of the book (dealing with transistor theory) and Dave wrote the latter chapters, dealing with applications. McGraw Hill was thrilled when we finished and it was published in 1957. At the time it came out, it was received as a thorough, comprehensive and accurate text on Transistor Electronics. It was used as a text in many colleges and universities. Both Dave and I were quite proud of the book. The work received a number of favorable reviews, relating both to the technical content and to the clarity of writing.

Author’s Comments (Continued)

Art Rossoff

Here is a section of a review of “Transistor Electronics” that appeared in the June 1958 edition of the proceedings of the IRE. The review was written by Mr. A.P. Stern of General Electric.

“…The principal merit of this book and what distinguished it from others dealing with transistor electronics is that it discusses device behavior and circuit performance consistently in terms of physical mechanisms and properties. In order to achieve this the authors had to give an unusually complete discussion and characterization of the pertinent physical processes and, due to the complexity of the field, had to use simplification and approximation abundantly. The authors deserve great credit for doing this without becoming scientifically crude or degrading the subject and by maintaining a constant, high scholarly level of treatment. The book reflects a thorough understanding of transistor behavior and is written in a mature and cultured manner reminding one of the best, today almost extinct, tradition of classical technical writing….”

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