Sixth Edition Marquis Who’s Who INSIGHT 15 INSIGHT MARQUIS WHO′S WHO SIXTH EDITION SPRING 2024 While his career has been filled with highlights, Dr. Gray takes the most pride in the work he conducted at the Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory, where he headed the chemistry section of the Laser Isotope Separations Program, and his work at the Savannah River Laboratory, where he developed processes to recover plutonium from the scrap stockpile and reactor fuel that had been declared as non-processable. These two programs returned tons of plutonium from the scrap heap to the weapons foundry. This was three of the four plutonium programs that sent Russia into bankruptcy and helped to bring an end to the Cold War. The cornerstone of his success lay in growing up working with his dad, Harvey C. Gray Sr., in the apiaries of Southeast Georgia, which encouraged him to reach for higher goals and never to give up. Dr. Gray fully retired in June 2021. How have you navigated disruptions in your industry to remain a top professional? I would say the biggest disruption was when I was transferred from the lab to the plant in Savannah River. I took over the separations technology lab, and within my first year, I published 10 papers. I was unsupported by supervisors as far as research was concerned. When it was time for me to be considered for a raise, my supervisor told me that if I had the time to publish 10 papers, I obviously didn’t have enough work to do. My wife worked for a headhunter at the time, who got me a job in Louisiana, but it was a mistake. They had hired four people, and we all left within a year because of poor management. I went home for Christmas, called the lab and asked for an interview. It turns out they brought me back with a larger salary than what Kaiser had given me. One of the biggest things that helped my progression was giving credit to people working with me. When I published papers, I added their names because they deserved it. What are two key behaviors/personality traits that allow you to be effective in your role? When I was developing new processes, I made sure my experiments went far enough to fail. I got to where the boundaries were and was able to develop a process because there was an understanding of limitations. If people failed before me, I didn’t let it bother me. I also didn’t let past experiences overly influence me. What is the most important issue/challenge you are dealing with in your industry? In the late 1980s, the Cold War was escalating, and the Department of Energy was looking for ways to try to outdo Russia and send it into bankruptcy. The Democratic Party has changed and is decimating our programs now. They are not keeping up with recycled weapons as they should. When dealing with radioactive materials, radioactive isotopes decay, you must recycle them. There aren’t facilities now to do the recycling that should be done. What excites you the most about your industry? What was exciting was that the laboratory sent me across 20 time zones, and I got to see the world. My wife and I have been to 41 countries; I’ve been to two that she hasn’t seen, and she’s been to two that I haven’t seen. I truly have had a blessed and marvelous career. The success I experienced in my career was not due to my own brilliance or effort but to the gifts and abilities God had given me. Whenever I faced a seemingly intractable problem, I learned to seek His wisdom and insight. Time and again, I witnessed how divine inspiration could break through even the toughest scientific conundrums.
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