Joseph Newton Fritz Dec. 27, 1931 – Jan. 27, 2024

COMMUNITY News:

The community is invited to attend the funeral service for Joseph Newton Fritz at 10 a.m. Saturday, June, 22, 2024 at the United Church of Los Alamos, at 2525 Canyon Road.

Fritz died Jan. 27, 2024 at the age of 92 due to complications from a fall he suffered in his long-time home in Los Alamos.

Fritz was born in the small coal mining community of Klein, Mont., Dec. 27, 1931, to Joe Fritz and Justina Fritz (née Stefanik). Early on, he displayed high aptitude for academic pursuits, of which his father, who had no access to education, was extremely proud. Fritz made his way from a one-room schoolhouse, through acceptance to Montana State University, all the way to Cornell University where he received his Ph.D. in physics.

He was a summer intern for the Los Alamos Scientific Laboratory in 1955. He and his wife Georgia moved permanently to Los Alamos in the winter of 1960/1961. Fritz became fully employed at what is now Los Alamos National Laboratory for the rest of his career, making important contributions to the shockwave physics field. His work is still being used to this day and is happily decipherable due to his deft coding and excellent penmanship.

Read his obituary here.