James Owen Perrine

James Owen Perrine (February 26, 1886 – September 10, 1974) was an American physicist, college professor, developer of telephone technology, and coach of college football and college basketball.

Perrine was a 1909 graduate of the University of Iowa, where he lettered in football on the 1908 team.^[1]

Perrine served as the head football coach at the University of Northern Iowa–then known as Iowa State Teachers College–in Cedar Falls, Iowa in 1910 and 1917.^[2]

Perrine earned a bachelor's degree from the University of Iowa, a master's degree from the University of Michigan, and a doctorate in physics from Cornell University. He was a professor at the University of Northern Iowa and also lectured on physics at Yale University and Montclair State University. From 1939 to 1951, he was an assistant vice president at AT&T, where he developed transatlantic telephone technology and the dial telephone.^[3]

Perrine was born on February 26, 1886, in Bushnell, Illinois to Peter and Elizabeth Rockefeller Perrine. He married Blanch Albright on October 1, 1910, in Burlington, Iowa. Perrine died on September 10, 1974, at the Western Home in Cedar Falls, Iowa.^[4]

• James Owen Perrine at Find a Grave