In Memoriam: Dr. Ernest A. Seglie, Physics 1967

Dr. Ernest A. Seglie, PHY’67, a nuclear physicist who joined the Office of the Secretary of Defense as the first Science Advisor, Operational Test and Evaluation, in 1988, died Sunday, May 1, in Rockville, Maryland. The cause was metastatic cancer.  A celebration of his life is planned at 3 p.m. on June 5, 2016, at Cedar Lane Unitarian Universalist Church in Bethesda Maryland.

Born and raised in Queens, New York, he was the son of Aldo Seglie, a builder, and Genevieve Seglie, a homemaker. At the Pentagon, his responsibilities included providing “scientific and technical guidance on the overall approach to DoD evaluation of the operational effectiveness and suitability of major DoD weapons systems.” After graduating from Saint Francis Preparatory School in New York City, he earned a BS in physics from The Cooper Union and a Ph.D. in theoretical nuclear physics from University of Massachusetts in 1972.

Dr. Ernest A. Seglie taught at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute and Yale University before joining the Institute for Defense Analyses in 1979. He received the Andrew J. Goodpaster Award for Excellence in Research in 1987, the International Test and Evaluation Association 2009 Allen R. Matthews Award for “leadership and technical contributions to the evaluation of operational effectiveness and suitability,” and the National Defense Industrial Association Walter W. Hollis Award in 2009. In addition, he was recipient of the President of the United States Rank Conferral of Meritorious Senior Professional in 2003 and the Secretary of Defense Medal for Meritorious Civilian Service in 2010, which included mention that he “led the drive to apply statistical methods to test design and evaluation.”

Recent areas of interest include test and evaluation policy in the Department of Defense and reliability. An avid fly-fisherman and photographer, he is survived by his wife of 29 years, Jean Fitzgerald Seglie of Kensington, stepdaughters Leila Kochis of Leander, Texas, and Sarah Jackson-Han of Chevy Chase, Maryland, three granddaughters, and a sister, Barbara Seglie, of the United Kingdom.

written by Sarah Jackson-Han, step daughter of Dr. Ernest A. Seglie