Henry Cary (3 May 1908 – 20 December 1991) was an American engineer and the co-founder of the Applied Physics Corporation (later known as Cary Instruments), along with George W. Downs and William Miller. The Cary 14 UV-Vis-NIR and the Cary Model 81 Raman Spectrophotometer were particularly important contributions in scientific instrumentation and spectroscopy. Before starting Applied Physics, Cary was employed by Beckman Instruments, where he worked on the design of several instruments including the ubiquitous DU spectrophotometer. Howard Cary was a founder and the first president of the Optical Society of Southern California. Personal life Henry Howard Cary was born on 3 May 1908 in Los Angeles, California to Henry Gardner Cary and Bessie (Brown) Cary. The 1940 US Census listed Cary as married to Barbara (Ward) Cary from Washington state. His occupation was recorded as research engineer and industry as laboratory. In 1991, Cary died of pneumonia after a long illness at Orange, California. Education In 1925, after graduating from Los Angeles High School, Cary entered the California Institute of Technology. He missed one year due to illness, and graduated in 1930 with a B.S. degree in civil engineering. In sports, he was captain of the varsity tennis squad. During his first year he won the junior travel prize. Cary was a member of Sigma Xi. After receiving his degree, Cary went to work in his father's plumbing construction business, H. G. Cary Co. He held a variety of engineering and accounting positions with the company during the early years of the Great Depression. National Technical Laboratories As of May 31, 1935, Cary was hired by Arnold Beckman of National Technical Laboratories (NTL) (later Beckman Instruments). By 1937, Cary was the chief design engineer on Beckman's research team. Cary distinguished himself in work relating to pH meters and glass electrodes, and became vice-president of development. By 1940 Cary and Beckman were developing a quartz spectrophotometer. They presented a paper on this work in July 1941 at MIT's Summer Conference on Spectroscopy. Cary made substantial contributions, including the design of a reliable ultraviolet phototube for the instrument. The DU spectrophotometer was the first easy-to-use single instrument containing both the optical and electronic components needed for ultraviolet-absorption spectrophotometry. During World War II, National Technical Laboratories worked on a number of then-secret projects, including one for the development of synthetic rubber. The Office of Rubber Reserve of the United States government