A personal history of random data analysis

At the International Modal Analysis Conference IMAC XXIII in Orlando, FL, I gave an invited talk on February 1, 2005 where I spoke about some of my work in the field of random data analysis over the past 50 years. Prof. Al Wicks from Virginia Polytechnic Institute, the Conference Chairman, attended this session and asked me to write a paper to benefit people in the field. Prof. Rune Brincker from Aalborg University in Denmark, the Chairman of the first IOMAC International Operational Modal Analysis Conference, to be held in Copenhagen on April 26-27, 2005, was also present. He invited me to write an introductory paper for the IOMAC Proceedings where I might use a historical perspective. This article was my response to Al Wicks and Rune Brincker. The IOMAC organizing committee also asked me to give the “Lecture of Honor” at the IOMAC conference dinner in Copenhagen on April 26, 2005. I greatly appreciated this special recognition for the contributions I was able to make with the help of people mentioned in this article. In particular, I want to acknowledge the close association with Allan Piersol, a mechanical engineer whom I met in 1960 when we did some pioneering research work for the Flight Dynamics Laboratory at WrightPatterson Air Force Base in Dayton, OH. Allan is the coauthor with me of six textbooks on Random Data Analysis and Engineering Applications, that were published by Wiley, New York, from 1966 to 2000. I also want to thank Paul Palo, an ocean engineer, who sponsored 10 years of research work from 1985 to 1995 that I did for the U. S. Naval Civil Engineering Laboratory and the Office of Naval Research. This work developed new practical ways to identify and analyze nonlinear system dynamic properties, and to two books on Nonlinear System Techniques and Applications published in 1990 and 1998.