As a physics professor at Washington University in St. Louis, Pake was an early researcher in nuclear magnetic resonance, work that directly led to the MRI scanner. But in 1970 Pake was lured away from WUSTL to head a newly created research laboratory: Xerox’s Palo Alto Research Center.
Researchers at PARC — not Apple, not Microsoft — invented the graphical user interface, the mouse, the laser printer, and Ethernet and local area networks. “George used to say he’d be surprised if anything came out of the lab within five years that would have tremendous impact on the corporation,” said John Shoch, one of PARC’s early researchers. “He set the time horizon pretty far out. That was pretty unusual in the context of a corporation.” Pake’s vision earned him a National Medal of Science in 1987. He died March 4 from heart failure at his home in Tucson, Ariz. He was 79.