Harry George Drickamer was a pioneer experimentalist in high-pressure studies of condensed matter. His work generally concerned understanding the electronic properties of matter. Harry Drickamer was born Harold George Wiedenthal to Louise and Harold Wiedenthal in Cleveland, Ohio on November 19, 1918. He attended Vanderbilt University on football scholarship, then Indiana University, finally transferring to the University of Michigan where he received the B.S. in Chemical Engineering in 1941 and was President of his Engineering College class. He was elected to the National Academy of Science , the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, and the American Philosophical Society. Among many awards he received were the Buckley Solid State Physics Award, the Irving Langmuir Award, the P.W. Bridgman and Michelson-Morley Awards, the John Scott Award from the City of Philadelphia, the Peter Debye Award in Physical Chemistry, the Robert Welch Award, the Cresson Medal from the Franklin Institute. In 1989 he was awarded the National Medal of Science. He received an honorary doctorate from the Russian Academy of Sciences (1994).