James Gee

Sandburg High School graduate James Gee has used his ideas, work ethic and communication skills to rescue the University Chicago Yerkes Observatory and build it to its present-day strength. Called the birthplace of modern astrophysics, Yerkes was established in 1897. Today, the 77-acre, park-like site provides laboratory space and access to telescopes for research and instruction. Gee is also the Director of Space and Astrophysics Research Engineering for the University of Chicago where he supports research on the University's Chicago campus, at Yerkes Observatory, Argonne National Laboratory, Fermilab and South Pole Station. In his spare time, he is the Chief Operation Officer and Founder of Geneva Medical Imagining, a small research company that is developing and patenting a new portable imagining device to field-detect traumatic brain injury.