English: Norman Bekkedahl studied chemical engineering at the University of Minnesota. He continued his studies at George Washington University and received his Ph.D. from the American University in Washington, DC. Bekkedahl was Deputy Chief of the Polymers Division at the NBS Institute for Materials Research. Bekkedahl’s international reputation led to a request from the Brazilian government to the U.S. government for him to establish a rubber laboratory in the Amazon valley. He received the 1967 Charles Goodyear Medal for his work with the application of thermodynamics to natural rubber. Bekkedahl made one of the first investigations of the glass transition of rubber and wrote more than 40 technical articles on rubber. In addition to NBS, Bekkedahl worked at the American Sugar Beet Company and the U.S. Department of Agriculture. Bekkedahl passed away in 1986.