 in mathematics and physics from DePauw University in Greencastle, Indiana in 1936 and his M.A.and Ph.D. in philosophy from the University of Michigan in Ann Arbor in 1937 and 1941, respectively.The summer after obtaining his Ph.D., the young Dr. Burks moved to Philadelphia, Pennsylvania and enrolled in the national defense electronics course offered by the University of Pennsylvania's Moore School of Electrical Engineering; his laboratory teaching assistant was J. Presper Eckert, a graduate student at the Moore School; a fellow student was John Mauchly, the chairman of the physics department at Ursinus College in nearby Collegeville, Pennsylvania.