Samuel Allen Face (1923 – 2001) was an American inventor and co-developer of some of the most important advances in concrete floor technology and wireless controls.
Early life and his studies
Face was born at the home of his maternal grandparents in City Point, Virginia. He attended Norfolk Public Schools and graduated from Matthew Fontaine Maury High School, the Norfolk Division of William and Mary/VPI (now Old Dominion University) and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.
His maternal grandfather, J. Fred Muhlig (1876–1948), also an MIT graduate, once worked as an engineer under Thomas Edison in West Orange, New Jersey.
After four years of employment as a marine engineer and naval architect at the Newport News Shipbuilding and Dry Dock Company, in 1951, this ninth generation resident of Hampton Roads joined the family of companies founded by his great-grandfather Edward Webster Face (1829–1907) in 1867.
Piezoelectric Technologies & Lightning Switch
Late in his life, Face became interested in piezoelectric technology, which led to his company's development of the Lightning Switch and other improvements and applications of piezoelectric actuators, generators and sensors... and Transoner transformers.
Death
Sam Face died of cancer in his home in the Larchmont section of Norfolk, Virginia in 2001. He was buried in Elmwood Cemetery in Norfolk.