Singer-activist Joan Baez' father dies

REDWOOD CITY, Calif., March 23 (UPI) -- Albert Baez, a pioneer in X-rays and father of folk singers Joan Baez and the late Mimi Farina, has died in Redwood City, Calif., at age 94.

Baez died Tuesday of natural causes in a care facility, the Los Angeles Times reported Friday.

Baez, a physicist, helped lay the foundation in the 1940s for the then-developing field of X-ray imaging optics and was on the team that developed the first X-ray reflection microscope that could examine living cells, the Times said.

The launch of the Soviet satellite Sputnik started a movement to improve U.S. science education, a cause that soon dominated his career. Baez helped make films aimed at improving the teaching of high school physics before being named the first director of UNESCO's science-teaching division.

In her memoir, Joan Baez said she admired her father for valuing teaching, not potentially lucrative defense work.

"We would never have all the fine and useless things little girls want. ... Instead we would have a father with a clear conscience," she recalled in her memoir. "Decency would be his legacy to us."

In addition to Joan, he is survived by his wife, another daughter, three grandchildren and a great-granddaughter.