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Matthew Arnold Allen, a former Mountain View Mayor and physicist who worked at Stanford Linear Accelerator Center for more than 40 years, died of complications from end stage Alzheimer’s at a Palo Alto retirement community on April 11, according to his son Peter Allen. He was 94.
A staunch supporter of science and public service, Allen worked hard to improve the lives of Mountain View residents and the wider community, according to colleagues and friends.
Allen was also known as a forward-thinker, upending established norms to advocate for more progressive housing and land use policies when he served on the Mountain View City Council in the 1970s.
“It was like a whole new fresh air coming in,” said Betsy Collard, who campaigned for Allen when he first ran for City Council in 1974. It had been an old-boys network until then, Collard said.
That year, Allen and his supporters went door-to-door handing out seed packets with the message, “Government is like a garden that takes ongoing care,” Collard said.
The message was effective. Allen was elected to the City Council in 1974, securing the most votes in the packed race. Two incumbents lost their seats, according to the Palo Alto Times.
“It was a surprise to most observers,” the newspaper said at the time.
Personal and professional life
Born in Edinburgh, Scotland in 1930, Allen grew up during the upheavals of World War II. When the war broke out, Allen and his older sister were evacuated to a village and temporarily separated from the rest of their family. Even so, Allen said that he had a fairly normal childhood, as recounted in an interview with the American Institute of Physics in 2020.
A gifted student, Allen attended the University of Edinburgh and graduated with a B.S. in physics. He then served in the British Army as a radar officer for two years before emigrating to the U.S. in 1955.
That same year, Allen attended Stanford University as a graduate student and received his Ph.D. in physics in 1959.
It also was during this time that Allen met his wife, Marcia Katzman, a graduate student earning a doctorate in molecular biology at Stanford University. They married in 1957, a partnership that lasted for more than 65 years until his wife’s death in 2023.
In 1961, Allen and Marcia moved to Boston where Allen worked at Microwave Associates while Marcia took up a post-doctoral position at Massachusetts Institute of Technology. They also grew their family in Boston, having two sons while a third son was born when they returned to the Bay Area several years later.
In 1965, Allen accepted a job at Stanford Linear Accelerator Center where he worked for more than four decades. Allen retired as an associate director in 2003.
“He was a high-level person at Stanford Linear Accelerator Center, really a bright guy,” said Judge Leslie Nichols, who served with Allen on the City Council in the 1970s and early 80s. “But he was more than that. He was a great guy, wonderful man, good sense of humor.”
Public service
The Allens settled in Mountain View in 1965, a time when the city was transitioning from a largely agricultural area to technological industries. Allen welcomed these changes, but always had an affinity for nature and the preservation of open space, according to his son.
The creation of the Shoreline Regional Park District compelled him to enter local politics.
“I went to the Mountain View City Council, and it wasn’t too difficult to persuade them to support it,” Allen said about the district, which he recounted decades later in an interview with the American Institute of Physics.
Allen’s involvement with Shoreline Park led a City Council member to encourage him to apply to the city’s Planning Commission. Allen served on the commission for three years, from 1971 to 1974, before being elected to the City Council.
According to Allen, the League of Women Voters tapped him to challenge council incumbents. “They were somewhat dissatisfied. They thought that the City Council was not responsive enough to the citizens,” he said in the interview.
Allen served two terms on the City Council, from 1974 to 1982, and was mayor in 1977 and 1980.
There were a lot of big changes happening in Mountain View at that time. There was a push for the revitalization of the downtown area and for more housing, as well as a need for major infrastructural upgrades, Nichols said.
“If you went pretty much through the whole downtown, the infrastructure had never really been developed to contemporary standards,” Nichols said.
Allen attended numerous neighborhood meetings and got the community behind these projects, Nichols said.
Allen also favored stronger tenancy protections and backed an ordinance that limited condominium conversions that is still on the books today.
In the 1970s, many of rentals were being converted into condos, according to Nichols. The trend was displacing tenants, many of whom did not have adequate time to find new housing on 30-day notice. The council passed an ordinance that limited condo conversions and established other tenancy protections, like allowing longer move-out periods.
“He was the lead signer of the argument for 1979’s Measure C, the (Condominium) Conversion Limitation Act, which passed and technically is still in effect,” said Lenny Siegel, a housing advocate who spearheaded rent relief and rent control initiatives during that time.
Allen also was at the helm of the council during a 40-day firefighter strike. It was stressful, but the council did not accede to the union’s demands, according to Nichols. “We just didn’t feel that we could afford the pension,” Nichols said, adding that it ended without anyone being fired.
A city proclamation highlighted Allen’s leadership as well, noting that he “survived the fiery ordeal of a labor dispute.”
The council cultivated congeniality and good working relationships even when people disagreed on issues, according to Richard Wilmuth, who served with Allen on the City Council for six years.
“(Allen) was a key part of it. He was not selfish. He gave his all for the city. He loved Mountain View, and it worked well,” Wilmuth said.
Allen is survived by three sons Bruce Allen (Rina), Peter Allen (Marlon) and David Allen (Jane); and two grandsons.
A memorial service will be held on Friday, May 30 at 2 p.m. at the Vi at Palo Alto located at 620 Sand Hill Road, Palo Alto. Donations in Allen’s memory can be made to the Peninsula Open Space Trust, his family said.
