In 1979 Tom Baur, a researcher at the National Center for Atmospheric Research, started  Meadowlark Optics as an after-hours venture in a spare bedroom of his Longmont,  Colorado, home. For a project he was leading in measuring the magnetic fields in the sun’s spots, Baur needed an optical device called Pockels cells, which he designed for his own work, and to meet the project demands of other astronomers. Based on the success of that one device, Baur began to design and make other products. When operations outgrew the spare room, he remodeled his barn, replacing the hayloft with offices and workrooms. As the Meadowlark band of polarization experts grew and the world learned more of our ultrahigh-quality work, Baur accommodated the growth by revamping his chicken coop.

As the company continued to grow, one might say we flew the coop. While still calling the small town of Frederick home, Meadowlark has been creating world-class polarization optics from a state-of-the-art manufacturing facility since 1998. To ensure precision and top quality, our  20,000-square-foot headquarters boasts the latest in clean rooms, optical fabrication,  metrology facilities, and a breath-taking view of Colorado’s Front Range. 

In the twenty-first century, Meadowlark products help position customers worldwide to pioneer their own innovations. These include our advances in liquid crystals with one-of-a-kind polarization controllers and the Liquid Crystal Stokes Polarimeter. Likewise, our outstanding metrology services measure waveplates to subnanometer precision. One-thousandth of a wave of retardance is our standard accuracy. 

In being true to our beginnings, we remain a pioneer in photonics, an innovator of optics solutions, and the only manufacturer of thin-crystal Pockels cells. Our current work in polarization, as our beginnings with the Pockels cells once were, is steeped in the technological possibility that is yet to unfold, which is why we are committed to our customers.