Chemists as Autobiographers The 20th Century Margaret Millar and Ian T. Millar The University. Keele. Staffordshire. England In this article, we bring to the present time our survey of chemists as autobiographers, which has already covered those born before the 20th century (I,2). Autobiography is focussed bv and unon the writer. As a recoenized and seoarate litera& form k dates only from the earG part of the iast centurv. I t contrasts with hiomanhvin several wavs: thus the latter &ally deals briskly i i i h childhood and early life, while the former dwells uoon them. In autohio~raohv - . - Parents are often important figures, hut spouses not; old age is usuallv. and death inevitahlv, omitted. The material on whichan autohiography is based is predominantly the memory of speech and scene, whereas in biography written material is commonly dominant. For the writer to have the self as his subject and the viewpoint a constantly changing one from youth to maturity is difficult enough, while retaining a true reflection of the moment. T o assess the more influential asnects of events and people upon that life, and to draw an interesting and t life in its context, is accurate oicture of the world. to ~ uthe a task that few autobiographers attempt. In an autobiography of lasting interest, it appears that a proper blend and balance exists between the inner world of the writer and the outer events and personalities shaping his life. In judging the result, we look for truth in its sundry forms; and for claims of meaningful shape in the writer's life, as he perceived it. We look also for a literary style in harmony with the personality that is heingrevealed; if these are not in accord. the result is inherentlv unsatisfadorv to the reader. ~here'shouldbe a basic unit; between the iescriber and the described: and this internal emnathv . - must enveloo the changing and developing attitudes and circumstances in the writer's life. His training in scientific observation should be of help to the chemist in his autohiographical writing. Honesty is essential to avoid the "original sin" of autohiography, which is being aware of the outcome of a phase of life and drawing a too-easy rational link between past and present. Worse still, imperfect memory, protective deceit, and fantasy combine to form major parts of our beliefs of the personal past. However, the use of scientific papers and work notes can also mislead, the real impressions of the time being concealed by the formal and rationalized account prepared for other readers. In these concluding autobiographies we move to a period in which the rules of life are less clear cut, bringing decisions of loyalty and moral stance to the chemist in-a world that science has changed more quickly than before, and in which politics have brought devastating changes in frontiers and ideas. Chemists in this era frequently find themselves caught up in the political changes, and in viewing the social changes their work can bring. As before, we consider chemist's autobiographies usually in sequence of their birth dates; and in this period, we include some physicists whose work bas had a major impact in chemistry. Carl Dulsberg Carl Duisberg (1861-1935) was a good chemist and a highly successful industrialist but is not very effective as an
autobiographer (3). His interest in chemistry began a t school. and led to oostdoctoral studies with A. von Baever and then to work on syntheticdyrs with the Bayer company. His success in the svnthesis of new dves was auicklv followed a t &e ~ G m a nSuby his success in defending his preme Court,. despite being.opposed by the famous H. Caro, . .. In a case that hecame a critical precedent. Bayer and its rising young chemist Duisherg both prospered; he suggested and oversaw the building of the Bayer factory on a new green-field site a t Leverkusen (on the Rhine between Cologne and Dusseldorf) that included such novel features as clinics and social facilities and homes for its workers, all managed .. bv. the comnanv. . . The chemical librarv. stocked with 1xr)kspurchased from KekuM, V. Meyer, and Roscoe, is of Leverku. still the lareest in Germanv: and the .ovulation . sen exceeded 100,000 by the 1960's. The creation of a combine of Bayer with other major chemical firms was another Duisberg idea, and he became Chairman of the Board of Directors of the resulting I. G. Farbenindustrie. He had already founded the US.division of Bayer and set up a society to sponsor the exchange of young economists and scientists between Germany and other countries. Some of those who wrote of him (e.g., Willstatter) describe an unattractivelv cold and arroeant oersonality, a t least in later life. Paul Walden (1863-1957) best known for his work on stereochemical inversion, wrote an autohiographical article at the reauest of R. E. Oesoer; its interest is limited by its brevity (4).
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Marle Curle Her American friends asked Marie Curie (1867-1934) to write the story of her life. She clearly felt an obligation to respond to the request in view of their generous research support in 1921 and the Autobiographical Notes added to her biography of Pierre Curie was the result (5). Autobiographical writing apparently was not in accord with Marie Curie's personality, nor would she normally have found the
Figure 1 The Ka ser W Ihe m ins1 M e tor Cnem s R ~ .Ber "-Dan em. on 1913 Many mapr German chemlsls worreo nerc incl.ang E Flrcher. W Israner. Haber. Hahn, Krabs, Debye, and Warburg.
Volume 65
Number 10 October 1988
847
leisure for such a pursuit. A tribute to her husband Pierre (killed in a street accident in 1906) and her research would always have seemed more important than recording her experience of life. She writes At first, the idea seemed alien to me, but I yielded to persuasion. However,Icould not conceive my biography as a completeexpressian of personal feelingsor a detailed description of all incidents I would remember. Many of our feelingschange with the years, and, when faded away, may seem altogether strange; incidents lose their momentary interest and may be remembered as if they have occurred to some other person. But there may be in a life some general direction,some continuous thread, due to afew dominant ideas and a few strong feelings that explain the life and are characteristic of human personality. Of my life, which has not been easy on the whole, I have described the general course and the essential features, and trust that my story gives an understanding of the state of mind in which I have lived and worked. The autobiography is a straightforward account of her life to 1921. Such a busv life left no time for contemnlation of such questions as "who am I?" Nevertheless, a clear personality emerges and in the account of her earlier days in Poland she does not conceal her passion for her native country. She writes feelinelv of her strueele for education in Russianoccupied poland and providesan insight into the experience of foreign repression upon the voune. The natriotic devotion and a hard-won degree a t th;sorbonne produced a young woman unusually devoted to hard work and to her research. Perhaps she answered thc question "what made me?" The 1914-1918 u,ar arrived afier a long period of intense activitv for her. She had discovered and examined the radioelements polonium and radium, married and given birth to two dauahters. received Nobel Prizes in Phvsics and in Chemi.it&,cop~dwith a household, ill health, her husband's d e ~ t and h shortlv afterwards the death oi her father-in-law. with whom she had shared the tasks of caring for her chil: dren. Her teaching duties continued throughout, along with increasing demands for lectures and articles. The new chair of physics created for Pierre at the Sorbonne was offered to ~ & e she ; was the first woman to hold a position in higher educationin France. In 1914 she organizedx-ray services for military hospitals. Radiography had hardly begun, and there was as yet no provision for it in the hospitals, hut in war the sureeon's need for it was overwhelming. u She devoted herself to securing equipment, visiting ambulance stations and hosnitals. and findine and instructine suitable "maninulators" ithe new radiogriphers). ~ u r i n g i h i stime she a160 moved her lahoratorv into new huildines in the Rue Pierre Curie. Many of the staff and students had been mobilized and she wasleft withone invalid mechanic. Marieseems to haw kerjt a sense of proportion; on the first day of the German hornbardment of Paris, she was planting- roses around the laboratory. By the end of the war in 1918 she was exhausted and discouraged. The need for development in her science was greater than ever, but in a country recovering from war there was a lack of resources. In 1921 the women of America, organized by Mrs. W. B. Meloney, collected sufficient money to present Marie Curie with the gift of a gram of radium for her research use. I t was an immense encouragement to her a t a vital moment. She died at 67 probably from leukemia: her exposure to radioactivity is suggestive in this.
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R. A. Millikan (1868-1953), although a physicist to the marrow, is familiar to chemists through his elegant, satisfying, and accurate oil-drop experiment in fundamental chemical physics, whereby the effect of the arrival and departure of electrons on an oil droplet could be directly observed and the charge on the electron (e) calculated. His autobiography ( 6 )opens with a brief and entertaining account of his child848
Journal of Chemical Education
Figure 2. Michelson, Einstein, and Millikanat California Institute of Technology in 1931.
hood in the rural American Midwest. Almost his earliest memory was of the sound of the steamboat foehorns and the thundemormsm the upper Mississippi. ~e
