edited by
JOHN H. WOTlZ
Southern Illinois University Carbondale, Illinois 62901
Who was First in R&D? Byron M. Vadtlerbilt Green Valley, Arizona 85614 Most U.S. companies have an R&D department. Large companies and corporations may have a separate R&D cornpany as an affiliate. This type of enterprise, which has only become cornmonolace in the 20th Centurv. - . must have had a beginning. Who was first? If you read the chemical literature, you get many answers-General Electric, Eastman Kodak, and Du Pont being most freauentlv mentioned. T h e then ACS oresident. Glenn Seaborg,-in thrs Centennial address td the'society in 1976, stated that "General Electric set up the first industrial lahorltnrv .-.-,in ... the ....1Tnitd ...... - Stntea - .-...devoted -- . ....- to ..hasir - -. - - science -. .. ... .. . ." . I 1 \~ In 1900 Willis Whitney of M.I.T. started a laboratory with & chemist a t the G.E. plant located in Schenectady. Whitney continued to live in Cambridge but visited Schenectady periodicallv. In 1904 three additional chemists were broueht in and wh%ney hecame a full-time G.E. employee. Their ';basic science" dealt orimarilv with imorovine the incandescent lamp. Du Pont founded their Eastern Laboratory in 1902 for work on improved explosives. The following year their Experiment Station was organized and housed in an old cotton mill on the Brandywine. Eastman Kodak hired Kenneth Mees in 1913 and soon had a laboratory doing research on photography. Many years before these abo;e-mentionedmeagk effdrts in industrial research, Thomas Edison had established a true rrswn.h and drwlopment cc,nter at \lrnlcn Park. N t w .lerity (2,. By lh7A rhc sire r,msiited of six huiltlinys, which included a tw,-sturv lahcnatorv of 5.000 tt2 aorkinl! ware. 'l'hc. technical staffincluded t6ree P ~ D ' S and numerous technicians. Besides the research laboratorv there was a seoarate analvtical laboratory, a library headed ;p by a professional, a bu;iness office, a drafting room, a machine shoo. and a seoarate h t ~ i l d ~ nfor g glnsc l,lrnwing.'l'hii re3earrh rrmter was rht: lirsr 1,) use inrnndescent l i r h r ~ n rComniunicarim . to the r,ur\ide was excellent. A telegraph l&e from the laboratory connected with a Western Union line running along the nearby New York-Philadelphia railroad track. Thus, Edison's Menlo Park Laboratory was the prototype of the present industrial research center. Charles Kettering, noted inventor, and General David Sarnoff, reknowned executive of the RCA Corooration. have called this Edison's p r a t e - t invention. As pointed out in Kelerence ti'). Ediam's M e n l i ~I'ark I.oborntur\ a.35 likrlv the world's firv 1&1) center. Edison's second research center was established well before any truly industrial research was started by others. His laboratories a t West Orange, New Jersey, occupied in 188%had laboratory and service area about ten times that a t Menlo Park. Today this site is largely as built and furnished by Ed~~~~
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ison and is a National Historic Site of the National Park Service, U S . Department of the interior. Thomas Edison and several of his staff were good chemists. Chemistry and chemical engineering were major fields of interest in his R&D program. Fourteen firsts in these fields are listed on pp. 335336 in a book dealing with ~ d i ~ ~ as a chemist (3). some of those accomplished at the ~~~l~ Park Laboratories include:
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The preparation of carbon fibers. Demonstration that carbon could be heated to over 2,000' C in uacuo without disintegration or severe volatilization. Ohsewation of the strong adsorption of gases by platinum metal. Major advances in electrical insulation for indoor, outdoor, and underground installations. Why are Edison's accomplishments in chemistry so neglected in textbooks? The best explanation is that science books are written largely by academicians and since Edison ouhlished little in the scientific literature, these authors knew iittle of his work. Hopefully future authors and speechmakers will give credit where credit is due when discoursing on early industrial research and the various fields to which ~ d i s o n contributed. It is encouraging that arecent hook on American chemists includes Thomas Edison (.4 .) . Some scientists of the late 19th Century tended to depreciate Edison's work. Often they were wrong. Jean Dumas, the great French chemist, predicted that Edison's light would fail because fraeile carbon would disinteerate a t incandescent " u temperatures. Henry Morton, president of Stevens Institute, ridiculed Edison's early attempts to replace gas lighting with electricity. Fortunately, times have changed. As a part of the nation's bicentennial activities, the Museum of Science and Industry in Chicago carried out a survey to select America's ten greatest scientists, engineers, inventors, and innovators (5).The Museum polled its 14-member Bicentennial Advisory Committee consisting of leading scientists, engineers, and historians. Thomas Alva Edison was the overwhelming choice as the greatest of this composite group. Literature Cited
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Mi1ep.w. D.;'Amerim
Chomisband Chemical Engineem." AmericanChemicalSaietv. \Varhinyton. IIC.. 1976. IS1 Danibr. Y..I.. "America's (ireaterl lliro~voriar.Invmticma,and lnnwations,'Ind. R18. .i h > I: r l , (41
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This column is a series of short articles on the less known events that contributed to important and interesting developments in c>f chemistry. ~ ~ ~ abut ~ two double-spaced, ~ ~ ~ typewritten i ~
pages and other inquiries should he addressed to the column editor, Dr. John Wotiz, Department o f ' Chemistry and Biochemistry, Southern Illinois University. Carbondale, Illinois 62901.
Volume 56. Number 5, May 1979 / 319
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