| DECEMBER 30 - BIRTHS | |
| John N. Bahcall | |
(source) |
 Born 30
Dec 1934
American astrophysicist who pioneered the development of neutrino astrophysics in the early 1960s. He theorized that neutrinos (subatomic particles that have no charge and exceedingly weak interaction with matter) can be used to understanding how stars shine. They are emitted by the sun and stars during the fusion energy creation process, and most are able to pass through the Earth without being stopped. He calculated the expected output of neutrinos from the sun, which created an experimental challenge to explain the unexpected result. He won the National Medal of Science (1998) for both his contributions to the planning and development of the Hubble Space Telescope and his pioneering research in neutrino astrophysics.«  Neutrino
Astrophysics, by John N. Bahcall. |
| Sir John (Theodore) Houghton | |
(source) |
Born 30
Dec 1931
Welsh metereologist who began in the late 1960's drawing attention to the buildup of carbon dioxide in the earth's atmosphere and its result of global warming, now known as the greenhouse effect. As director-general (1983) of the British Meteorological Office, he began tracking changing climate patterns. In 1990, he co-chaired a team of scientists working for the United Nations that produced the first comprehensive report on the science of climate change. This led to the 1997 U.N. Conference on Climate Change, in Kyoto, Japan. The Kyoto Protocol that resulted there was a treaty among industrialized and developed nations to combat global warming by voluntarily adhering to progressively stiffening emissions-reduction standards.« Global
Warming: The Complete Briefing, by John T. Houghton. |
| Asa Griggs Candler | |
(source) |
Born 30
Dec 1851; died 12 Mar 1929.
U.S. soft-drink manufacturer who expanded the marketing of the Coca-Cola soft drink created (1886) by pharmacist John "Doc" Pemberton who made the syrup that he used in his drugstore fountain drinks. When he died, the formula (still a very well kept secret) was sold to Asa Candler, a marketing genius. Candler devoted $50,000 a year to advertising, an unheard-of amount at the turn of the century. His goal was to make the drink a national product. He did this partially by bottling the product and not relying totally on fountain sales. There were constant legal battles to keep copy-cat products off the market, a fight eventually won with the patenting of a uniquely-shaped bottle. Coca-Cola advertising even influenced our view of Santa Claus.«
For
God, Country, and Coca-Cola: The Definitive History of the Great American
Soft Drink and the Company That Makes It, by Mark Pendergrast. |
| John Milne | |
(source) |
Born 30
Dec 1850; died 30 Jul 1913.
English seismologist who invented the horizontal pendulum seismograph (1894) and was one of the European scientists that helped organize the seismic survey of Japan in the last half of the 1800's. Milne conducted experiments on the propagation of elastic waves from artificial sources, and building construction. He spent 20 years in Japan, until 1895, when a fire destroyed his property, and he returned home to the Isle of Wight. He set up a new laboratory and persuaded the Royal Society to fund initially 20 earthquake observatories around the world, equipped with his seismographs. By 1900, Milne seismographs were established on all of the inhabited continents and he was recognized as the world's leading seismologist. He died of Bright's disease.«
Seismology,
by John Milne. |
|
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| DECEMBER 30 - DEATHS | |
| Eleanor Gibson | |
(source) |
 Died
30 Dec 2002 (born 7 Dec 1910)
Eleanor Jack Gibson was an American psychologist who studied learning processes in children. She is remembered for her “visual cliff” experiment which showed how an infant's depth perception helps prevent injuries and falls. In 1960, she placed 6-14 month old infants on a table covered with a sheet of plate glass that extended beyond the table's edge. When enticed with a favorite toy or coaxed by their mothers to crawl out beyond the table's edge onto the clear glass extension, nearly all of the babies withdrew. Thus she demonstrated that babies can distinguish depth. In 1992, Gibson was awarded the National Medal of Science, becoming one of only ten psychologists among 304 recipients of the award since 1962.« An
Odyssey in Learning and Perception, by Eleanor Gibson |
| Alfred North Whitehead | |
(source) |
Died
30 Dec 1947 (born 15 Feb 1861)
English mathematician and philosopher, who worked in logic, physics, philosophy of science and metaphysics. He is best known for his work with Bertrand Russell on one of probably the most famous books of the century, Principia Mathematica (1910-13) to demonstrate that logic is the basis for all mathematics. In physics (1910-24) his best known work was a theory of gravity, that competed with Einstein's general relativity for many decades. In his later life from 1924 onward at Harvard, he worked on more general issues in philosophy rather than mathematics, including the development of a comprehensive metaphysical system which has come to be known as process philosophy.« Science
and the Modern World, by Alfred North Whitehead. |
| Sir James Paget | |
(source) |
Died
30 Dec 1899 (born 11 Jan 1814)
(1st Baronet) British surgeon and physiologist, considered (with Rudolf Virchow) to be a founder of scientific medical pathology. As a new medical student, in 1834, Paget discovered the pathogen for trichinosis, a parasitic disease caused by Trichina spiralis, a minute roundworm that infests the muscles of the human body. In 1877, he described Paget's disease of bone (osteitis deformans), a chronic disease of bones, occurring in the elderly and most frequently affecting the skull, backbone, pelvis, and long bones. He also described an early indication of breast cancer known as Paget's disease of the breast (1874). Paget was one of the first to urge surgical removal of bone-marrow tumours (myeloid sarcoma) instead of limb amputation.« |
| John Henry Dallmeyer | |
(source) |
Died
30 Dec 1883 (born 6 Sep 1830)
German-born British inventor and manufacturer of lenses and telescopes. He introduced improvements in both photographic portrait and landscape lenses, in object glasses for the microscope, and in condensers for the optical lantern. Dallmeyer made photoheliographs (telescopes adapted for photographing the Sun) for Harvard observatory (1864), and the British government (1873). He introduced the "rapid rectilinear" (1866) which is a lens system composed of two matching doublet lenses, symmetrically placed around the focal aperture to remove many of the aberrations present in more simple constructions. He died on board a ship at sea off New Zealand. [Image: Dallmeyer 10x8 Rapid Rectilinear Brass Lens for a large format camera.] |
| John Needham | |
| Died
30 Dec 1781 (born 10 Sept 1713)
John Turberville Needham was an English naturalist and Roman Catholic priest, born in London. He experimented, with Buffon, on the idea of spontaneous generation of life. After boiling mutton broth and sealing it in sealed it in glass containers which were stored for a few days, then reopened, he found numerous microorganisms therein. His conclusion was that the organisms had arisen from non-living matter. (However, two decades later, Spallanzani indicated this was invalid since some spores could still survive the short period of boiling temperature Needham used.) He was the first clergyman of his faith to become a member of the Royal Society of London (1768). |
|
| Sir Samuel Morland | |
(source) |
Died
30 Dec 1695 (born 1625)
English mathematician and inventor of mechanical calculators. His first machine added and subtracted English money using eight dials that were moved by a simple stylus. Another could multiply and divide using 30 discs with numbers marked around the edge - circular versions of Napier's linear bones. Five more discs handled finding square and cube roots. His third machine made trigonometric calculations. Morland built a speaking trumpet (1671) he claimed would allow a conversation to be conducted over a distance of 3/4 mile. By 1675, he had developed various pumps for domestic, marine and industrial applications, such as wells, draining ponds or mines, and fire fighting. He also designed iron stoves for marine use, and improved barometers.« |
| Robert Boyle | |
(source) |
Died
30 Dec 1691 (born 25 Jan 1627)
Anglo-Irish chemist and natural philosopher noted for his pioneering experiments on the properties of gases and his espousal of a corpuscular view of matter that was a forerunner of the modern theory of chemical elements. He was a founding member of the Royal Society of London. From 1656-68, he resided at Oxford where Robert Hooke, who helped him to construct the air pump. With this invention, Boyle demonstrated the physical characteristics of air and the necessity of air for combustion, respiration, and the transmission of sound, published in New Experiments Physio-Mechanical, Touching the Spring of the Air and its Effects (1660). In 1661, he reported to the Royal Society on the relationship of the volume of gases and pressure (Boyle's Law). |
| Jan Baptista van Helmont | |
(source) |
Died
30 Dec 1644 (born 12 Jan 1580)
Belgian chemist, physiologist, and physician who recognized the existence of discrete gases and identified carbon dioxide. He was part medieval alchemist and part scientist. Helmont was the first to recognize the existence of gases distinct from atmospheric air. He determined that the gas given off by burning charcoal is the same as that given off by fermenting grape juice. He called it spiritus silvestre (“wild spirit”); we call it carbon dioxide. As a physician and physiologist, Helmont was one of the first to apply chemical principles to questions of human health and disease. He has been called by some the “father of biochemistry.” Yet, he was subjected to several interrogations by the Inquisition, and spent time under house arrest. |
| DECEMBER 30 - EVENTS | |
| Blue moon | |
 |
In 1982, a second full moon of the month was visible. Known as a "blue
moon," the name does not refer to its colour, but it is a rare event, giving
rise to the expression, "once in a blue moon" came from. This blue blue
moon was more special as a total lunar eclipse also occurred (U.S.). Although
there were 41 blue moons in the twentieth century, this was one of four
during an eclipse
of the moon, and the only total eclipse of a blue moon in the twentieth
century. A blue
moon happens every 2.7 years because of a disparity between our calendar
and the lunar cycle. The lunar cycle is the time it takes for the moon
to revolve around the earth, is 29 days, 12 hours, and 44 minutes. |
| Earth's curvature photographed | |
|
In 1930, a photograph showing the curvature of the Earth was exhibited
in Cleveland, Ohio, at a joint session of the American Association for
the Advancement of Science, holding its annual convention, and the Society
of Sigma XI. According to the New York Times report, it was the
first photograph to show the Earth's curvature. The picture, taken from
an airplane flying over South America by Capt. A.W.
Stevens of the U.S. Army, used super-sensitive panchromatic photographic
film to record an image of an area larger than some States. It showed the
distant horizon of the pampas over 300 miles ahead as bent slightly downward
toward one end. The speaker, Dr. C.E.K. Mees, research director at Eastman
Kodak Company said it was taken with a 1/50 sec. exposure.*« |
|
| Milky Way | |
 |
In 1924, Edwin
Hubble announced the existence of another galactic system in addition
to the Milky Way. He had found at least one "island universe," or galaxy
of stars, lies outside our own Milky Way. Until then, scientists were not
certain whether certain fuzzy clouds of light called "nebulae" that had
been seen with telescopes were small clusters of clouds within the Milky
Way or separate galaxies. Hubble measured
the distance to the Andromeda nebula and showed it to be a hundred thousand
times as far away as the nearest stars. This proved
it was a separate galaxy, as large as our own Milky Way, but very far away.
More galaxies have been found, some a spiral form like the Milky Way; others
spheroidal, others without the spiral arms, or of irregular shape. |
| Tungsten filaments | |
(source) |
In 1913, Dr William David Coolidge patented (#1,082,933) a method for making
ductile tunsten for the purpose of making filaments for electric lamps.
When Coolidge joined the General Electric Research Laboratory (1905), he
was given the task
of replacing the fragile carbon filaments in electric light bulbs with
tungsten filaments, although tungsten was difficult to work. He developed
a way to superheat the metal tunsten in order to draw it out into the fine
threads used for lamp filaments. Coolidge then improved the X-ray tube
by using a heated tungsten filament cathode in vacuum producing electrons,
instead of residual gas molecules in the tube. This permitted higher operating
voltages, higher energy X rays and the treatment of deeper-seated tumors. |
| US Weights and measures | |
|
In 1873, the American Metrological Society was formed in New York City
to improve systems of weights, measures and money. Its activities eventually
extended with a committee considering units of force and energy, and another
concerned with the adoption of Standard Time for the U.S. On 30 Dec 1884,
at the meeting of the American Metrological Society at Columbia College
in New York City, Charles S. Peirce read
a paper on the determination of gravity. He also participated in a discussion
of the adequacy of the standards of weight and measure in the United States
and pointed out some of the deficiencies in the current system. As a result
of his revelations, the Society passed a resolution recommending the appointment
of a committee to advise Congress on the need for establishing an efficient
bureau of standards. |
|
| Patent for cotton spinning | |
|
In 1791, a U.S. patent for spinning cotton by water power was issued to
William Pollard of Philadelphia. In his petition,
Pollard had stressed usefulness and an important economic value to the
U.S., rather than novelty. Actual details of any machine were vague and
secondary his claims being of deserving character. Pollard
was one of three British immigrants that sought exclusive rights to introduce
into America cotton spinning machines based on those devised by Richard
Arkwright in England. By Jun 1791, Pollard's factory was in full operation,
and is said to be the first water frame built in that city. However, it
was not successful, and for that reason may have in effect retarded the
growth of the industry in Philadelphia.« |
|
