| APRIL 30 - BIRTHS | |
| Eugen Bleuler | |
(source) |
 Born 30
Apr 1857; died 15 July 1939.
Swiss psychiatrist, who made notable contributions to the understanding of mental illness, and coined the term "schizophrenia" (1908) for the disorder previously named as dementia praecox by Emil Kraepelin. Bleuler realised the condition was neither a dementia, nor did it always occur in young people (praecox meaning early) and so gave the condition the name from the Greek for split (schizo) and mind (phrene). Contrary to the belief of the time, he held that schizophrenia was neither invariably incurable, nor would always progress to full dementia. He was one of the first psychiatrists to apply psychoanalytical methods in his research, and was an early proponent of the theories of Sigmund Freud.«  Dementia
Praecox or The Group of Schizophrenias, by Eugen Bleuler. |
| John Lubbock | |
(source) |
Born 30
Apr 1834; died 28 May 1913.
1st Baron Avebury. English banker, politician, naturalist and archaeologist who coined the terms Neolithic and Paleolithic. Like his father, astronomer Sir John William Lubbock, his scientific work was an avocation. Lubbock was a friend and advocate of Charles Darwin. He discovered the first fossil remains of musk-ox in England (1855), and undertook archaeological work identifying prehistoric cultures. As a naturalist, he studied insect vision and colour sense. He published a number of books on natural history and primitive man. In 1870, he became a member of Parliament. The legislation he initiated included the Bank Holidays Act (1871) and the Ancient Monuments Act (1882) and the Shop Hours Act (1886). He was made a peer in 1900.« 
Ants,
Bees, and Wasps: A Record of Observations, by John Lubbock. |
| Carl Friedrich Gauss | |
(source) |
Born 30
Apr 1777; died 23 Feb 1855
German mathematician who transformed nearly all areas of mathematics, for which his talent showed from a very early age. For his contributions to theory in magnetism and electricity, a unit of magnetic field has been named the gauss. He devised the method of least squares in statistics, and his Gaussian error curve remains well-known. He anticipated the SI system in his proposal that physical units should be based on a few absolute units such as length, mass and time. In astronomy, he calculated the orbits of the small planets Ceres and Pallas by a new method. He invented the heliotrope for trigonometric determination of the Earth's shape. With Weber, he developed an electromagnetic telegraph and two magnetometers.«
Carl
Friedrich Gauss: Titan of Science, by G. Waldo Dunnington. |
|
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| APRIL 30 - DEATHS | |
| Joel H. Hildebrand | |
(source) |
 Died
30 Apr 1983 (born 16 Nov 1881)
US educator and chemist whose monograph Solubility (1924; later editions, Solubility of Non-Electrolytes) was the classic reference for almost a half century. The Hildebrand solubility parameter carries his name. |
| Sir Almroth Wright | |
(source) |
Died
30 Apr 1947 (born 10 Aug 1861)
Sir Almroth Edward Wright was an English bacteriologist who developed an immunization against typhoid fever that protected British soldiers in WW I, saving lives from infection. It was the result of his work beginning in 1892, while professor of pathology at the Army Medical School, using typhoid bacilli killed by heat. Tests on over 3,000 soldiers in India were followed by its successful use during the South African (Boer) War. He was noted for creating autogenous vaccines, prepared from the bacteria harboured by the patient. Wright also developed vaccines against enteric tuberculosis and pneumonia and contributed to the study of opsonins (blood enzymes that make bacteria more susceptible to phagocytosis by white cells.)« The
Plato of Praed Street: The Life And Times of Almroth Wright ,
by Michael S. Dunnill. |
| David Randall-MacIver | |
(source) |
Died
30 Apr 1945 (born 31 Oct 1873)
English-born American archaeologist and anthropologist who excaved in Egypt and Sudan. He began his career at the excavation (1899-1901) of Abydos, Egypt, led by Sir Flinders Petrie. After conducting excavations of the Zimbabwe ruins in Southern Rhodesia (now Zimbabwe), Randall-MacIver wrote Medieval Rhodesia (1906), in which he contended that these great ruins were not built by an ancient and vanished white civilization as was currently believed but were of purely African origin and that they dated from about the 14th century. This view was borne out by later archaeological study. From 1907 to 1911 Randall-MacIver led an expedition into Egypt and the Sudan.« [Image: aerial view of the Great Zimbabwe ruins.] Greek
Cities in Italy and Sicily, by David Randall-MacIver. |
| J.C. Arthur | |
(source) |
Died
30 Apr 1942 (born 11 Jan 1850)
Joseph Charles Arthur was an American botanist who discovered basic facts about the parasitic fungi known as "rusts." He was the first head of the Department of Botany and Plant Pathology at Purdue University. The plant rusts form one of the largest natural groups of plant parasitic fungi. They are of great scientific interest because of their close evolutionary relationships with their host plants, their complex life cycles, and their numerous biological adaptations that permit them to thrive on all the continents (except Antarctica) under great extremes of environments. |
| William Henry Welch | |
(source) |
Died
30 Apr 1934 (born 8 Apr 1850)
American pathologist who played a major role in the introduction of modern medical practice to the U.S. As the first dean of the medical school at Johns Hopkins University (1893-98), Welch revolutionized American medicine by demanding of its students a rigorous study of physical sciences and an active involvement in clinical duties and laboratory work. His students included Walter Reed, James Carroll and Simon Flexner. As an original investigator, With Flexner, he demonstrated (1891-92) the pathological effects produced by diphtheria toxin. In 1892, he discovered Micrococcus albus and its relation to wound fever and of Clostridium welchii (Welch's bacillus), the causative agent of gas gangrene.  "William
Henry Welch and the Heroic Age of American Medicine" by
Simon Flexner, James Thomas Flexner |
| Ludwig Büchner | |
(source) |
Died
30 Apr 1899 (born 29 Mar 1824)
German physician and philosopher who became one of the most popular exponents of 19th-century scientific materialism. He wrote many works to disseminate knowledge of the natural sciences. These were based on his definition of force as "expression for the cause of a possible or an actual movement," and on the unity of matter and force. No insight was conceivable without exact knowledge of matter and its laws. "The laws according to which nature acts, and matter moves, now destroying, now rebuilding, and thus producing the most varied organic and inorganic forms, are eternal and unalterable." He also did much to spread knowledge of Darwin's work in particular. |
| Abram Lyle | |
(source) |
Died 30 Apr 1891 (born 14 Dec 1820)
Scottish shipowner and sugar refiner, known for Lyle's Golden Syrup. Lyle began in his father's cooperage business, but later extended into shipping with John Kerr. Their fleet grew from 161 tons in 1849 to 22,000 tons in 1870. As a cooper, Lyle supplied casks to ship Caribbean sugar and molasses. This led them to join with other partners to operate the Glebe Sugar Refinery (1865). Lyle moved the shipping operation in 1881 to wharves in East London where he built a refinery specialising in the production of golden syrup. When the price of raw sugar collapsed in 1882, Lyle suffered huge losses forcing reduction of his business holdings, yet his golden syrup product eventually thrived. Sugar refiner Henry Tate amalgamated with Lyle in 1921.« [Image right: Lyle's Golden Syrup tin showing the original motif of a sleeping lion surrounded by bees.] |
| Joseph Leidy | |
1863 (source) |
Died
30 Apr 1891 (born 9 Sep 1823)
American zoologist, who made significant contributions in a remarkably wide range of earth and natural science disciplines, including comparative anatomy, parasitology, and paleontology. As the Father of American Vertibrate Paleontology, he described not only the first relatively complete dinosaur skeleton, but the diversity of fossil finds in the American West. His knowledge of comparative anatomy enabled him to make sense of even fragmentary fossil remains. He was also a competant microscopist, scientific illustrator, and published papers in human biology and medicine. His microscopic examination of parasite cysts in cooked ham and microorganisms in housefly mouthparts enabled him to improve public heath.« Joseph
Leidy: The last man who knew everything, by Leonard Warren. |
| William Starling Sullivant | |
(source) |
Died
30 Apr 1873 (born 15 Jan 1803)
American botanist who was the foremost U.S. bryologist in his time. Sullivant graduated in the same year his father died, and took over his surveying business. He began studying and the plant life of central Ohio and published A Catalogue of Plants, Native and Naturalized, in the Vicinity of Columbus, Ohio (1840). When he expanded his interest to the bryophytes (mosses and liverworts), he cataloged not only specimens from the U.S., but also Central America, South America, and various Pacific Ocean islands. He was elected to the National Academy of Sciences in 1872. The moss Sullivantia Ohioensis was named in his honour.« |
| Robert Fitzroy | |
(source) |
Died
30 Apr 1865 (born 5 Jul 1805)
British naval officer, hydrographer, and meteorologist who commanded the voyage of HMS Beagle, aboard which Charles Darwin sailed around the world as the ship's naturalist. That voyage provided Darwin with much of the material on which he based his theory of evolution. Fitzroy retired from active duty in 1850 and from 1854 devoted himself to meteorology. He devised a storm warning system that was the prototype of the daily weather forecast, invented a barometer, and published The Weather Book (1863). His death was by suicide, during a bout of depression. |
| Jean-Jacques Barthélemy | |
(source) |
Died
30 Apr 1795 (born 20 Jan 1716)
French archaeologist and author. During three years spent in Italy from 1755, he gained a background assisting in archaeological research. Later in his life he wrote Voyage du jeune Anacharsis en Grèce dans le milieu du IVe siècle (Voyage of Young Anacharsis in Greece in the mid-14th century; 1789). The central character in this four-volume novel was a young Scythian in the age of Plato travelling through ancient Greece, meeting famous people, with descriptions of its cities, buildings, institutions, and manners. It was one of the most widely read books in 19th-century France. As an author, his intention was to convey some knowledge of Greek civilization in an interesting form, rather than a work of strict scholarship.« |
| John Montagu | |
 |
Died
30 Apr 1792 (born 3 Nov 1718)
(4th Earl of Sandwich) British politician, inventor and explorer, for whom the sandwich is named, which is said he invented in 1762. A story was offered in Grosley's Tour to London that Sandwich often spent excessive time gambling and he didn't want to get up from the gambling table, so he told his servants to bring him meat between two slices of bread. Although this story is often quoted, it seems without support. Rodger, Sandwich's biographer, describes the original form using salt beef, as more likely to have been invented to eat while working at his desk, where he spent long hours. Captain Cook named the Sandwich Islands (Hawaii) for him. As first lord of the admiralty (1771-82) during the American Revolution, he was held responsible for the navy's disastrous unpreparedness for war.« |
| APRIL 30 - EVENTS | |
| Space medicine | |
 In
1993, an astronaut received a test infusion while in orbit on the space
shuttle Columbia. German physicist Hans Schlegel had the saline
solution at body temperature pumped into him through a needle. The experiment
provided a means to address dehydration and other common space problems
such as puffy face and skinny legs. |
|
| Little brown bat | |
(source) |
In
1960, the oldest U.S. bat was identified as 24 years old, having been banded
on 22 Jun 1937 in Mashpee, Massachusetts. The female little
brown bat (Myotis lucifugus), the most abundant bat in the U.S.,
was found in a cave on Mount Aeolis, Vermont. The little brown bat has
a wing span of 222-269 mm with glossy fur on its back and paler underside
colours ranging from pale tan to dark brown. The species
is ., found throughout forested areas of North America and Alaska, in tree
or cliff cavities, caves, mines and the attics. They feed on a wide variety
of insects. On 25 Aug 1999, a newspaper
reported a 33-yr-old wild bat in Europe. On 20
Jun 2005, a journal received an article identifying a 41-yr-old bat
in Siberia.« |
| Mendelevium | |
|
In 1955, the element 101, a new artificial element was announced. It was
synthesized
by bombardment of Es-253 with helium nuclei using the cyclotron at the
Radiation Laboratory of the University of California by Albert Ghiorso,
Bernard G. Harvey, G.R. Choppin and S.G. Thompson, research chemists, headed
by the Nobel laureate Glenn T. Seaborg.
Being radioactive, with a half-life of between a half hour to several hours,
this transuranic element cannot exist in nature since it decays so rapidly
into lighter elements. It was named mendelevium, named in honour of Dmitry
Mendeleev, the Russian chemist who worked on the periodic classification
of the elements. |
|
| Cosmic rays generate electricity | |
(source) |
In 1939, cosmic rays entering a Geiger-Mueller
counter produced electrical impulses used to control electrical power.
This first ever such event, was used for the illumination ceremony of the
1939 New York World's Fair. The counter, at the Hayden Planetarium, New
York City, switched
on an electrical circuit wired to a display at the Lagoon of Nations where
relays activated local battery circuits ringing bells and flashing lights
to signal each capture of a cosmic ray. Albert
Einstein as guest speaker explained cosmic rays. Sadly his accent and
faulty amplification made his words incomprehensible to the crowd. Upon
the tenth ray's signal, a huge light was to be turned on to illuminate
the 600-ft Trylon triangular spire, but the power source failed.«
[Image:
Trylon spire.] |
| Electron | |
 |
In 1897, at the Royal Institution
Friday Evening Discourse, Joseph John
Thomson (1856-1940) first announced the existence of electrons (as
they are now named). Thomson told his audience that earlier in the year,
he had made a surprising discovery. He had found a particle of matter a
thousand times smaller than the atom. He called it a corpuscle, meaning
"small body." Although Thomson was director of the Cavendish
Laboratory at the University of Cambridge, and one of the most respected
scientists in Great Britain, the scientists present found the news hard
to believe. They thought the atom was the smallest and indivisible part
of matter that could exist. Nevertheless, the electron was the first elementary
particle to be discovered. |
| Iceberg | |
(source) |
In 1894, an Antarctic iceberg
fragment was sighted at a latitude 26.50 degrees south, comparable to Rio
de Janeiro. Reported by the ship Dochra, this remains the nearest
to the equator that an Antarctic iceberg has been seen. Sightings of large
icebergs as far north as 42 degrees south were made from 15 vessels in
1893. The Falkland Islands Gazette warned that year of exceptional
ice conditions with large icebergs in shipping lanes around Cape Horn and
commented: "Ice in this latter position is absolutely unknown, and must
be looked upon as a great danger."« |
| Electric company | |
 |
In 1883, a company that would build the first U.S. three-wire
central station for incandescent lighting - the Edison Electric Illuminating
Co. was incorporated. The plant was a simple wooden structure erected in
Sunbury, Pennsylvania. The station
began service on 4 Jul 1883. An Armington & Sims steam engine drove
two 110-volt direct-current generators. The electricity was delivered by
overhead wires. Edison patented his
three-wire system on 20 Nov 1882 to supercede the distribution system used
at his first commercial central generating station in New York (4 Sep 1882)
because it gave savings of over 60 per cent in copper used in conductors.
This meant a smaller investment and enabled building generating plants
in smaller communities.« [Images
- top: Sunbury
generators at the Edison Ford Museum; bottom:
Thomas Edison] |
| Pasteur's germ theory | |
(source) |
In
1878, Louis Pasteur lectured at the
French Academy of Science in support of his germ theory of disease, in
which he held that many diseases were caused by tiny organisms. Since he
still met with opposition from some scientists, he called their contrary
opinions "fatal to medical progress." Pasteur also described ways to prevent
infection, and provided the skeptics with an experiment with which to prove
the theory to themselves. [Image:Louis
Pasteur] |
| Patent pills | |
(source) |
In 1796, the first U.S. patent for a pill of any kind was issued to Samuel
Lee, Jr., of Connecticut, for a "Composition of bilious pills" which he
renewed on 24 May 1810 and marketed as "Lee's Windham Pills." These pills
were the subject of patents and renewals by both him and his son Samuel
H.P. Lee (1772-1863), and were highly popular for a long period.*
"Lee's New-London Bilious Pills" (named after New-London, Connecticut)
were patented by his son on 26 Jun 1799 and 8 Feb 1814. An advertisement
of 1803 for "Doctor Lee's Patent New-London Bilious Pills" described them
as "Interesting to all sea-faring People" and promised to cure a variety
of ills, including "foul stomachs, where pukes are indicated."« [Image:
part of advertisement for Dr. Lee's New-London Bilious Pills, 1803)  |
| Boston Philosophical Society | |
(source) |
In 1683, the Boston Philosophical Society held its first meeting.*
Rev. Increase Mather, stimulated by a recent comet sighting, and seeking
to discuss how God intervenes in the natural order of things, had met earlier
in the month with Samuel Willard and a few others to plan the group. Mather's
idea was to model their meetings on the Royal Philosophical Society, established
in London about 20 years earlier. Each last Monday of most of the following
months, the members met and presented papers to emulate the transactions
of the London society. However, the few local intellectuals didn't sustain
interest in the society beyond about three years. Mather wrote Kometographia,
or, A Discourse concerning Comets (1683).« [Image:
Rev. Increase Mather] |
| Pepys records Great Plague | |
(source) |
In 1665, Samuel Pepys made his first diary
reference to the Great Plague in London."Great fears of the sicknesses
here in the City, it being said that two or three houses are already shut
up. God preserve us all." The entries in his diary continue
throughout the year, documenting the terrible conditions in the city as
many thousands died, until Winter's freezing cold reduced the number of
fleas that spread the disease. The symptoms of the plague begin like those
of a bad cold. A high fever follows, with vomiting and painful black swellings,
called buboes appearing in the groin and under the armpits. His diaries
over the period Jan 1660 to May 1669. He also wrote
about the Great Fire of London in 1666. |
| Supernova | |
(source) |
In
1006, Chinese and Arabic astronomers noted a supernova.
The speed of the still-expanding shock wave was measured nearly a millenium
later.* This is was history's brightest
"new star" ever recorded, at first seen to be brighter than the planet
Venus. It occurred in our Milky Way galaxy, appearing in the southern constellation
Lupus, near the star Beta Lupi. It was also
recorded
by observers in Switzerland, Italy, Japan, Egypt and Iraq. From the careful
descriptions of the Chinese astronomers of how the light varied, that it
was of apparently yellow color and visible for over a year, it is possible
that the supernova reached a magnitude of up to -9. Modern measurements
of the speed of the shock
wave have been used to estimate its distance.« [Image:
reconstruction of supernova 1006 observed from a point in Turkey.] |
