| MAY 22 - BIRTHS | |
| George A. Olah | |
(source) |
 Born 22
May 1927
George Andrew Olah is a Hungarian-American chemist who won the 1994 Nobel Prize for Chemistry for work conducted in the early 1960s that isolated the positively charged, electron-deficient fragments of hydrocarbons known as carbocations (or carbonium ions). Carbocations are elusive intermediate compounds formed when large hydrocarbon molecules are broken into smaller ones, or vice versa. His discovery has opened up a new area of economically important hydrocarbon research into basic reactions of oil refining, plastics and other industrial processes that continues today.  A
Life Of Magic Chemistry: Autobiographical Reflections...,
by George A. Olah. |
| Thomas Gold | |
(source) |
Born 22
May 1920; died 22 Jun 2004
Austrian-born British astronomer known for a steady-state theory of the universe, explaining pulsars, and naming the magnetosphere. In 1948, as a graduate student at Cambridge, he (together with Hermann Bondi and Fred Hoyle) proposed that, a continuous creation of matter in space is gradually forming new galaxies, maintaining the average number of galaxies in any part of the universe, despite its expansion. This is not accepted, as there is more evidence for the Big Bang theory. In 1967, Gold presented his theory on the nature of pulsars (objects in deep space that produce regularly pulsing radio waves). He suggested that they were rotating neutron stars - tiny, extraordinarily massive stars - which emit waves as they spin. The
Deep Hot Biosphere : The Myth of Fossil Fuels, Thomas
Gold |
| Herbert C(harles) Brown | |
(source) |
Born 22
May 1912; died 19 Dec 2004.
English-born American chemist who developed organoboranes (compounds of boron, carbon and hydrogen) which provided many new techniques in synthetic organic chemistry. For this accomplishment, he shared (with Georg Wittig) the 1979 Nobel Prize for Chemistry. The versatility of organoboranes as reagents in reductions, additions and rearrangements provides new ways of linking carbon atoms to each other. Applications of organoboranes now include the manufacture of agricultural and pharmaceutical chemicals (such as the antidepressant Prozac). In graduate research during WW II, he discovered a method to produce sodium borohydride, giving a new approach to making hydrogen gas, used in weather balloons and later in fuel cells.« |
| Yves-André Rocard | |
(source) |
Born 22
May 1903; died 16 Mar 1992.
French mathematician and physicist who contributed to the development of the French atomic bomb and to the understanding of such diverse fields of research as semiconductors, seismology, and radio astronomy. During WW II, as Head of the Research Department of the Free French Naval Forces in England, he learnt about radars in England and interference from strong radio emission from the Sun. After the war, Rocard returned to France and proposed that France started a project to conduct radio astronomy. In the last part of his life he studied biomagnetism and dowsing which reduced his standing in the eyes of many of his colleagues. |
| Sir Arthur Conan Doyle | |
(source) |
Born 22
May 1859 (died 7 July 1930)
Scottish novelist, physician, spiritualist. His fictional detective, Sherlock Holmes, emulates the scientist, diligently searching through data and to make sense of it. "It is a capital mistake to theorize before one has data. Insensibly one begins to twist facts to suit theories, instead of theories to suit facts." |
| Oliver Perry Hay | |
(source) |
Born 22
May 1846; died 2 Nov 1930.
American paleontologist whose catalogs of fossil vertebrates greatly organized existing knowledge and became standard references. From 1912, he conduct his research at the United States National Museum where he assisted in working up and describing the museum's collections in vertebrate paleontology. Hay's primary scientific interest was the study of the Pleistocene vertebrata of North America. He is renowned for his work on skull and brain anatomy. His first major work was his Bibliography and Catalogue of the Fossil Vertebrata of North America (1902), supplemented by two more volumes (1929-30). Hay also wrote on the evidence of early humans in North America.« [Image: Diplodocus is portrayed as a slithering sauropod by Oliver P. Hay, 1910. From Oliver P. Hay, Proceedings of the Washington Academy of Sciences, vol. 12, 1910, pp. 1-25] Bibliography
and Catalogue of the Fossil Vertebrata of North America,
by Oliver P. Hay. |
| Albrecht von Gräfe | |
(source) |
Born 22
May 1828; died 20 Jul 1870.
Albrecht Friedrich Wilhelm Ernst von Gräfe was a German eye surgeon, who is regarded as a founder of scientific opthalmology. He was also an authority in diseases of the nerve and brain. He diagnosed sudden visual loss due to retinal artery embolism, optic retinitis and was one of the first to treat glaucoma successfully. He described a large number of new findings, among them stase papillas in brain tumors, retardation of the eyelid in Basedow's disease and introduced a new operation for cataract - iridictomy. In his short career (he died at age 42), von Gräfe performed more than 10,000 eye operations, and was undoubtedly the most important ophthalmologist of the 19th century.« |
| William Sturgeon | |
(source) |
Born 22
May 1783; died 4 Dec 1850.
English electrical engineer who devised the first electromagnet capable of supporting more than its own weight (1825). The 7-oz (200-g) magnet supported 9-lb (4-kg) of iron with a single cell's current. He built an electric motor (1832) and invented the commutator, now part of most modern electric motors. In 1836, he invented the first suspended coil galvanometer, a device for measuring current. Sturgeon also worked on improving the voltaic battery, developing a theory of thermoelectricity, and even atmospheric charge conditions. From 500 kite flights made in calm weather, he found the atmosphere is consistently charged positively with respect to the Earth, and increasingly so at increased height.« |
| MAY 22 - DEATHS | |
| Joseph Wood Krutch | |
 Died
22 May 1970 (born 25 Nov 1893)
American naturalist, conservationist, writer, and critic. |
|
| Albert Claude | |
(source) |
Died
22 May 1983 (born 24 Aug 1898).
Belgian-American cytologist who was awarded the 1974 Nobel Prize for Physiology or Medicine for discoveries concerning the structural and functional organization of the cell (shared with Christian de Duve and George E. Palade). With cell fractionization methods he developed using a high-powered centrifuge, Claude was able to separate various organelles in the nucleus of the living cell. He was able to show that mitochondria are the respiration centres of the cell. From 1942, he applied electron microscopy to further elucidate the structure of cells. Modern cell biology is partly based on his work.« |
| Alfred Day Hershey | |
(source) |
Died
22 May 1997 (born 4 Dec 1908)
American biologist who, along with Max Delbrück and Salvador Luria, won the Nobel Prize for Physiology or Medicine in 1969. The prize was given for research done on bacteriophages (viruses that infect bacteria). This was the famous "blender experiment" (1956). Hershey used an isotope- labeled phage to to infect a bacterial colony and begin to inject their genetic material into the host cells. Then he whirred them in a Waring Blendor to tear the phage particles from the bacterial walls without rupturing the bacteria. Upon examining the bacteria, Hershey found that only phage DNA, but no detectable protein, had been inserted into them. This showed that the DNA was sufficient to transfer to the bacteria all the genetic information needed to produce more phage. |
| Julius Plücker | |
(source) |
Died
22 May 1868 (born 16 Jun 1801).
German mathematician and physicist whose work suggested the far-reaching principle of duality, which states the equivalence of certain related types of theorems. He also discovered that cathode rays (electron rays produced in a vacuum) are diverted from their path by a magnetic field, a principle vital to the development of modern electronic devices, such as television. At first alone and later with the German physicist Johann W. Hittorf, Plücker made many important discoveries in spectroscopy. Before Bunsen and Kirchhoff, he announced that spectral lines were characteristic for each chemical substance and this had value to chemical analysis. In 1862 he pointed out that the same element may exhibit different spectra at different temperatures. |
| MAY 22 - EVENTS | |
| Saturn moons | |
In 1995, astronomers Amanda S. Bosh and Andrew S. Rivkin found two new
moons of Saturn in photos taken by the Hubble Space Telescope. |
|
| Genetically altered cell transplant | |
|
In 1989, the first successful transfer of cells containing foreign genes
into a human being is performed at the National Institutes of Health (altered
cancer-fighting cells placed in the blood of a cancer-patient). |
|
| Mastodon and Man | |
(source) |
In 1979, the discovery of a Clovis type projectile point found in association
with mastodon remains provided the first solid evidence of the coexistence
of humans and the American mastodon in Eastern North America*.
Paleontologist Russell W. Graham of the Illinois State Museum made the
discovery
during a state sponsored excavation in the Kimmswick Bone Bed, near Imperial,
Missouri. The first recorded report of bones of mastodons and other now-extinct
animals in the vicinity of the town of Kimmswick, Missouri, was in the
early 1800s. St. Louis Museum owner, Albert C. Koch, in 1839 excavated
bones weathering out of the banks along Rock Creek. The site is now the
Mastodon State Historic Site and excavations have been halted.« |
| Ethernet | |
|
In 1973, Robert Metcalfe wrote a memo describing a way to transmit data
from the early generation of personal computers to a new device, the laser
printer. He called his multipoint data communications system Ethernet,
and today it continues to dominate as the standard computer network. A
U.S. patent for "a Multipoint data communication system with collision
detection" was issued 13 Dec 1977 ( 4,063,220) to Metcalfe, and others
who developed the Ethernet. The patent was assigned to the Xerox Corporation. |
|
| Telephone stock quotes | |
|
In 1964, the Am-Quote system capable of giving subscribing stock brokers
automated voice quotes over the telephone was described in Time
magazine. It replaced the need to search paper tape. A computer built by
Teleregister Corp. stored the stock quotation information from the floor
of New York's American Stock Exchange. A stock's code numbers could be
dialled by the broker, and the computer responded by repeating the stock's
code letters and the latest information including bid price, high and low.
The voice of Walter Jennison, a Teleregister Corp. engineer, was recorded
for a machine vocabulary of 57 words and letters on a revolving magnetic
drum. The computer extracted a sequence of these pre-recorded words to
report the stock data.« |
|
| Revolving restaurant | |
1962 source) |
In 1961, the Top Of The Needle restauraunt
in the Space Needle in Seattle, Wash., was dedicated. It was the first
revolving restaurant in the U.S., 500 feet above the ground. A 14-foot
ring next to the windows carrying 260 seats rotated 360 degrees in one
hour on a track and wheel system driven by a 1 horsepower motor. Dinners
averaged $7.50, including a cocktail. The Space Needle itself is a 600
foot high steel and glass tower with an observation deck above the restaurant,
topped by a beacon. A ride up the elevator cost
only one dollar. |
| Canned rattlesnake | |
|
In 1931, the first sale of canned rattlesnake meat was made by George Kenneth
End of Arcadia, Florida. Cans were first packed in Mar 1931, and first
served at an American Legionnaires dinner. End formed the Floridian Products
Corp to market the canned rattlesnake meat. |
|
| Wright brothers patent | |
|
In 1906, the brothers Orville and Wilbur Wright received a patent for
"new and useful improvements in Flying Machines" (U.S. No. 821,393). This
was the first airplane patent in the USA. |
|
| Pianola | |
|
In 1900, a U.S. patent was granted to Edwin S. Votey for the first practical
pneumatic piano attachment, or pianola (No. 650,285). His original invention
(1896) led to a model that was larger than the piano itself. The patent
described the device as being of practical and economical construction
which could be applied to and removed from any piano. It was produced by
the Aeolian Company. |
|
| Computing scale | |
|
In 1900, the first automatic computing scale was issued a patent to the
Toledo, Ohio, inventor Allen De Vilbiss, Jr. After applying for the patent
on 24 Jan 1899, he formed the De Vilbiss cale Co., predecessor of the Toledo
Scale Co. This company produced a number of firsts in innovations for scales.
In addition to the first automatic computing pendulum-type scale, other
firsts included an indicator controller to bring the hand to a quick stop,
a cylinder type platform scale, automatic-dial portable scale and auto
truck scales using a shallow pit. |
|
| Automobile | |
|
In 1899, Plain Dealer reporter Charles Shanks first used the French
word "automobile" in a series of articles he writes about a road trip with
car magnate Alexander Winton from Cleveland to N.Y. (the word thereafter
becomes accepted in U.S.). |
|
| Oil heater | |
|
In 1894, black American inventor S. Newson was issued a patent for an "oil
heater or cooker" (U.S. No. 520,188).
The
Inventive Spirit of African Americans: Patented Ingenuity,
by Patricia Carter Sluby. |
|
| Toothpaste tube | |
|
In 1892, Dr. Washington Sheffield, a dentist of New London, Conn., USA,
invented the collapsible metal toothpaste tube, which was later manufactured
by his Sheffield Tube Corp. Within the same year, in Great Britain, where
toothpaste was formerly sold in round pots, Beecham's Tooth Paste was packages
for sale in collapsible tubes. The idea of collapsible metal tubes, however,
dates back to a patent by American artist John Rand on 11 Sep 1841, but
these packages were first commercially used for oil-paints. The first collapsible
polythene tubes were produced in the U.S. for skin-tanning lotion in 1953. |
|
| Skyscraper patent | |
|
In 1888, Architect Leroy S. Buffington patented the system for building
skyscrapers using a metal skeleton frame. Although Buffington claimed to
be the originator of the metal skeleton frame that made building tall structures
feasible, his claim to be the inventor of the skyscraper was refuted.
However, using the designs created by Harvey Ellis, Buffington is credited
with playing a pivotal role in refining the new method of construction.
The invention of the skyscraper lies with George A. Fuller (1851-1900),
who worked on solving the problems of the load bearing capacities of tall
buildings. |
|
| Lincoln's patent | |
|
In 1849, Abraham Lincoln was issued a patent for "buoying boats over shoals"
(No. 6,469). He was the first American president to receive a patent. His
idea utilized inflated cylinders to float grounded vessels through shallow
water. Lincoln had worked
as a deck-hand on a Mississippi flat-boat. |
|
| Reclining chair | |
|
In 1841, Henry Kennedy, a cabinetmaker and upholsterer of Philadelphia,
Pa., was issued the first U.S. patent for a reclining chair. |
|
| Transatlantic steamboat | |
|
In 1819, the first American-built steam-propelled vessel to attempt a trans-Atlantic
crossing, the Savannah, departed from Savannah, Ga. It was a 350-ton
wooden boat, full-rigged so that during the trip steam power was used for
only 80 hours. It was fitted with an inclined direct-acting low-pressure
steam engine. The Atlantic crossing ended at Liverpool on 20 June 1819.
The vessel had been originally launched on 22 Aug 1818, with a sea trial
from New York City to Savannah on 28 Mar 1819. Although it had 32 state
rooms, it sailed without passengers, for none dared to make the trip. |
|
