| JULY 16 - BIRTHS | |
| Dan Bricklin | |
(source) |
 Born 16
July 1951
American computer scientist who with Bob Frankston created VisiCalc, the first spreadsheet computer program (1979) which created a market beyond hobbyists for the emerging personal computers. Businesses found the program very useful because of the speed and accuracy of its calculations. Originally written in 6502 assembly language to run on a 32K-byte Apple II, it was soon ported to virtually all major 6502- and Z80-based personal computers then available. They did not reap huge financial profits from the spreadsheet program, despite eventually selling over a half-million copies by 1983, because at the time, copyright protection was not generally sought for software, and it was subsequently surpassed by Lotus 1-2-3.« |
| Irwin Rose | |
(source) |
Born 16
July 1926
American biochemist who was a awarded a share of the 2004 Nobel Prize in Chemistry (with Israelis Aaron Ciechanover and Avram Hershko) for discovering the role of the protein ubiquitin in cells. This small protein molecule attaches to other proteins, tagging them for removal, which are thus recognized by the cell's proteasomes. These structures are the cell's waste-disposal units, where the proteins are broken down into tiny pieces for reuse. This ubiquitin-mediated process cleans up unwanted proteins resulting during cell division, and performs quality control on newly synthesized proteins. Faulty protein-breakdown processes lead to such conditions as cystic fibrosis, several neurodegenerative diseases, and certain types of cancer.« |
| David Lambert Lack | |
(source) |
Born 16 July 1910; died 1973.
British ornithologist and author of books popularizing natural science, such as The Life of the Robin (1943). From the 1930s, he engaged in fieldwork investigating bird habitat and behaviour. A year spent studing the birds of the Galapagos (1938-9) yielded material he published in Darwin's Finches (1947), describing the14 specialized species of finch that have evolved from an original invading flock of ordinary seed-eating finches. During WW II, his involvement in the early work on radar later enabled him to employ radar to study bird migration. From 1945, for the rest of his life, he was director of the Edward Grey Institute of Field Ornithology, Oxford. He studied the factors controlling numbers in natural populations and group selection.« |
| Orville Redenbacher | |
(source) |
Born 16
July 1907; died 19 Sep 1995.
American agronomist and popcorn business founder, born in Brazil, Ind., Popcorn King whose devotion to creating and promoting a fluffier, tastier popcorn turned him into a bow-tied advertising icon. His interest in popcorn blossomed early. It was the favorite snack on his family's farm, and Redenbacher grew it to earn extra spending money. In the early '40s, while managing a 12,000-acre farm where he was growing popcorn, Redenbacher and a friend, Charles Bowman, used the fields to experiment with corn hybrids from Purdue University. Several decades and 30,000 hybrids later, they introduced gourmet popcorn. |
| Harold Dadford West | |
(source) |
Born 16
July 1904; died 5 Mar 1974.
African-American biochemist and college president, who was the first to synthesize the essential amino acid threonine. Although he is best known for his studies of amino acids, he conducted research in a wider field, including the biochemistry of various bacilli, the B vitamins, and antibiotics. He spent his career from 1937 as professor of biochemistry at Meharry Medical College, Nashville until his retirement in 1973 where he held also the position of college president (1952-63). He was plagued and often hospitalized by severe asthma, which contributed his death. |
| Frits Zernike | |
(source) |
Born 16
July 1888; died 10 Mar 1966.
Dutch scientist, winner of the Nobel Prize for Physics in 1953 for his invention of the phase-contrast microscope, an instrument that permits the study of internal cell structure without the need to stain and thus kill the cells. In addition to its capacity to render colourless and transparent objects visible in the microscope, it also enables one to detect slight flaws in mirrors, telescope lenses, and other instruments indispensable for research. In this connection, Zernike's phase-plate serves as an indicator which locates and measures small surface irregularities to a fraction of a light-wavelength. |
| Giuseppe Piazzi | |
(source) |
Born 16
July 1746; died 22 Jul 1826.
Italian astronomer and author, born in Valtellina, discovered the first asteroid - Ceres. He established an observatory at Palermo and mapped the positions of 7,646 stars. He also discovered that the star 61 Cygni had a large Proper Motion, which led Bessel to chose it as the object of his parallax studies. He discovered Ceres on 1 Jan 1801, but was able to make only three observations. The term "asteroid," meaning "star-like" was coined (1803) by Herschel. Fortuitously, Gauss had recently developed mathematical techniques that allowed the orbit to be calculated. Within the next few years, astronomers discovered three more asteroids: Pallas, Juno, and Vesta. The thousandth Asteroid discovered was named Piazzi in his honor. |
| John Kay | |
(EB) |
Born 16
July 1704; died 1764.
John Kay was an English machinist and engineer, inventor of the flying shuttle power loom, patented 1733, which was an important step toward automatic weaving. Kay placed shuttle boxes at each side of the loom connected by a long board, known as a shuttle race. By means of cords attached to a picking peg, a single weaver, using one hand, could cause the shuttle to be knocked back and forth across the loom from one shuttle box to the other. A weaver using Kay's flying shuttle could produce much wider cloth at faster speeds than before. |
| JULY 16 - DEATHS | |
| Julian Seymour Schwinger | |
(source) |
 Died
16 July 1994 (born 12 Feb 1918)
American physicist who shared the 1965 Nobel Prize in Physics for his contributions to quantum electrodynamics (with Richard Feynman and Shin-Itiro Tomonaga). Schwinger worked on reconciling quantum mechanics with Albert Einstein's special theory of relativity. He published his first physics paper at the age of sixteen. During WW II, he developed important methods in electromagnetic field theory, which advanced the theory of wave guides. His variational techniques were applied in several fields of mathematical physics. In the 1940's he was one of the inventors of the "renormalization" technique. In 1957, he proposed that theoretically there were two different neutrinos: one associated with the electron and one with the muon. Later experimental work provided verification. He invented source theory.« |
| Henri Frankfort | |
(source) |
Died
16 July 1954 (born 24 Feb 1897)
Dutch-American archaeologist who established the relationship between Egypt and Mesopotamia and completed a thoroughly documented reconstruction of ancient Mesopotamian culture and art. The excavations he directed in Egypt (1922, 1925-29) and Iraq (1929-37) were conducted with exemplary archaeological scholarship. In 1925, Frankfort resumed work which had been started by Naville at Abydos excavating the Osireion, discovered by Petrie (1902) who named it from his interpretation as a symbolic tomb of Osiris. Frankfort's initial project site was situated to the West of Seti's Temple but expanded to record the fine reliefs of the temple of Seti itself.«  The
Art and Architecture of the Ancient Orient, by Henri
Frankfort. |
| Ilya Ilyich Mechnikov | |
(source) |
Died
16 July 1916 (born 15 May 1845)
Russian zoologist and microbiologist, who shared the 1908 Nobel Prize for Physiology or Medicine with Paul Ehrlich "in recognition of their work on immunity." Metchnikoff's research was on phagocytosis, a fundamental process in immunology whereby macrophages and other specialized cells engulf and digest bacteria and other foreign particles. In 1882, leaving his university teaching career, he set up a private laboratory at Messina to better pursue his interest in microbes and the immune system. He discovered phagocytosis by experiments on the larvae of starfish. His theory that certain white blood cells could engulf and destroy harmful bacteria was at first disbelieved, then slowly accepted by other scientists.« The
Life of Elie Metchnikoff, by Olga Metchnikoff. |
| William Hamilton Gibson | |
(source) |
Died
16 July 1896 (born 5 Oct 1850)
American illustrator, author, and naturalist. Gibson had sketched flowers and insects when he was only eight years old, had long been interested in botany and entomology, and had acquired great skill in making wax flowers. His first drawings of a technical character were published in 1870. He drew for many periodicals, his most popular works being a long series of nature articles published in Harper's Weekly, Scribner's Monthly, and Century. Gibson was an expert photographer, and his drawings had a nearly photographic and almost microscopic accuracy of detail. [Image: Pink Lady's Slipper illustration by Gibson.] |
| Josiah Spode | |
(source) |
Died
16 July 1827 (born 1755)
Potter, Penkhull, died Staffordshire. Before the invention of bone china, the English manufactured fine soft-paste porcelain at Chelsea, Bow, and Derby. It was Josiah Spode who is generally recognised as the inventor of Fine Bone China as we now know it (1800). In Stoke-on-Trent, his father, Josiah Spode I (1733-97) began the pottery business with the manufacture of porcelain ornamented with designs inspired by eastern art. His son, also Josiah, later mixed kaolin, feldspar, and bone ash to make a bone china paste that became the standard English paste in 1800. Spode china featured a large number of designs but was especially noted for its exotic birds. In 1806 he was appointed potter to the Prince of Wales. |
| Charles Du Fay | |
(source) |
Died
16 July 1739 (born 14 Sep 1698)
Charles François de Cisternay Du Fay was a French chemist who made early experiments in electricity. In 1733, he distinguished electrical fluid in two types he named "vitreous electricity" and "resinous electricity" depending on the objects that produced the charge (subsequently called "positive" and "negative" by Benjamin Franklin). Du Fay discovered that objects with like charges repel each other, but oppositely charged objects repel. He also noted the effect of electricity shock on his body, and visible spark when making contact with a highly charged object. He observed that electricity may be conducted in the gaseous matter (now called plasma) adjacent to a red-hot body. Du Fay was also a pioneer in crystal optics.« |
| JULY 16 - EVENTS | |
| Genetic Pattern of Syphilis | |
Late congenital syphilis (source) |
In 1998, scientists at the University of Texas Health Science Center in
Houston and the Institute for Genomic Research in Rockville, Md., say they
have mapped the 1.1 million base pairs of DNA that make up the syphilis
genome. Thus, the researchers have mapped the entire genetic pattern of
the syphilis bacterium.
This breakthrough may lead to a new vaccine that will prevent infection
by the microbe, and, eventually, eradication of a sexually transmitted
disease
that has been a worldwide scourge for 500 years. It was reported
by the Associated Press on 16 July that details of the work would be published
in that week's issue of the journal Science. |
| Shoemaker-Levy Comet | |
(source) |
In 1994, the first of 21 asteroids, major fragments of the comet Shoemaker-Levy
9 broken-up 2 years earlier, hit Jupiter, creating a 1200-mile wide fireball
600 miles high to the joy of astronomers
awaiting the celestial fireworks, giving scientists their first chance
to observe such a collision as it happened, and others through July 22.
Jupiter is a gas giant, made up mostly of hydrogen and helium in gas and
liquid form.When we observe Jupiter, we are looking not at a solid surface,
but a banded atmosphere with swirling clouds and huge storms.
Image: Fireballs on Jupiter after impacts of fragments of Comet Shoemaker-Levy 9. |
| Moon Shot | |
 |
In 1969, the Crew of Apollo XI, Neil A. Armstrong, Edwin E. Aldrin, Jr.,
and Michael Collins, blasted off from Cape Kennedy on the first manned
mission to the surface of the moon.
Photo: On July 1, 1969, Apollo 11 stands on Launch Pad 39A at Kennedy Space Center, during a simulated countdown, preparing for its July 16 launch. (NASA) |
| Mont Blanc Road Tunnel | |
(source) |
In 1965, the Mont Blanc seven-mile road tunnel opened, linking the countries
of France and Italy. 11.6 km long, the Mont-Blanc tunnel links Courmayeur
and the Italian Val d’Aoste with the French valley of Chamonix Mont-Blanc.
It takes a little more than 10 minutes to go through the tunnel and 1/2
an hour overall to get from Courmayeur to the centre of Chamonix. The Mont-Blanc
tunnel holds the world record for the deepest tunnel with 2480 m of rock
covering it. It took six years, from 1959 to 1965, to bore the 11.6-km
long tunnel. |
| Jet Speed Record | |
(source) |
In 1953, the F-86D Sabre beats its own world aircraft speed
record by flying 715.7 mph (1152 kph). After its first flight in 1949,
more than 6,000 F-86s were manufactured by North
American's Los Angeles and Columbus, Ohio, divisions. Various models
of the Sabre held world's speed records for six consecutive years, setting
five official records and winning several National Aircraft Show Bendix
Trophies. In September 1948, an F-86A set the Sabre's first official world
speed record of 570 mph. This mark was bettered in 1952 by an F-86D that
flew at 698 mph. The "D" became the first model of a fighter to better
its own record, in 1953, with a run of 715 mph. |
| Turbo-prop Flight | |
 |
In 1948, The world's first production turbine-propellor aircraft,
the Vickers Viscount, made its maiden flight. The Viscount is still Britains
most successful commercial transport aircraft, with 444 aircraft being
built. Combining speed, passenger appeal and operating economics, Viscounts
formed the basis for many airlines until replaced by pure jet equipment. |
| Atomic Bomb | |
 |
In 1945, the first atomic bomb was exploded at Los Alamos, New Mexico.
The atomic bomb was invented
by two refugee German scientists in Britain, Professor Rudolph Peierls
and Otto Frisch, of Birmingham University. They designed a "blue-print"
for making an atom bomb in 1940. It actually began when the Italian-born
physicist Enrico Fermi, working in the United States, invented an apparatus
which produced the first atomic chain reactions. In 1940 both the Americans
and British were researching the atom bomb and when the United States entered
WW2, the British joined the American "Manhattan Project" and production
of the bomb went on ahead in the US. |
| Ready-Mixed Paint | |
(source) |
In 1867, a patent for the first prepared, or "ready-mixed" paint in the
U.S. was granted to D.R. Averill, of Newberg, Ohio. The first recorded
paint
mill in America was reportedly established in Boston in 1700 by Thomas
Child. In the nineteenth century, with the large-scale
manufacture of linseed oil from the flax plant and pigment-grade zinc
oxide were combined before the paint was marketed. Previously, home owners
would mix their own paint from a base, oil, turpentine and pigments. It
was Henry Alden Sherwin and partner Edward Williams who invested ten years
in developing the commercial product and introduced it in 1880. |
| Reinforced Concrete | |
(source) |
In 1867, reinforced concrete was patented by F. Joseph Monier (1823-1906),
a gardner in Paris, to reinforce
garden tubs, beams and posts. The French inventor had found that the tensile
weakness of plain concrete
could be overcome if steel rods were embedded in a concrete member..The
new composite material was called reinforced concrete, or ferroconcrete.
William E. Ward builds (1871-75) the landmark building, first in the U.S.
to use reinforced concrete, for a private house in Port Chester, N.Y.,
It was designed by architect Robert Mook. |
