| JULY 24 - BIRTHS | |
| Amelia Earhart | |
 |
 Born 24
July 1897; died 2 Jul 1937
Amelia Earhart, aviator, born in Atchison, Kansas, was one of the world's most celebrated aviators, the first woman to fly alone over the Atlantic Ocean, but got lost on a flight enroute to Howland Island. |
| Henri-Alexandre Deslandres | |
(source) |
Born 24
July 1853; died 15 Jan 1948.
French astrophysicist who invented a spectroheliograph (1894) to photograph the Sun in monochromatic light (about a year after George E. Hale in the U.S.) and made extensive studies of the solar chromosphere and solar activity. He worked at the Paris and Meudon Observatories. His investigation of molecular spectra produced empirical laws presaging those of quantum mechanics. He observed spectra of planets and stars and measured their radial velocities of, and he determined the rotation rates of Uranus, Jupiter and Saturn (shortly after James E. Keeler). |
| Sir William de Wiveleslie Abney | |
(source) |
Born 24
July 1843; died 3 Dec 1920
Sir William de Wiveleslie Abney was an English chemist and astronomer who investigated colour photography and colour vision. He pioneered a method to measure the relative proportions of the primaries in a sample colour. Having developed a suitable photographic emulsion, he was the first to take infra-red photographs, and study the solar infra-red spectrum. In 1877, he was first to suggest a relationship between a star's rapid rotation and broadened lines in its spectrum. He introduced hydroquinone (1880) as an effective photograph developing chemical. He co-authored a paper (1885) on infra-red spectra of organic compounds, studied how sunlight is altered in passing through the atmosphere and invented the abney level.«  Photography
with Emulsions: A Treatise on the Theory and Practical Working of the Collodion
and Gelatine Emulsion Processes, by William de Wiveleslie
Abney. |
|
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| JULY 24 - DEATHS | |
| Sir Richard Doll | |
(source) |
 Died
24 July 5 (born 28 Oct 1912)
British epidemiologist who was one of the first two researchers to link cigarette smoking to lung cancer, as published in the British Medical Journal in 1950. In the same journal, fifty years later, Doll published (22 Jun 2004) the first research that quantified the damage over the lifetime of a generation, based on a 50-year study of a group of almost 35,000 British doctors who smoked. The study found that almost half of persistent cigarette smokers were killed by their habit, and a quarter died before age 70. Persons who quit by age 30 had normal life expectancy. Even quitting at age 50 saved six more years of life over those who continued smoking. He studied other health effects, such as those caused by asbestos and electricmagnetic fields.« Geography
of Disease, by Richard Doll. |
| Sir James Chadwick | |
(source) |
Died
24 July 1974 (born 20 Oct 1891)
English physicist who received the Nobel Prize for Physics (1935) for his discovery of the neutron. He studied at Cambridge, and in Berlin under Geiger, then worked at the Cavendish Laboratory with Rutherford, where he investigated the structure of the atom. He worked on the scattering of alpha particles and on nuclear disintegration. By bombarding beryllium with alpha particles, Chadwick discovered the neutron - a neutral particle in the atom's nucleus - for which he received the Nobel Prize for Physics in 1935. In 1932, Chadwick coined the name "neutron," which he described in an article in the journal Nature. He led the UK's work on the atomic bomb in WW II, and was knighted in 1945.« The
Neutron and the Bomb: A Biography of Sir James Chadwick,
by Andrew P. Brown. |
| Albert C. Barnes | |
(source) |
Died
24 Jul 1951 (born 2 Jan 1872)
Dr. Albert C(oombs) Barnes was a U.S. inventor of the antiseptic Argyrol, which assured his fortunes. This is a silver-protein compound, whose aqueous solution is used as topical antiseptic. Deeply interested in the theories of social philosophers such as John Dewey, Barnes felt he could better the lives of his fellow citizens. He applied his own ideas in his own factories. He scheduled his workers on 8-hour shifts 6 hours on the production line, followed by 2 hours of lectures on esthetics and art. He became a noted art collector, whose collection is now in the Barnes Foundation galleries in Merion, outside Philadelphia. Barnes' theories of art appreciation continue to be taught at The Barnes Foundation today. Dr. Barnes died in a car crash in 1951. |
| JULY 24 - EVENTS | |
| Human genes in Polly clone | |
(source) |
In 1997, the same Scottish scientists who produced Dolly the cloned sheep
announced they had cloned a sheep with human genes. Polly
and
four other cloned lambs mark a milestone in the effort to alter the genetic
make-up of animals. It is hoped that similar animals will eventually provide
human drugs, milk and transplant organs as well as aiding medical research.
PPL Therapeutics and the Roslin Institute near Edinburgh, produced the
transgenic animal, which was born July 9. Image:
Polly the lamb, who carries human genes, with her Scottish blackface surrogate
mother. (Reuters) |
| Planet found outside Solar System | |
(source) |
In 1991, a University of Manchester scientist announced the finding a planet
outside of solar system. Andrew G. Lyne of the University of Manchester
subsequently retracted his claim for a planet around pulsar PSR 1829-10
at the Jan 1992 meeting of the American Astronomical Society in Atlanta.
He said that the modulation of radio waves coming from the pulsar was caused
not by the presence of a planet but was in fact an artifact of the Earth's
motion around the Sun. That possibility that had been considered but then
discounted in earlier studies of the data. |
| Moon mission splashdown | |
(source) |
In 1969, the Apollo XI astronauts, two of whom had been the first men to
set foot on the moon, splashed down safely in the Pacific Ocean at 12:50
p.m. EDT about 812 nautical miles southwest of Hawaii. The three astronauts.
They transferred to a life raft and were met by a Navy frogman. All four
men were wearing biological isolation garments. After helicopter pickup
and transport to the U.S.S. Hornet, they stayed in quarantine for three
weeks. The day before splashdown, Aldrin said, "We feel this stands as
a symbol of the insatiable curiousity of all mankind to explore the unknown." |
| Moon relay | |
(source) |
In 1954, the sound of a human voice was, for the first time ever, transmitted
beyond the ionosphere and returned to Earth after reflecting off the moon.
James H. Trexler, an engineer in the Radio Countermeasures Branch at the
Naval Research Laboratory (NRL), spoke carefully into a microphone at the
laboratory's Stump Neck radio antenna facility in Maryland. Two and a half
seconds later, his words speeded back to him at Stump Neck, after traveling
500,000 miles via an Earth-Moon circuit. The objective of the Communication
Moon Relay project was to add another option for the Navy's secure global
communications technologies that could reduce the vulnerability of ionospheric
storms cutting off radio transmissions to the U.S. fleet. [Image:
Early notebook entry by James H. Trexler, 28 Jan 1945, showing calculations
for a long-distance communications link via the Moon.] |
| First Cape Canaveral launch | |
(source) |
In 1950, the first successful rocket launch from Cape
Canaveral took place. "Bumper" No. 8 was a captured German V-2 rocket
with the payload replaced by another rocket 700-pound Army-JPL Wac Corporal
rocket on top. It was fired from Long-Range Proving Ground at Cape Canaveral.
The first-stage V-2 climbed 10 miles, separated from the second-stage Corporal
which traveled 15 more miles. (V-2 exploded). A previous attempt on 19
July 1950 of a similar launch was aborted on the pad. Image:
A V2 just after launch (White Sands Missle Range, NM) |
| Instant coffee | |
 |
In 1938, Nescafé instant coffee was comercially introduced in Switzerland
by the Nestlé company, as it assists the Brazilian government in
solving its coffee surplus problem. In 1881, Dr. Satori Kato of Japan presented
the first instant coffee during the Pan-American World Fair. It was patented
in 1903 in the U.S. Nestlé improved the production process. Instant
coffee is made with a blend of beans, mixed in a blending drum, roasted
and ground, then brewed in huge percolators, sprayed into a heated stainless
steel dryer to remove all water, and the coffee is packed as small granules. |
| Machu Picchu | |
(source) |
In 1911, American Hiram Bingham discovered the Lost City of the Incas,
Vilcapampa (now called Machu Picchu), where the last Incan Emperors found
refuge from the conquistadors. |
| Lung removal operation | |
|
In 1933, Dr. W. F. Reinhoff Jr. performed the first successful lung removal
operation (extirpation of the lung) because of cancer in Baltimore, Maryland.
[Rienhoff WF. Pneumonectomy: A preliminary report of the operative technique
in two successful cases. Bulletin Johns Hopkins Hosp 1933;55:390-3.] |
|
| Rotary printing press | |
(source) |
In 1847, Richard M. Hoe of New York City patented the rotary type printing
press on this day. He created a revolution in printing by rolling a cylinder
over stationary plates of inked type and using the cylinder to make an
impression on paper. This eliminated the need for making impressions directly
from the type plates themselves, which were heavy and difficult to maneuver. |
| Steam pump | |
|
In 1844, Henry Rossiter Worthington (b. 17 Dec 1817, d. 17 Dec 1880) patented
the independent single direct-acting steam power pump, an invention which
laid the foundation of the entire pump industry. He was a U.S. mechanical
engineer, and this invention solved the major steam-engine problem
of supplying water to the boiler - even when the engine was shut down -
and replaced hand-pumping to keep the boiler filled. He had several inventions
leading to the perfection of the direct-acting steam power pump (1845-55),
patented the duplex steam pump (1859), and built the first duplex waterworks
engine, widely adopted and used for more than 75 years. He established
a pump manufacturing plant, New York City, in 1859. |
|
| Fourdrinier paper-making machine patent | |
|
In 1806, a British patent, No 2,951/1806 was dated for Henry Fourdrinier's
paper-making machine. The specification gave that "A number of moulds,
of the description called laid and wove, are hooked together to form one
long mould...A vessel or trough from which the paper stuff or material
is caused to flow upon the moulds...A set of cylinders, upon which is passed,
in the manner of a jack towel, an endless web of felting. There is a third
cylinder...communicates by means of another web of felt with an additional
pair of pressing cylinders, whence it proceeds to the second pair,...so
that continuing the process, paper of any length may be made..." Improvements
were granted a further patent dated 14 Aug 1807.« |
|
| Collecting expedition sponsored | |
(source) |
In 1801, the American Philosophical Society of Philadelphia, Pennsylvania,
sponsored the first collecting expedition under the auspices of an American
scientific society, when a loan of $500 was provided to Charles Willson
Peale. He operated a museum in Philadelphia, and he had just returned from
New York State with a partial skeleton of a mastodon found by a farmer
digging marl from a bog. Peale went back to the collection site and made
a systematic search for more bones. The excavation was drained by a huge,
man-powered water wheel. Long, slender, iron rods were used to probe the
soil for solid objects under the ground. Peale exhibited
the complete mastodon skeleton at his museum, where it caused a sensation.« |
| Halley enters Oxford University | |
(sourcee) |
In 1673, Edmund Halley entered Queen's College, Oxford, as an undergraduate.
Halley had attended the prestigious St. Paul's school, where in 1671, he
was appointed captain, a position resembling today's student body president.
He was an excellent student, and by the time he entered Queen's College,
Oxford. At this young age, Halley already possessed,
"... the basic facts and computations not only of navigation but also those
which the practical astronomer is concerned when he sets about the delicate
task of measuring the positions of celestial bodies in the sky," according
to Colin Ronan in his book Edmond Halley, Genius in Eclipse (1969). |
