Robert Howson Pickard

Last updated

Sir Robert Howson Pickard FRS (27 September 1874 – 18 October 1949) was a chemist who did pioneering work in stereochemistry and also for the cotton industry in Lancashire. He was also involved in educational administration and was Vice Chancellor of the University of London from 1937-1939. [1] He was Principal of Battersea Polytechnic (which later became the University of Surrey) from 1920 to 1927. [2]

Fellow of the Royal Society Elected Fellow of the Royal Society, including Honorary, Foreign and Royal Fellows

Fellowship of the Royal Society is an award granted to individuals that the Royal Society of London judges to have made a 'substantial contribution to the improvement of natural knowledge, including mathematics, engineering science and medical science'.

Stereochemistry subdiscipline of chemistry

Stereochemistry, a subdiscipline of chemistry, involves the study of the relative spatial arrangement of atoms that form the structure of molecules and their manipulation. The study of stereochemistry focuses on stereoisomers, which by definition have the same molecular formula and sequence of bonded atoms (constitution), but differ in the three-dimensional orientations of their atoms in space. For this reason, it is also known as 3D chemistry—the prefix "stereo-" means "three-dimensionality".

Lancashire County of England

Lancashire is a ceremonial county in North West England. The administrative centre is Preston. The county has a population of 1,449,300 and an area of 1,189 square miles (3,080 km2). People from Lancashire are known as Lancastrians.

Contents

Early life

Mason Science College, now the University of Birmingham Mason Science College.png
Mason Science College, now the University of Birmingham

He was born in Balsall Heath, Birmingham, Warwickshire, (now the West Midlands), England, [1] the son of Joseph Henry Pickard, a tool maker, and Alice his wife, the daughter of Robert Howson of Birmingham. [3] From 1883-1891 [3] he attended King Edward VI's Grammar School. In 1891 he studied chemistry at Mason Science College (which later became the University of Birmingham), under Percy F. Frankland and obtained a first class BSc, then awarded by the University of London. In 1896 he attended the University of Munich as an 1851 Exhibitioner [3] being awarded a PhD summa cum laude in 1898. [1]

Balsall Heath is a working class, inner-city area of Birmingham, West Midlands, England. It has a diverse cultural mix of people and is the location of the Balti Triangle.

Birmingham City in the English Midlands, 2nd highest population of UK cities

Birmingham is the second-most populous city in the United Kingdom, after London, and the most populous city in the English Midlands. With an estimated population of 1,137,100 as of 2017, Birmingham is the cultural, social, financial and commercial centre of the Midlands. It is the main centre of the West Midlands conurbation, which is the third most populated urban area in the United Kingdom, with a population in 2011 of 2,440,986. The wider Birmingham metropolitan area is the second largest in the United Kingdom with a population of over 3.7 million. Birmingham is frequently referred to as the United Kingdom's "second city".

Warwickshire County of England

Warwickshire is a landlocked county in the West Midlands region of England. The county town is Warwick, although the largest town is Nuneaton. The county is famous for being the birthplace of William Shakespeare.

Career

After a year in Birmingham doing chemical research, he was appointed head of the chemistry at Blackburn Technical School in Blackburn, Lancashire and was principal from 1908-1920. Whilst at Blackburn was involved in publication of 35 papers in the Journal of the Chemical Society. He did original work on chemical structure and optical isomerism and as a result became a Fellow of the Royal Society (FRS) in 1917. Pickard was Principal of Battersea Polytechnic (which later became the University of Surrey) from 1920 to 1927. [2] He was also consulted by the cotton industry and later became director of the British Cotton Industry Research Association (then the Shirley Institute) in Manchester from 1927-1943 and expanded the technical facilities extensively in 1936. [1]

Blackburn College is a further and higher education college in Blackburn, North West England.

The Journal of the Chemical Society was a scientific journal established by the Chemical Society in 1849 as the Quarterly Journal of the Chemical Society. The journal underwent several renamings, splits, and mergers throughout its history. In 1980, the Chemical Society merged with several other organizations into the Royal Society of Chemistry. The journal's continuity is found in Chemical Communications, Dalton Transactions, Faraday Transactions, and Perkin Transactions, all of which are published by the Royal Society of Chemistry.

University of Surrey public research university located within the county town of Guildford, Surrey

The University of Surrey is a public research university in Guildford, Surrey, United Kingdom. The university specialises in science, engineering, medicine and business. It received its charter on 9 September 1966, and was for more than 60 year prior near Battersea Park in south-west London. The institution was known as Battersea College of Technology before gaining university status. Its roots, however, go back to the Battersea Polytechnic Institute, founded in 1891 to provide further and higher education for London's poorer inhabitants. More recently, the university launched the Surrey International Institute with Dongbei University of Finance and Economics.

He had considerable organisational skills and was active in several scientific organisations including the Royal Society (council); Society of Chemical Industry (president 1932-33); the Royal Institute of Chemistry [4] (now the Royal Society of Chemistry) (president 1936-1939); the Chemical Society (vice-president); the now defunct Chemical Council (chairman) and various positions over a long period with the University of London including Vice-Chancellor 1937-1939. [1]

The Society of Chemical Industry (SCI) is a learned society set up in 1881 "to further the application of chemistry and related sciences for the public benefit". Its purpose is "Promoting the commercial application of science for the benefit of society" and provides an international forum where science meets business on independent, impartial ground. Since being founded in 1881, the society has expanded and diversified to cover a range of interest areas, such as food and agriculture, pharmaceuticals, biotechnology, environmental science and safety.

Royal Institute of Chemistry learned society

The Royal Institute of Chemistry was a British scientific organisation.

Royal Society of Chemistry UK learned society

The Royal Society of Chemistry (RSC) is a learned society in the United Kingdom with the goal of "advancing the chemical sciences". It was formed in 1980 from the amalgamation of the Chemical Society, the Royal Institute of Chemistry, the Faraday Society, and the Society for Analytical Chemistry with a new Royal Charter and the dual role of learned society and professional body. At its inception, the Society had a combined membership of 34,000 in the UK and a further 8,000 abroad. The headquarters of the Society are at Burlington House, Piccadilly, London. It also has offices in Thomas Graham House in Cambridge where RSC Publishing is based. The Society has offices in the United States at the University City Science Center, Philadelphia, in both Beijing and Shanghai, China and Bangalore, India. The organisation carries out research, publishes journals, books and databases, as well as hosting conferences, seminars and workshops. It is the professional body for chemistry in the UK, with the ability to award the status of Chartered Chemist (CChem) and, through the Science Council the awards of Chartered Scientist (CSci), Registered Scientist (RSci) and Registered Science Technician (RScTech) to suitably qualified candidates. The designation FRSC is given to a group of elected Fellows of the society who have made major contributions to chemistry and other interface disciplines such as biological chemistry. The names of Fellows are published each year in The Times (London). Honorary Fellowship of the Society ("HonFRSC") is awarded for distinguished service in the field of chemistry.

Personal life

He married Ethel Marian Wood in 1901 (d.1944). They had a daughter, who predeceased him, and a son. He died at his son's home in Headley, Surrey. [1]

Headley, Surrey village in the United Kingdom

Headley is a village and civil parish in the North Downs in Surrey, England. The nearest settlements are, to the west, Mickleham and Leatherhead; to the north, Ashtead and Langley Vale; to the east, Walton-on-the-Hill; and to the south, Box Hill. It is just outside the M25 motorway encircling London.

Surrey County of England

Surrey is a subdivision of the English region of South East England in the United Kingdom. A historic and ceremonial county, Surrey is also one of the home counties. The county borders Kent to the east, East and West Sussex to the south, Hampshire to the west, Berkshire to the northwest, and Greater London to the northeast.

See also

Related Research Articles

Mason Science College

Mason Science College was a university college in Birmingham, England, and a predecessor college of Birmingham University. Founded in 1875 by industrialist and philanthropist Sir Josiah Mason, the college was incorporated into the University of Birmingham in 1900. Two students of the college, Neville Chamberlain and Stanley Baldwin, later went on to become Prime Ministers of the UK.

Harry Thode Canadian geochemist and university President

Henry George "Harry" Thode was a Canadian geochemist, nuclear chemist, and academic administrator. He was president and vice-chancellor of McMaster University from 1961 to 1972. Thode built a cyclotron capable of making radioactive isotopes and along with Dr. C.H. Jaimet, investigated the use of radioactive iodine in the diagnosis and treatment of thyroid disease in humans, the first medical application of radioactive iodine in Canada.

David Orme Masson Chemist known for Nitroglycerine work

Sir David Orme Masson KBE FRS FRSE LLD was a scientist born in England who emigrated to Australia to become Professor of Chemistry at the University of Melbourne. He is known for his work on the explosive compound Nitroglycerine.

Sir Geoffrey Allen is a British chemist who has also served as a Vice-President of the Royal Society. He is primarily known for his work on the physics and chemistry of polymers. He is especially well known for his work on the thermodynamics of rubber elasticity. He inspired a generation of physical chemists as a result of his research interests, and he displayed a passion for fostering links between academia and industry.

Sir Rex Edward Richards FRS, FRSC, FBA is a British scientist and academic. He has been Vice-Chancellor of the University of Oxford and a director of the Leverhulme Trust.

William A. Tilden British chemist

Sir William Augustus Tilden was a British chemist. He discovered that isoprene could be made from turpentine. He was unable to turn this discovery into a way to make commercially viable synthetic rubber.

Dorothy Jordan Lloyd British biochemist

Dorothy Jordan Lloyd was an early protein scientist who studied the interactions of water with proteins, particularly gelatin. This is because her father was a distinguished professor of Surgery and worked at the University of Birmingham. She was also Director of the British Leather Manufacturers' Research Association. She was the first to propose that the structure of globular proteins was maintained by hydrogen bonds, an idea championed later by Linus Pauling and others.

Archibald Liversidge British scientist

Archibald Liversidge FRS FRSE FRSNSW LLD was an English-born chemist and founder of the Australasian Association for the Advancement of Science.

John Stopford, Baron Stopford of Fallowfield British anatomist

John Sebastian Bach Stopford, Baron Stopford of Fallowfield KBE FRCS FRCP FRS was a British peer, a physician and anatomist, and a Vice-Chancellor of the University of Manchester. Lord Stopford was described as "one of the greatest anatomists of this century".

James Pickering Kendall FRS FRSE was a British chemist.

Graham John Hutchings FRS FIChemE FRSC FLSW is a British chemist, professor and Pro Vice-Chancellor for Research at Cardiff University.

Professor Frank Horton FRS was professor of physics at Royal Holloway College, London University from 1914 to 1946 and later Vice-Chancellor of London University during the years of World War II from 1939 to 1945.

Hugh Hale Leigh Bellot FRHS was an English historian; he was Professor of American History and Vice-Chancellor of the University of London from 1951 to 1953. His writings were published under the name "H. Hale Bellot".

Maurice Stacey CBE FRS FRIC was a British chemist who worked alongside Sir Norman Haworth to artificially synthesize Vitamin C.

Raymond Edward Smallman was a British metallurgist and academic known for his research into alloys and the causes of metal fatigue. Smallman was also a significant figure at the University of Birmingham, serving as its vice-principal between 1987 and 1992 and helping to establish its reputation as a leading modern research university.

Arthur Smithells British chemist

Arthur Smithells, CMG FRS was a British chemist. Born in Bury, Lancashire, on 24 May 1860. His father James Smithells, was a railway manager. He was educated at University of Glasgow, then spent time under Roscoe and Schorlemmer at Owens College, Manchester. He gained his B.Sc. from the University of London, then took supplemental courses at Munich and, with Robert Bunsen, at Heidelberg University. In 1883 he was appointed assistant lecturer at Owens College, and two years later succeeded Professor Sir Edward Thorpe as Professor of Chemistry in Yorkshire College, Leeds, which was subsequently incorporated as the University of Leeds. Smithells went on to hold the position of Pro-Vice-Chancellor at Leeds, which he held until he retired from the Chair then becoming Emeritus Professor in 1923. During his career he was Honorary Educational Adviser on Home Science and Household Economics to King's College London, President of the Society of British Gas Industries (1911).

Sir James Wilfred Cook FRS FRSE DSc LLD (1900–1975) was an English chemist, best known for his research of organic chemistry of carcinogenic compounds. Friends knew him simply as Jim Cook.

Patrick Joseph A. Dowling, CBE FRS is an Irish engineer and educationalist.

Mary Corner, was a pharmacist, a worker in the British Cotton Industry and British Leather Manufacturers, Head of the Micro-analytical Section of the Chemical Research Laboratory, Vice-Chairman of the Microchemistry group and a founding member of the Microchemical Club.

References

Academic offices
Preceded by
Sir Herbert Lightfoot Eason CMG CB
Vice-Chancellor of the
University of London

1937-1939
Succeeded by
Professor Frank Horton FRS