Compare Constellations

Bartlett, Paul D. Oral history interview with Paul Doughty Bartlett, 1978 July 18.

Title: Oral history interview with Paul Doughty Bartlett, 1978 July 18.

Family background; father's education; early education and musical interest; Amherst College with graduate fellowship; graduate school at Harvard University; influence of Elmer Kohler's course on early research problems, bromination of ketones. Comments on staff, fellow students and influential faculty at Harvard (James B. Conant); teaching policies at Harvard. Postdoctoral work at Rockefeller Institute and Columbia University; wife's contribution to career; University of Minnesota position, comments on Charles Frederick Koelsch's work and on the facilities at Minnesota. Discussions of own work and works of Richard S. Berry, Robert Henry Rosenwald, Irving Pökel. Research funds at University of Minnesota, the importance of National Science Foundation (NSF) and National Institutes of Health (NIH); move to Harvard, lengthy comments on teaching, graduate students and faculty, as well as on other organic chemists (Christopher Ingolf, William Gould Young, Howard Lucas); status of physical organic chemistry and the future of chemistry.

ArchivalResource: Sound recordings: 3 sound cassettes (ca. 3.0 hrs.), 1 session.Transcript: 59 p.

http://www.worldcat.org/oclc/80490093 View

Price, Charles C. (Charles Coale), 1913-2001,. Oral history interview with Charles C. Price, 1979 April 26.

Title: Oral history interview with Charles C. Price, 1979 April 26.

During the course of this interview, Charles Price discusses his life and career as a chemist. Initially, he recalls his childhood, early education, and undergraduate life at Swarthmore College. Price then speaks about his teachers and colleagues at Harvard University, where he did graduate work. Considerations about his work at the University of Illinois, his first faculty appointment, and research for the National Defense Research Committee during the war follow. Price explains why he assumed the chairmanship of the department of chemistry at the University of Notre Dame and why he convened the first Conference on Organic Reaction Mechanisms, a landmark in the development of physical organic chemistry. Price elucidates his research at Notre Dame and then at the University of Pennsylvania, where, as chairman, he helped to rebuild the department of chemistry. The interview concludes with Price discussing his more recent chemical research, the current state of physical organic chemistry, his family, and his political and sporting activities.

ArchivalResource: Sound files ; digital, mp3 fileTranscript : (66 leaves) ; 29 cm.

http://www.worldcat.org/oclc/710365667 View

Streitwieser, Andrew, 1927-. Oral history interview with Andrew Streitwieser, 1981 January 22.

Title: Oral history interview with Andrew Streitwieser, 1981 January 22.

Andrew Streitwieser begins this interview by describing his family, early education, and undergraduate days at Columbia University. He then discusses his graduate education at Columbia, stressing the influence of William Doering upon his work, and his research on molecular orbital theory as a fellow at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Finally, Streitwieser describes the emergence of organic chemistry at the University of California, Berkeley, and his own ambitious and productive research program there.

ArchivalResource: Sound files ; digital, mp3 fileTranscript : (138 leaves) ; 29 cm.

http://www.worldcat.org/oclc/715390933 View

Mayo, Frank R. (Rea), 1908-1987. Oral history interview with Frank R. Mayo, 1981 January 21.

Title: Oral history interview with Frank R. Mayo, 1981 January 21.

In this interview Dr. Frank Mayo first discusses his educational career as an undergraduate and graduate student at the University of Chicago. He then traces his professional career as a research chemist with Du Pont, an instructor at the University of Chicago where his primary role was the supervision of Morris Kharasch's research group, a group leader at U.S. Rubber during and after World War II, a research associate at General Electric, and finally, a fellow at SRI International. He discusses his closest associates, explains his scientific work, and comments on the rise of free radical chemistry and the value of applying basic research to practical problems.

ArchivalResource: Sound files ; digital, mp3 fileTranscript : (56 leaves) ; 29 cm.

http://www.worldcat.org/oclc/710365659 View

Marvel, Carl Shipp, 1894-1988,. Oral history interview with Carl S. Marvel, 1983 July 13.

Title: Oral history interview with Carl S. Marvel, 1983 July 13.

In this interview, Carl Marvel speaks about his life and career as a chemist. He begins by recalling his youth on a farm and his early education. Considerations of his undergraduate days at Illinois Wesleyan College and of his graduate studies at the University of Illinois follow. Marvel then describes his first teaching job at Illinois, his colleagues, and the operation of the chemistry department. In the central portion of the interview, Marvel provides extended discussion of his consulting work for Du Pont, his direction of the federal government's program on synthetic rubber during World War II, and his research on anti-malarial and chemical warfare agents. He then talks about his postwar research in polymer chemistry. Marvel concludes with an appraisal of his contributions to chemistry and remarks about his family, hobbies, and involvement with the American Chemical Society.

ArchivalResource: Sound files ; digital, mp3 fileTranscript : (56 leaves) ; 29 cm.

http://www.worldcat.org/oclc/709780199 View

Cohn, Mildred, 1913-2009,. Oral history interview with Mildred Cohn 1987 December 15.

Title: Oral history interview with Mildred Cohn 1987 December 15. 1987.

Mildred Cohn begins the interview by reflecting on her childhood, education, and family life, describing how she was prepared to enter college by age fourteen. She then discusses her undergraduate experience at Hunter College, recalling the difficulties she encountered as a woman in the sciences. She continues by recounting her graduate years at Columbia, where, after working for a short time at the National Advisory Committee for Aeronautics, she began her work with isotopes in Urey's lab. She tells of her experience working with du Vigneaud at George Washington and Cornell universities and contrasts that with the much more independent atmosphere of the Cori's lab at Washington University in St. Louis. Finally she describes her years at the University of Pennsylvania and highlights the most fulfilling aspects of her work. She concludes with her analysis of the future of biochemistry and advice for those, especially women, interested in pursuing a career in the natural sciences.

ArchivalResource: Sound recordings ; cassettes (210 min.)Transcript : (119 leaves) ; 29 cm.

http://www.worldcat.org/oclc/76937855 View

Walling, Cheves, 1916-. Oral history interview with Cheves Walling, 1979 September 12.

Title: Oral history interview with Cheves Walling, 1979 September 12.

Cheves Walling begins this interview by describing his family, early education, and undergraduate days at Harvard. He then discusses his graduate education at the University of Chicago, stressing the major review article on the peroxide effect that he and Frank Mayo wrote in 1940. Walling next examines the research that he undertook at Du Pont, U.S. Rubber, and Lever Brothers, emphasizing the work that he did before 1950 at U.S. Rubber. Finally, Walling examines his academic career at Columbia and the University of Utah. Throughout the interview he reflects upon the emergence and maturation of physical organic chemistry.

ArchivalResource: Sound files ; digital, mp3 fileTranscript : (38 leaves) ; 29 cm.

http://www.worldcat.org/oclc/715406929 View

Tishler, Max,. Oral history interview with Max Tishler, 1983 November 14.

Title: Oral history interview with Max Tishler, 1983 November 14.

This interview discusses Max Tishler's life and career. Tishler reminisces about his family, early schooling, undergraduate education at Tufts, and graduate and postgraduate work at Harvard. He then talks about his colleagues at Harvard and the state of chemistry in the 1930s. The major portion of the interview contains Tishler's impressions of the research and development undertaken by Merck & Co. in the 1940s, 1950s, and 1960s, and of his role in that activity. He also describes individuals involved in that work and the major contributions that Merck & Co. made to combat disease. Tishler ends the interview by discussing his current activities at Wesleyan and presenting his views about the future direction of chemistry.

ArchivalResource: Sound files ; digital, mp3 fileTranscript : (79 leaves) ; 29 cm.

http://www.worldcat.org/oclc/715390935 View

Breslow, Ronald,. Oral history interview with Ronald C. Breslow 1999 March 19 and April 9.

Title: Oral history interview with Ronald C. Breslow 1999 March 19 and April 9.

ArchivalResource: Sound recordings ; cassettes.Transcript : (90 leaves) ; 29 cm.

http://www.worldcat.org/oclc/76937834 View

Noyce, Donald S. (Donald Sterling), 1923-2004. Oral history interview with Donald S. Noyce 1981 January 22

Title: Oral history interview with Donald S. Noyce 1981 January 22

Donald Noyces comments on his childhood in Iowa, his years at Grinnell College, his experience at Columbia University as a graduate student, and his position at the University of California at Berkeley. Noyce also discusses the faculty, the chemistry administration, the changing atmosphere with respect to organic chemistry, his research, and his graduate students. Finally, he discusses the development of physical organic chemistry from the turn of the century to 1980.

ArchivalResource: Sound recordings ; digital, mp3 fileTranscript : (35 leaves) ; 29 cm.

http://www.worldcat.org/oclc/743095509 View

Cram, Donald J. Oral history interview with Donald J. Cram 1981 January 14

Title: Oral history interview with Donald J. Cram 1981 January 14

In this interview Donald Cram talks briefly about his family and growing up in Vermont, Florida and New York, and this is followed by a description of his experiences at Rollins College and his start in the world of chemistry. Next he talks about his graduate work at the University of Nebraska with Norman Cromwell, the circumstances which led him to work at Merck during World War II, and his work at Merck and the chemists with whom he collaborated. He then talks at length about his doctoral work at Harvard, his research, his coursework, cumulative and foreign language exams, and his interaction with various members of the faculty. In 1947 he took a position at UCLA, and he describes much of his research through the early 1960s, Saul Winstein and his interactions with Winstein, and the changes that took place over thirty years in the UCLA chemistry department. The last part of the interview includes comments on the changes that have taken place in organic chemistry as a result of various factors, the advantages to the academic community of interactions with industry, the state and future of organic chemistry, and a description of his major research effort in the late 1970s, guest-host chemistry. It was this research that led to his sharing the Nobel Prize in 1987. In the final pages of the interview he talks about the influence of theory and theoretical papers on the development of chemistry.

ArchivalResource: Sound recordings ; cassettesTranscript : (53 leaves) ; 29 cm.

http://www.worldcat.org/oclc/76937857 View

Berson, Jerome A. Oral history interview with Jerome A. Berson, 2001 March 21

Title: Oral history interview with Jerome A. Berson, 2001 March 21

Jerome Berson begins this interview with a discussion about his family, his early interest in chemistry, and his childhood in Florida. After high school, Berson attended college at City College of New York. He then attended Columbia University, where he received both his A.M. and Ph.D. Berson went on to do postdoctoral work at Harvard University. Berson held various academic positions at the University of Southern California, Wisconsin, and Yale. Berson credits William von Eggers Doering, Robert Burns Woodward, Saul Winstein, and Herbert Brown as all having profound influence on his career. He talks about his transformation from a natural-products chemist to a physical-organic chemist and the influence of the work of Erich Huckel. He discusses in some detail several of his major research efforts, and comments extensively on the importance of M.O. theory, funding, and the role of government in the support of science. Berson concludes the interview with thoughts on the present and future of organic chemistry and physical organic chemistry.

ArchivalResource: Sound recordings ; cassettesTranscript : (102 leaves) ; 29 cm.

http://www.worldcat.org/oclc/70189212 View

Westheimer, F. H., (Frank Henry) 1912-. Oral history interview with Frank H. Westheimer, 1979 January 4 & 5.

Title: Oral history interview with Frank H. Westheimer, 1979 January 4 & 5.

In this interview, Frank Westheimer begins with his family, his childhood and early education in Baltimore, his undergraduate days at Dartmouth, his decision to go into chemistry, and his choice of Harvard for graduate work. Next, he covers his years as a graduate student at Harvard and talks about his research with James Conant and Elmer Kohler, the faculty at Harvard and the courses they taught, and his summer work with Alsoph Corwin at Johns Hopkins. He also talks at length about his early interest in biochemistry, his view of theoretical organic chemistry in the mid-1930s and the opportunities for research open to him, the development of theoretical organic chemistry in the early part of the twentieth century, and the publications of some of the early scientists. This is followed by a description of his year as a National Research Fellow at Columbia, his research, his colleagues, and more on the development of his interest in biochemical problems. Westheimer continues with the offer of a position at the University of Chicago from Morris Kharasch, and includes an extensive discussion of the university, his research, and his collaboration with John Kirkwook, Joe Mayer and Birgit Vennesland. In the next part of the interview, he comments on his selection and training of students and discusses a number of former students who have been successful in research careers. The interview concludes with more discussion of physical organic chemistry, past, present and future; a review of his work on the hydrolysis of phosphate esters and pseudorotation; comments on the future of organic chemistry; and a review of the Westheimer Report, the analysis of American chemistry by the National Academy of Sciences.

ArchivalResource: Sound files ; digital, mp3 fileTranscript : (130 leaves) ; 29 cm.

http://www.worldcat.org/oclc/715391574 View