Chandler, Charles Frederick, 1836-1925

Charles Frederick Chandler was an important American chemist and chemical educator. He was deeply involved in issues of chemistry, mining, and public health throughout the last third of the nineteenth and early decades of the twentieth centuries. As a professor at Columbia University, he revolutionized chemical education in the United States and was a major proponent of practical, scientific education. He was deeply involved in professional organizations and kept scrupulously abreast of scientific advancements, keeping detailed notes and files of clippings and articles about different chemical and scientific matters. He often acted as an expert witness in legal cases dealing with chemical matters and was well respected as an expert in his field.

Chandler was born in Lancaster, Massachusetts on December 6, 1936. His family moved shortly after his birth to New Bedford, Massachusetts, where he spent most of his formative years and engaged in his earliest formal education. As a child he devoted nearly all of his free time to scientific and geological explorations and attending public lectures on scientific subjects. These public lectures at the New Bedford Lyceum, in particular a series of lectures given by the geologist and naturalist Louis Agassiz, sparked his lifelong interest in science. He was particularly interested in mineralogy and collected rock and mineral samples that he found around his grandfather's Lancaster home.

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