Frederick Gardner Cottrell
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Frederick Gardner Cottrell | |
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![]() Cottrell, c. 1910–1920 | |
3rd Director of the U.S. Bureau of Mines | |
In office 1920–1920 | |
Preceded by | Van H. Manning |
Succeeded by | H. Foster Bain |
Personal details | |
Born | Oakland, California, U.S. | January 10, 1877
Died | November 16, 1948 Berkeley, California, U.S. | (aged 71)
Spouse |
Jessie Mae Fulton (m. 1904) |
Children | 2 |
Alma mater |
|
Frederick Gardner Cottrell (January 10, 1877 – November 16, 1948) was an
Biography
He was born on January 10, 1877, in Oakland, California, to Cynthia (née Durfee) and Henry Cottrell, both prominent families going back to the settlement of America.[1]
Cottrell's immense curiosity gained him notice early in life. One acquaintance said, “He read textbooks like novels.” He finished high school at age 16, entered the University of California, Berkeley, and graduated in 3 years.[2] After graduation, he taught chemistry at Oakland High School, saving money (his annual salary was $1,200) until he could afford to continue his formal education. A notation in his diary, dated January 15, 1900, reads: “Week for lunch and yard duty at school.”
At the time, it was common for American scientists to conduct their graduate studies abroad. To that end, Cottrell left for
Then he went to Paris where he visited the Exposition Universelle, the 1900 world's fair designed to celebrate the achievements of the past century and to accelerate development into the next. There, Cottrell saw the new Eiffel Tower (“[went] to summit”), and visited “Old Paris.” His diary entry on August 11 notes: “got up at 5 a.m. on account of bed bugs. Shook out and packed up things and made arrangements… to change room.”
From Paris, Cottrell traveled to Berlin where he began his studies at
Cottrell then moved to Leipzig University[3] where he studied with Wilhelm Ostwald, undertaking a theoretical study of the effect of the counterflow of an electrolyte on the migration of ions through a diaphragm in an electrolytic cell. A month after his arrival in Leipzig, Cottrell wrote to his future wife, Jessie Fulton, “My old-time enthusiasm, which during my Berlin stay may sometimes have waned a little, is coming back in full force and I find I have about twice to four times as many schemes to try as there is possibly time for. The change is mainly due, I think, to my being turned loose once more on my own work and being thrown in contact with a large number of men with diverse ideas.” For his work with Ostwald, Cottrell earned a Ph.D. in 1902. Ostwald received the Nobel Prize in Chemistry in 1909.
Cottrell struggled with learning new languages. In France, his efforts to speak French were often met with blank stares. Although his German became good enough to study with German scientists, and to write his dissertation, he was far from fluent. Inspired no doubt by Ostwald (who studied
Degrees in hand, Cottrell returned to California and began teaching at University of California, Berkeley. On New Year's Day 1904, he married Jessie Mae Fulton, a former high-school classmate he had met in botany class. Jessie was shy and frail, a sharp contrast to Cottrell's bounding enthusiasm and unending energy. When he proposed, Cottrell declared his love, with the proviso, “but my work comes first.” After two difficult pregnancies and the loss of two children, they settled into a quiet, solitary life. They enjoyed reading aloud to one another, travel, and attending lectures and theatre performances.
In 1917 Cottrell was initiated into the Sigma chapter of Alpha Chi Sigma at the University of California at Berkeley.[4]
Career
Shortly after returning to Berkeley, Cottrell began consulting for the
Cottrell was not a businessman, but he recognized the business potential of his invention and decided to use it to fund scientific research through the creation of Research Corporation. In the time before science was routinely funded by government and private sources, Cottrell, at the age of 34, resolved that science would be the principal beneficiary of his invention. Those associated with him in developing electrostatic precipitation agreed with this highly unusual suggestion, and Cottrell made several attempts to donate the patent to organizations that might market the precipitator, using the proceeds to finance scientific research. After the University of California and the Smithsonian Institution declined his offer, Cottrell worked with then-Secretary of the Smithsonian Charles Doolittle Walcott, to form Research Corporation, a foundation devoted to philanthropy in science. The original board of directors—academics, scientists, lawyers and bankers—invested a total of $10,100 to fund the fledgling organization, and served without compensation. The board of directors shared Cottrell's goal of acquiring inventions and patents, developing them, making them available to industry under licensing, and applying all profits to support investigations in fundamental scientific research. Within a year, all of the board's investments had been repaid and the precipitator business was under way. Cottrell is perhaps best known for this act of philanthropy.
Cottrell's belief in public service and his love of the environment prompted him to join the
In 1921, Cottrell left the Bureau of Mines to chair the Chemistry and Chemical Technology Division of the
As a science consultant, Cottrell was highly regarded in national and international circles, in industry and the academic community. He traveled widely, was acquainted with scientists in the U.S. and abroad, and was especially well known for his ability to identify and contribute to new ideas. Cottrell declined any role at Research Corporation as an officer or director, but remained active as an adviser for the rest of his life. Many of Research Corporation's early grants were made to scientists who Cottrell had identified as “movers and shakers” in their fields, among them
Another Cottrell “brainchild” was Research Associates Inc. which was organized January 1, 1935, with 10 employees and offices on the campus of American University in Washington D.C. Funded by “grants” from Research Corporation, Research Associates represented an effort by Cottrell to create another Research Corporation which would, in time, become self-supporting through returns for its services and products. Among its projects were Brackett headlights, detergents, heat wave roasting of Fullers earth, the Greger fuel cell and Royster stoves and deodorizers.
In an obituary he wrote at the time of Cottrell's death in 1948, Vannevar Bush recalled: “The purpose of [Research Associates] was to conduct scientific and social research and to eliminate as far as possible the time lag between the perfection of scientific ideas and their introduction into the national life. The period of Research Associates’ activity, from 1935 through 1938, was a most stimulating one.”
For many reasons, the organization eventually floundered. In a letter dated September 18, 1951, J.W. Barker, then-president of Research Corporation, discussed:
“...the main problem at Research Associates, Inc.–the complete inability of this brilliant heterogeneous group of prima donnas to stick sufficiently long on any line of investigation to determine either that it would or would not work. It seemed as if the moment any particular experiment was started everyone, including Cottrell particularly, lost all interest in that experiment. Sparks began flying about some other experiment and dropping the older one without any specific determinations, off they would go after the new spark.”
Throughout his life, Cottrell had suffered periods of depression. The failure of Research Associates resulted in a long, difficult depression and marked a decline in Cottrell’s previously unbounded fervor and enthusiasm.
Cottrell’s longtime interest in nitrogen fixation prompted a collaboration with
By the time the United States entered World War II, Cottrell was 64 years old. His health was declining and his mind was weary. In 1944, he and Jess bought a house in Palo Alto, California and retired. Jessie Cottrell died in February 1948.
On November 16, 1948, Research Corporation’s founder, Frederick Gardner Cottrell, died while attending a meeting of the National Academy of Sciences held at his alma mater, the University of California at Berkeley.
The following obituary subsequently ran in the “Milestones” section of the November 29, 1948, issue of Time magazine:
Died. Dr. Frederick Gardner Cottrell, 71, California-born chemist and inventor (Cottrell Electrical Precipitator); of a heart ailment; in Berkeley, Calif. Dr. Cottrell founded the famed Research Corporation in 1912 as a nonprofit organization for the advancement of science, authorized it to spend the entire $3,500,000 grossed by his invention.
Although Cottrell was gone, the Foundation carried on his inspiration. In 2012, Research Corporation for Science Advancement celebrated 100 years of funding early-career teacher-scholars at America's leading colleges and universities. Shortly before his death, Cottrell said, “Bet on the youngsters. They are long shots, but some of them pay off.” His investment has financed thousands of scientific research projects, many of which have changed our world.
Honors and awards
- 1919 Perkin Medal of the Society of Chemical Industry
- 1920 Willard Gibbs Medal
- 1924 Gold Medal of the American Institute of Mining, Metallurgical, and Petroleum Engineers
- 1937 Holley Medal of the American Society of Mechanical Engineers
- 1938 American Institute of Chemists Gold Medal
- 1939 National Academy of Sciences
- 1982 Alpha Chi Sigma Hall of Fame[4]
- 1992 National Inventors Hall of Fame
Patents
- U.S. patent 866,843 – Manufacture of sulfuric acid, 1907
- U.S. patent 895,729 – Art of separating suspended particles from gaseous bodies [electrostatic precipitator], 1908
- U.S. patent 945,917 – Effecting interchange of electric charges between solid conductors and gases, 1910
- U.S. patent 1,016,476 – Purification of gases, 1912
- U.S. patent 1,035,422 – Apparatus for separating suspended particles from gaseous bodies, 1912
- U.S. patent 1,067,974 – Method of discharge of electricity into gases, 1913
See also
- Cottrell equation
- Electrostatic precipitator
- Research Corporation for Science Advancement
- 2026 Cottrell
References
- ^ Advancement, Research Corporation for Science. "About Frederick Cottrell". Research Corporation for Science Advancement. Retrieved 2024-01-12.
- ^ Advancement, Research Corporation for Science. "About Frederick Cottrell". Research Corporation for Science Advancement. Retrieved 2024-01-12.
- ^ Advancement, Research Corporation for Science. "About Frederick Cottrell". Research Corporation for Science Advancement. Retrieved 2024-01-12.
- ^ a b "Alpha Chi Sigma Hall of Fame". Alpha Chi Sigma Educational Foundation. Alpha Chi Sigma Fraternity, Inc. Retrieved January 21, 2018.
- Report of the National Academy of Sciences, Washington, D.C.: National Academy of Sciences, 1949
- Cameron, Frank (1993) [1952], Cottrell: Samaritan of Science: The Biography of Scientist and Inventor F. G. Cottrell, Tucson, Arizona: Research Corporation, OCLC 849847487
- Cornell, Thomas (2004), Establishing Research Corporation: A Case Study of Patents, Philanthropy and Organized Research in Early Twentieth-Century America, Tucson, Arizona: Research Corporation, OCLC 56988198
- "About Frederick Cottrell". Research Corporation for Scientific Advancement. 2017.
- "Frederick Gardner Cottrell". Chemical Heritage Foundation. Archived from the original on July 12, 2016.
- Bush, Vannevar (1952), Frederick Gardner Cottrell, 1877—1948: A Biographical Memoir by Vannevar Bush (PDF), Washington, D.C.: National Academy of Sciences, OCLC 1026640536
External links
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