John Read FRS

FRSE Fellowship of the Royal Society of Edinburgh (FRSE) is an award granted to individuals that the Royal Society of Edinburgh, Scotland's national academy of science and letters, judged to be "eminently distinguished in their subject". This so ...

FCS FIC (1884–1963) was a British chemist and scientific author.

Life

He was born on 17 February 1884 at

Maiden Newton Maiden Newton is a village and civil parish in the county of Dorset in south-west England. It lies within the Dorset Council administrative area, about north-west of the county town, Dorchester. Geography The village is sited on Upper Greens ...

Dorset Dorset ( ; archaically: Dorsetshire , ) is a county in South West England on the English Channel coast. The ceremonial county comprises the unitary authority areas of Bournemouth, Christchurch and Poole and Dorset. Covering an area of ...

the son of John Read (1814-1889) a farmer, and his wife, Bessie Gatcombe (1854-1904). His father was 70 years old when he was born but his mother was only 30. His father died when John was five years old. He was educated at

Sparkford Sparkford is a village and civil parish in the South Somerset district of Somerset, England. The parish includes the village of Weston Bampfylde. It is situated near the junction of the A303 from London to Exeter and the A359 from Frome to Yeo ...

village school then Sexey's School in

Bruton, Somerset Bruton ( ) is a market town, electoral ward, and civil parish in Somerset, England, on the River Brue and the A359 between Frome and Yeovil. It is 7 miles (11 km) south-east of Shepton Mallet, just south of Snakelake Hill and Coombe Hill, 10 ...

. Around 1900 he obtained a Diploma in Science from Finsbury Technical College and won a place at the

University of London The University of London (UoL; abbreviated as Lond or more rarely Londin in post-nominals) is a federal public research university located in London, England, United Kingdom. The university was established by royal charter in 1836 as a degre ...

studying Chemistry, graduating in 1907. He then went to

Zurich Zurich (; ) is the largest city in Switzerland and the capital of the canton of Zurich. It is located in north-central Switzerland, at the northwestern tip of Lake Zurich. , the municipality had 443,037 inhabitants, the urban area 1.315 mill ...

as a postgraduate gaining his first doctorate (PhD). In 1908 he began as an assistant in the Chemistry Department at

Cambridge University , mottoeng = Literal: From here, light and sacred draughts. Non literal: From this place, we gain enlightenment and precious knowledge. , established = , other_name = The Chancellor, Masters and Schola ...

. The university gave him a further MA in 1912. In 1916 the

University of Sydney The University of Sydney (USYD), also known as Sydney University, or informally Sydney Uni, is a public university, public research university located in Sydney, Australia. Founded in 1850, it is the oldest university in Australia and is one o ...

offered him the post of Professor of Organic Australia and so he emigrated to Australia. However he returned to Britain in 1923 as Professor of Chemistry at

St Andrews University (Aien aristeuein) , motto_lang = grc , mottoeng = Ever to ExcelorEver to be the Best , established = , type = Public research university Ancient university , endowment ...

. In April 1923 he visited the author

Thomas Hardy Thomas Hardy (2 June 1840 – 11 January 1928) was an English novelist and poet. A Victorian realist in the tradition of George Eliot, he was influenced both in his novels and in his poetry by Romanticism, including the poetry of William Wo ...

. In 1924 he was elected a Fellow of the

Royal Society of Edinburgh The Royal Society of Edinburgh is Scotland's national academy of science and letters. It is a registered charity that operates on a wholly independent and non-partisan basis and provides public benefit throughout Scotland. It was established i ...

. His proposers were Sir

James Colquhoun Irvine Sir James Colquhoun Irvine KBE JP PhD (Leipzig) DL DSc BSc FRS FRSE FEIS (9 May 1877 – 12 June 1952) was a British organic chemist and Principal and Vice-Chancellor of the University of St Andrews from 1921 until his death. As a research che ...

, Sir

D'Arcy Wentworth Thompson Sir D'Arcy Wentworth Thompson Order of the Bath, CB Fellow of the Royal Society, FRS FRSE (2 May 1860 – 21 June 1948) was a Scottish biologist, mathematician and classics, classics scholar. He was a pioneer of mathematical and theoretical bi ...

Herbert Stanley Allen Herbert Stanley Allen FRSE FRS (29 December 1873 – 27 April 1954) was an English physicist noted as a pioneer in early X-ray research, working under J. J. Thomson at the University of London and alongside Nobel laureate Charles Glover Barkla a ...

and

Herbert Turnbull Prof Herbert Westren Turnbull FRS FRSE LLD (31 August 1885 – 4 May 1961) was an English mathematician. From 1921 to 1950 he was Regius Professor of Mathematics at the University of St Andrews. Life He was born in the Tettenhall district, o ...

. He resigned in 1928. In 1935 he was elected a Fellow of the

Royal Society of London The Royal Society, formally The Royal Society of London for Improving Natural Knowledge, is a learned society and the United Kingdom's national academy of sciences. The society fulfils a number of roles: promoting science and its benefits, re ...

. According to his application citation his work covered: "'' wide and important fields, including (a) Optical activity; (b) Formation of halogenohydrins from unsaturated compounds; (c) Investigation of Australian products, including eucalyptus oils, marine fibre, Papuan petroleum; (d) Terpene chemistry''". He was also credited with building and developing the Sydney organic chemistry school. He received the

Dexter Award for Outstanding Achievement in the History of Chemistry The HIST Award for Outstanding Achievement in the History of Chemistry (2013-present) is given by the Division of the History of Chemistry of the American Chemical Society (ACS). The award was originally known as the Dexter Award (1956-2001) and th ...

from the

American Chemical Society The American Chemical Society (ACS) is a scientific society based in the United States that supports scientific inquiry in the field of chemistry. Founded in 1876 at New York University, the ACS currently has more than 155,000 members at all ...

in 1959. He died in

St Andrews St Andrews ( la, S. Andrea(s); sco, Saunt Aundraes; gd, Cill Rìmhinn) is a town on the east coast of Fife in Scotland, southeast of Dundee and northeast of Edinburgh. St Andrews had a recorded population of 16,800 , making it Fife's four ...

on 21 January 1963

Family

In 1916 he married Ida Suddards. The ship that she rode to join him inn Australia evaded pursuit by a German submarine. They had two sons, Arthur, a mathematician and mountaineer, and Jan, a movie writer, author and photographer. A grandson,

Richard Read Richard Read (born 1957) is a freelance reporter based in Seattle, where he was a national reporter and bureau chief for the Los Angeles Times from 2019 to 2021. A two-time Pulitzer Prize winner, he was a senior writer and foreign correspondent fo ...

, went on to become an American journalist.

Publications

*''A Textbook of Organic Chemistry'' (1926) *''Alchemy and Alchemists'' (1933) *''Prelude to Chemistry'' (1936) *''Explosives'' (1942) *''A Direct Entry to Organic Chemistry'' (1948) *''From Alchemy to Chemistry'' (1957)

References

External links

John Read (1884–1963)
1884 births 1963 deaths People from Dorset Academics of the University of St Andrews Alumni of the University of London British chemists Fellows of the Royal Society of Edinburgh Fellows of the Royal Society Fellows of the Chemical Society {{UK-chemist-stub