In 1856, eighteen-year-old chemist William Henry Perkin was working in his laboratory, trying to discover a way to synthesize quinine. After one of his experiments failed to produce anything but a useless reddish-brown sludge, he proceeded to clean his beaker with alcohol and when he did something amazing happened. When the alcohol combined with the sludge it turned into a vibrantly beautiful purple liquid. Perkin had accidently discovered the world’s first synthetic dye. He named it mauveine.
At that time most colorful dyes were very expensive to produce and only the wealthy could afford the benefit of them. Dark blue, for example, was made from indigo, a subtropical plant that was one of the leading cash crops in slave-based economy of the American deep South. At that time indigo was by weight more valuable than gold. Purple, so rare and valuable that it had always been considered the color of royalty, was laboriously produced from the excretions of certain kinds of mollusks. By comparison, the dye Perkin had discovered could be produced from coal tar, abundantly and cheaply available in industrial Britain. And whereas natural dyes tended to quickly fade, Perkin’s synthetic creations held their color.
After his serendipitous discovery, Perkin and two colleagues continued their dye research in secret, until Perkin was ready to register a patent and launch a dye-making business. Hoop skirts having come into style, more cloth than ever was required for women’s dresses, and fashionable colors were in great demand. Perkin’s discovery was well-timed. Within a few years Queen Victoria herself was wearing mauveine-dyed dresses, once outrageously expensive colors were now affordable by nearly all people, and Perkin was a wealthy man. He was only 18 years old when he registered his patent.
During his career Perkin invented synthetic dyes in numerous other colors. By the time of his death in 1907 at age 69, Perkin was an accomplished and highly esteemed scientist. The Perkin Medal, the highest honor in the U.S. chemical industry, is awarded each year to the chemist who has made the greatest contribution to the practical application of chemistry.
Sir William Henry Perkin was born in London on March 12, 1838, one hundred eighty-five years ago today.
The portrait is by Sir Arthur Stockdale Cope (1906) and hangs in the National Portrait Gallery in London. The other photo is of cloth dyed with Perkin’s original “mauveine.”
@SnoCapsPerhaps Politics is not allowed in the forums. Please make sure you follow the forum rules in the future. [netrunner]
The world is mad but there are also birds singing trees growing clouds parting seeds sprouting life beginning again and again and again and again and again
Madness and beauty
Both can exist and there is nothing wrong with feeling the bottomless abyss of them both
Connection and devastation make our knees tremble our minds empty our purpose clear just the same
Gloria Swanson, 1924, photo by Edward Steichen.
Steichen described the idea he had for this shoot: “I took a piece of black lace veil and hung it in front of her face, She recognized the idea at once. Her eyes dilated and her look was that of a leopardess lurking behind leafy shrubbery, watching her prey."
(I love these quotes and smile with each one I read)
“In March the Earth remembers its own name. Everywhere the plates of snow are cracking. The rivers begin to sing. In the sky the winter stars are sliding away; new stars appear as, later, small blades of grain will shine in the dark fields.
And the name of every place is joyful.
II. The season of curiosity is everlasting and the hour for adventure never ends, but tonight even the men who walked upon the moon are lying content by open windows where the winds are sweeping over the fields, over water, over the naked earth, into villages, and lonely country houses, and the vast cities
III. because it is spring; because once more the moon and the earth are eloping - a love match that will bring forth fantastic children who will learn to stand, walk, and finally run over the surface of earth; who will believe, for years, that everything is possible.
IV. Born of clay, how shall a man be holy; born of water, how shall a man visit the stars; born of the seasons, how shall a man live forever?
V. Soon the child of the red-spotted newt, the eft, will enter his life from the tiny egg. On his delicate legs he will run through the valleys of moss down to the leaf mold by the streams, where lately white snow lay upon the earth like a deep and lustrous blanket of moon-fire,
VI. and probably everything is possible.
~Mary Oliver, Worm Moon